Like certain luminaries before and doubtless more to come, designers Ana Mil and Emil Padrós of Barcelona’s emiliana design studio seem smitten with the potential of plywood. Like Alvar Aalto and the Eames duo before them, Mil and Padrós apparently love curves almost as much as they admire the blatant contradiction of the concept of bent wood. They respect it so much, in fact, that they designed an entire series of stools in different heights and finishes to showcase what ply can do for you: “The Naoshima Stool combines four identical pieces of plywood to construct the seat. The seat, together with four wooden legs, creates a solid and unique whole. The empty spaces generated in the corners of the plywood seat make Naoshima a light and visually vibrant piece of furniture.” (more…)
During the London Design Festival this coming month, a new Swedish brand is planning their attack. Based in Malmö, Sweden, founders Johannes Herbertsson and Jonas Nordgren of RVW have been working on their inaugural collection since last year in preparation for their huge Tramshed exhibition from the 22 to 26 September in east London. (more…)
In the past, I’ve referred to design pairs as dynamic duos, but now I have the good luck to introduce readers to “an inseparable duo”—which, I like to imagine, refers to a two-headed humanoid or a set of conjoined twins, but, alas, is a term not meant to be taken literally. The aforementioned inseparable duo is composed of François Dingjian and Eloi Chafaï, founders of Normal Studio, both of whom share “the same sensibility, and the same untraditional and out-of-the-mainstream approach to design.” The image of them sharing a sensibility also conjures up mad scientist laboratories where brains float in jars, but the designers don’t intend that either—so I will rein in my visions. Thankfully, they will not. (more…)
We’re about mid-way through the National Design Triennial exhibition at NY’s Cooper-Hewitt, and we had to do a bit of coverage owing to the intractable pull of Beijing. If that last tidbit seems like a non sequitur, I’ll point you to an article from two year’s back about the Olympic city’s infamous Aquatics Center. Turns out the distinctive cube wasn’t the only innovative construction occurring at the time, as a creation of N.Y. architect Simone Giostra graces the expansive facade of a building in proximity to The Cube. Giostra’s Sol Pix/Green Pix Zero-Energy Media Wall arose as a collaboration between Simone Giostra & Partners Architects, Permasteelisa North America, Zahner Metal Fabrication, Scheuten Solar USA, and Arup. Why so many players for one Beijing building facade? Because the thing does so darn much. Sol Pix is an energy-efficient curtain wall that houses multiple banks of LEDs and PVCs. (more…)
Kaldewei was founded in 1918 as a manufacturer of raw materials for the enamel industry. Soon after they began bath tub production and introduced the first freestanding bath in Germany in 1934, followed by the first “seamless” baths made from a single sheet in 1957. These technologies have combined to create a modern line of bathroom fixtures that are luxurious, long lasting, and recyclable. Kaldewei stresses the longevity of their products which requires timeless design aesthetic as opposed to trend watching. Part of being sustainable is keeping the user from replacing the fixture, which Kaldewei is striving to achieve. (more…)
Can you imagine being the custodian of an entire legacy of design? That’s the task faced by Marie Wabbes, widow of famed Belgian designer Jules Wabbes, whose aesthetic of simple, clean lines and exquisite craftsmanship was a palpable influence on Belgian—and, by extension, European—design, especially during the 50s and 60s. Mrs. Wabbes has taken the job in stride, tirelessly defending the designer’s legacy through years of legal wrangling and finally penning an agreement with manufacturer Bulo just last year to re-issue many of his designs. (more…)
It seems as if designer Naoto Fukasawa can do it all. While he’s of Japanese extraction, and thus would seem to possess an intrinsic talent for clean, geometric lines and minimal adornment, he can also go full-on organic and curvaceous. Take a gander at his recent re-visiting of the iconic Grande Papilio to see whereof I speak. His latest, the AF/21 collection of taps and mixers for Aboutwater, is a synthesis of natural functionality and derived simplicity. The series of fixtures for tub and shower are crisp and cool like a drop of rain—they “embody purity through their gently curved lines and simple details.” (more…)
Sometimes simplicity is best. One might even say that it is in simplicity that one discovers complexity. This paradoxical notion may have been the impetus behind Thomas Feichtner’s Drawing Lamp. As the name implies, this light is meant to illuminate the workspace, notably one’s drawing workspace, notably the designer’s own drawing workspace—“a lamp preferably used by the designer to illuminate the drawing area.” Its design enables it to be positioned in two ways: one illuminates the entire area, while the other sheds focused light in a particular spot. (more…)
Although it may seem that the façade of a building falls victim to it’s surface material when it comes to color choice, Swisspearl creates an effect using cement composite panels in a wide assortment of colors that could change the way you see architecture. (more…)
The second reincarnation of the shag rug has been revealed by Jason Miller, the creator of the Woolly Chair. Fittingly, the Woolly Chair was released in an exhibition called “It’s Not a Joke Anymore” in Istanbul, Turkey in March 2009. Jason is a native New Yorker who has worked for creative minds such as Jeff Koons and Karim Rashid. He started his own design studio in Brooklyn, New York in 2001 and has had a series of solo and group exhibitions since then. (more…)
