The New Wave of Los Angeles Design, On View Now at Our Site Specific LA Show at Austere

If you’ve been reading the news lately, you’ve probably caught a whiff of the endless hype currently surrounding Los Angeles, and how it’s been luring people away from places like New York City with its weather, food, and rapidly expanding art scene. Yet despite how annoying that media buzz has been, the sentiment is undeniably true for L.A.’s design scene, as well, which has always nurtured makers with its affordable studio spaces and its (relatively) robust manufacturing base, but seems to have grown even more fertile in the last couple of years. Case in point: our 2015 Sight Unseen OFFSITE show, in which even we were surprised to realize how many participants hailed from the West Coast mecca. So when the folks behind Austere, the airy design showroom in Downtown L.A., asked us to create some kind of installation in their space for the months of December and January, the theme was a no-brainer — we’d showcase the new wave of L.A. design, inviting 11 of our favorite studios to install a selection of their work. The result is Site Specific L.A., which opened on Saturday and runs through February 14, and is like a mini, localized version of OFFSITE.

Arranged in vignettes throughout Austere’s large second-floor loft space, the works on view include a brand new series of technicolor wall hangings by Tanya Aguiñiga, a new set of neo-classical-inspired tables and chairs by AQQ Design, a new collaboration between Eric Trine and Laura Cornman of Settlewell, and a new table and pair of rubberized stools by Ouli. You can check out those pieces, plus the amazing contributions of our other seven participants, below, but of course there’s nothing like seeing it all in person — make sure to stop by Austere if you’re in L.A. between now and February.