
01.25.25
Saturday Selects
Week of January 20, 2025
A weekly Saturday recap to share with you our favorite links, discoveries, exhibitions, and more from the past seven days. This week: hits from Maison & Objet, the first of the year’s design fairs, a new showroom in Chiang Mai, and Christofle trades its traditional silver for an oxidation-resistant aluminum in a new series of candelabras.
Exhibitions
Mia Kim and Paul Trussler, of the Paris-based studio goons, bring their experience in fashion design and architecture (as well as parenthood) to their latest collection, Evolving Forms, in their first solo show at St Vincents in Antwerp. The eight pieces include a dining set of Scandinavian birch plywood: The two dining tables and console can be rearranged in nine different ways. As Trussler says: “The name goons is rooted in our strong desire for simple solutions. Judged lightly these solutions might be considered dumb, even rudish, yet there’s a strong philosophy and quiet sophistication behind each piece.” On view through March 1.
At Karimoku Research in Tokyo, Survey 01: New Tradition, includes two exhibitions that explore tradition and innovation, starting points and departures, as expressed through wood working, printing capabilities, painting techniques, and textiles. The KARI KARI MOKU MOKU WAKA WAKA exhibition, led by Los Angeles-based Japanese designer Shin Okuda of WAKA WAKA, recontextualizes Japanese traditions and lifestyles via furniture, objects, processes, and ceremonies. The show includes a portable tea room, built with Karimoku Furniture, where a special tea ceremony takes place. And with Karimoku Re:issue by Lichen, New York-based design studio Lichen unveil re-issued furniture pieces using designs from the Karimoku Furniture design archive, transforming the basement floor study space into a moody lounge. On view through March 28.
The most recent Maison&Objet fair in Paris earlier this month brought several new works to our attention. With the Perspectives Collection for Christofle, French artist Mattias Kiss deconstructs and reimagines the forms and contours — sharp edges and delicate curves — of molding into candleholders, a vase, and candelabras. It’s contemporary design rooted in classic style. And while Christofle is renowned for silverware, they turned to aluminum here, lightweight and strong, finished with a smooth, vacuum-applied film that is oxidation-resistant and heat-resistant for a beautiful, high polish.
Interior designer Dorothée Delaye showcased three new pieces of furniture at her Vivant exhibition. The Orso wall sconce, produced in collaboration with artist Olivia Stora, is inspired by fossils and shells. Similarly taking cues from nature, the wood and glazed ceramic Levant table evokes coral and lava. And the Zéphyr armchair reinterprets the sofa version in Delaye’s collection, combining breeziness and depth with its generous curves.
The Rising Talents Award section featured several South Korean designers, including Kuo Duo, Sisan Lee, and Dahye Jeong, but perhaps our favorite installation was by New York transplant Minjae Kim, who stacked his carved wooden chairs atop one another and debuted new forms like a raised fist rocking chair and a gorgeous metal floor lamp.
Discoveries
Brooklyn design studio Asa Pingree recently became Garnier Pingree, a recognition of the yearslong and ongoing creative relationship between Asa Pingree and Marie Garnier (who are also partners in life). To go with the new name, they’ve got a new mirror collection, which offers more than simple reflective surfaces – the Claude mirrors are like light-diffusing sculptures made of superimposed textured glass, powder-coated aluminum rods, and stainless-steel frames, customizable in size and color. They’re an homage to Garnier’s uncle Claude Belleudy, a reclusive painter and sculptor whose rustic house in the South of France was filled with abstract art — and whose workshop Garnier loved as a child.
In 2021, Thai-American designer Robert Sukrachand moved his Brooklyn studio to Chiang Mai and three years later founded Pern Baan as a platform for contemporary Thai design and craftsmanship. For Sukrachand, design is a both form of communication and connection, and to celebrate Pern Baan’s new showroom in a five-story building in Chiang Mai — which Sukrachand has been painstakingly remodeling on Instagram — he co-curated the Friends of the Home show with Thai designer Rathee Phaisanchotsiri. The exhibition divides the space into “roomscapes,” featuring over 30 designers from across Thailand and America, ranging from textiles to ceramics, metalware to sculptural furniture, and more. Up through February 28.
Moonstone has many associations, thought to be both calming and mysterious. You could say the same about the Moonstone sconce from Patti Miller at Ümlaut Ceramics in Portland, Oregon. Hand-built stoneware flats layer neatly in this made-to-order light.
Interiors
Soothing and welcoming neutral tones mix with an interesting and sensory depth of texture in a Warsaw renovation by Zuzanna Gąsior of Thisispaper Studio. Taking a former law office in a historic building and turning it into the first therapeutic clinic for the Można Zwariować Foundation, dedicated to mental health, Gąsior kept the original layout but completely transformed the space. She also added meaningful artistic accents like Warsaw-based artist Bartłomiej Stawiński’s ear-inspired sculpture, which embodies the act of listening with empathy.