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10.24.23

Fair Report

Move Over, Milan: This Naples-Based Fair Is Providing Young Designers a Prominent Platform

Milan’s Salone del Mobile might be the largest and best-known design event in Italy, but it’s by no means the be-all and end-all of the country’s creative scene. Case in point: EDIT Napoli, which held its fifth edition over three days at the beginning of October. Curated by Emilia Petruccelli and Domitilla Dardi, the design fair took place within the recently renovated cloisters, atriums and frescoed rooms of the Archivio di Stato di Napoli, the city’s historic State Archives building. There were several gems from emerging European talents, who have a better chance to shine at a smaller, more intimate fair like this one. Here are our picks from Naples.
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10.22.23

Saturday Selects

Week of October 16, 2023

A weekly Saturday recap to share with you our favorite links, discoveries, exhibitions, and more from the past seven days. This week: a bucolic design exhibition hosted on a farm in Germany, mesmerizing wood and aluminum furniture, a new furniture collection featuring four buzzy New York designers, and chairs upholstered with a patchwork of reclaimed hospital sheets. 
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10.16.23

Interiors

A Fictional Graphic Designer Was the Muse for This São Paulo Exhibition

“Who lives in this house?” you might be wondering after seeing these images of a stainless-steel Mario Botta sofa sitting upon a high-pile wool rug, or two steel-wrapped, camel-colored Kazuhide Takahama chairs. Its occupant would certainly be lauded for having great taste — if only they existed IRL. The space was actually designed for a fictional character, by a trio of Brazilian creative forces who teamed up to produce an exhibition that celebrates the country’s architecture, design, and art of the mid-20th century, and uses its modernist flavors to inform new works that are also on show.
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10.10.23

Up and Coming

This Graphic Designer–Turned–Cabinetmaker’s Dyed-Wood Furniture is, Well, To Die For

Paris-based designer Jonathan Cohen has been working in wood for only a couple of years. Initially trained as a graphic designer, his eye for flat compositions naturally transferred into the three-dimensional world of furniture, with his creations quickly catching the eye of top architects and designers and local galleries. “When you have knowledge of good proportion, shape, and balance, you can design a letter or furniture,” Cohen says. “For me, it’s almost the same.” What lends the designer's work a certain je ne sais quoi, however, is the unique dye treatment he uses, applied in various techniques to bring out the grain and texture of the wood — forming patterns reminiscent of those created by Memphis artist Nathalie du Pasquier. 
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10.03.23

Interiors

These Three Historic Properties Have Been Reimagined As Our New Favorite Design Hotels

Designing the interior for a hotel these days can be a tricky thing. Most hotels aren't ground-up builds, so there needs to be a certain amount of sensitivity towards the building's past while still imagining a place that a 21st-century traveler — who is constantly bombarded with other people's vision of what makes the perfect vacay — might actually want to stay. In our fall hotel round-up, we look at three projects who have succeeded beyond our wildest dreams. How about a reimagined historic English country manor from the 17th century? A ‘50s-inspired guest house in Marseille above a famed restaurant? Or a renovated functionalist building that’s the talk of Brussels? Take your pick after the jump. 
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Upholstered task chair herman miller
09.26.23

Sighted

Herman Miller’s New Task Chair Wants to Become the Next Upholstered Icon (And It Doesn’t Have a Ton of Competition)

We don't talk a lot on this site about Naoto Fukasawa. He's one of an earlier generation of industrial designers — along with names like Jasper Morrison and Hella Jongerius — whose talent and influence is, by this point, simply a given in certain creative circles. (And not, perhaps, in others.) But while we hadn't heard about a major project of his in a long time — his Pao light for Hay was probably the most recent, though why did no one tell us about this sweet Japanese playground equipment? — our ears perked up with we heard one of America’s largest and most celebrated office furniture brands had teamed up with the feted Japanese designer. The result is the Asari task chair, the latest collab between Herman Miller and Naoto Fukasawa, and it is, expectedly, a resounding match made in functional, ergonomic, minimalist heaven.
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09.16.23

Saturday Selects

Week of September 11, 2023

A weekly Saturday recap to share with you our favorite links, discoveries, exhibitions, and more from the past seven days. This week: Gallery Fumi’s biology-inspired 15th anniversary exhibition, furniture made from giant toothpicks, and the juiciest tiled interior we've seen to date.
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08.07.23

Sighted

These Woven Outdoor Chairs Are Built to Withstand the Test of Time — As Well As the Elements

By now, we’ve become accustomed to the reissues of classic furniture designs for interiors — so much so that it can sometimes be hard to keep track. But the same can’t be said for outdoor furniture, so when the relaunch of an iconic product for exterior use does come along, we sit up and take notice. Case in point: Spanish manufacturer Expormim’s Lapala collection of chairs, typified by their woven seats and backrests, which turns 25 this year. Highly chameleonic and adaptable to almost any plein-air setting — from garden patio to urban balcony — the design has proven its longevity through a variety of only the subtlest tweaks over the years. 
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07.25.23

Interiors

Yowie, the Best Design Boutique in Philly, Has Opened an Equally Cool Hotel

We've long been obsessed with the always-just-under-the-radar design scene in Philadelphia, but a decade ago — when we devoted a whole week of coverage to Philly — something like Yowie, the design store founded and curated by creative director Shannon Maldonado, simply didn't exist. That all changed when Yowie opened its doors in 2016, introducing a variety of Danish and American furniture brands and a refreshingly playful color palette to Philadelphia. Today, Yowie offers clothing, lighting, furniture, homeware, gifts, books (including our own!) and more, deservedly it earning the title of coolest boutique in Philly. And thanks to this success over the past seven years, Yowie is now not only expanding its retail footprint, but opening an entire hotel upstairs.
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07.24.23

Sighted

This Bar is a Desert Oasis (And a Design Dream) in Joshua Tree

If you've traveled through the desert in this summer’s record-breaking temperatures, you'll know that stopping to cool off and refresh is an absolute necessity. Along Highway 62 through the famed California town of Joshua Tree, siblings Brit Epperson of Studio Plow and Barrett Karber of Grain Construction have designed Mas o Menos, an ideal refuge to do just that: pause, grab a drink, and relax in a laid-back setting of terracotta tiles, warm sandy hues, and inviting furniture.
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07.16.23

Saturday Selects

Week of July 10, 2023

A weekly Saturday recap to share with you our favorite links, discoveries, exhibitions, and more from the past seven days. This week: a zesty creative hub in Milan, a set of “noisy” rugs, and a sofa modeled after boxing gloves.
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07.13.23

Sight Unseen Collection

Only a Year Out From Graduating RISD, Alexis & Ginger Already Have Two Collections Under Their Belt

Was it fate that brought Alexis Tingey and Ginger Gordon together? The designers’ studio benches happened to be positioned next to each other during their furniture design Master's program at RISD, and after two years of sharing ideas and inspirations, the pair decided to officially join forces and set up a business together after graduating in 2022. A year later, Alexis & Ginger have moved to Brooklyn, launched two collections — one as part of our Sight Unseen Collection — and already have plans for so much more.
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