10.25.22

From the Archives

Adam Stech on Italian Futurism, Part II: The 1930s Ceramics of Mazzotti and Nikolay Diulgheroff

Like many of the best art movements of the early 1900s, the radical Italian Futurist movement was most-known for two-dimensional works, but encompassed the applied arts as well. One of its more interesting — yet largely forgotten — practitioners was the late designer and artist Nikolay Diulgheroff, for whom ceramics became a medium of dynamic expression for his and the Futurists’ ideas.

10.24.22

From the Archives

Adam Stech on Italian Futurism, Part I: Tour Four of Italy’s Most Avant-Garde Interiors

In the 1909 manifesto for one of the most controversial avant-garde art movements of the 20th century — Italian Futurism — founder Filippo Tommaso Marinetti confessed his admiration for the modern age and its inventions, for speed, the roar of engines, and the rage of war weapons. The group’s paintings and sculptures attempted to depict the speed and dynamism of the industrial age, but Futurism’s reach also extended to a practice in architecture and interior design, and in the past few years I toured Italy to uncover few of its best spaces.

11.02.21

From the Archives

A Tacchini Reissue Proves Tobia Scarpa’s Very First Chair Is Still One of His Best

As a designer, you may have been taught to always explore beyond your initial hunch — that, not unlike the "bad pancake" theory of dating, your first idea will never be your best. And yet history offers a wealth of exceptions to that rule, including Tobia Scarpa's iconic 1959 Pigreco chair, the first furniture piece he ever designed that, having recently been reissued by Tacchini, endures to this day.

08.30.21

From the Archives

Revisiting the Czech Postmodernist Whose Unusual Chairs Are Suddenly Everywhere

The Czech designer Bořek Šípek was one of the heavyweights of design in the late 1980s and 1990s, creating postmodern furniture and objects that enchanted the international scene. But he failed to become a household name, and his work ultimately fell into oblivion. That, however, is suddenly changing: A new generation of designers, curators, and tastemakers is rediscovering Šípek’s designs and bringing his tribal and highly eclectic aesthetic to the forefront again.

07.15.21

From the Archives

These Playful Postmodern Clocks and Their Late Designer, Vit Cimbura, Are Finally Getting Their Due

Earlier this year, a somewhat forgotten Postmodern designer named Vít Cimbura died. A member of the iconic Postmodern group Atika, Cimbura decided at the end of the 1980s to channel his criticism of Communism through a series of experimental Postmodern creations that balanced on the edge of kitsch. The Prague-based gallery, Okolo, pays tribute to Cimbura’s work this month in an exhibition of clocks, which formed an important part of his life's work.

06.04.21

From the Archives

We Love the 1980s Resin Objects of the Obscure French Duo Migeon et Migeon

The internet recently introduced us to the work of the French design studio Migeon et Migeon, a couple who designed jewelry for fashion houses like Christian Lacroix and Yves Saint Laurent before branching out into housewares in the 1980s and 1990s, when they made resin objects for the Parisian gallery En Attendant les Barbares.

12.14.20

From the Archives

Rediscovering Pucci De Rossi, the Founding Father of Ugly Furniture

Among the army of designers from the 1980s and '90s plucked from the archive in recent years — Ettore Sottsass, Nathalie du Pasquier, and their Memphis cohort, to name a few — there are still many that remain ripe for rediscovery. Our latest find is Pucci de Rossi, the Italian-born artist and designer who intrigued and confused the Parisian design world with his Brutti Mobili (Ugly Furniture). A clear predecessor to a whole cohort of artist-designers working today — think Misha Kahn’s mixed media chimeras — Pucci de Rossi didn’t invent the concept of functional art, but his work from the 1970s to 1990s certainly laid some groundwork.

02.13.15

From the Archives

Andrew O. Hughes on DeWain Valentine

Our first-ever From the Archives post, which looked back at William Sklaroff's mid-century desk accessory set Radius One, dates back to November 10, 2009 — the very first day of Sight Unseen's existence. But after that, the column pretty much petered out, partly because we didn't have the time to research it properly and partly because, with millions upon millions of wonderful old things to potentially highlight, how could we ever choose just one? We've officially solved that problem today with the launch of our new and improved From the Archives series, in which designers and artists will do all the work for us: Each edition will invite a talent we admire to give a little history lesson on someone from the past who's had a strong impact on their work. Our first subject is Brooklyn glassmaker Andrew O. Hughes, speaking about the California Light and Space sculptor DeWain Valentine (no holiday-themed pun intended).

10.09.12

From the Archives

Vitsoe’s Tumblr

If you have a particularly sprawling design-book library, or if you religiously follow things like Mondo Blogo or Herman Miller editorial director Sam Grawe's Instagram feed, you may be relatively familiar with the heaps of amazingly designed archival ephemera that original modern furniture brands tend to generate over the decades. But the rest of us still get giddy when we come upon a gem like Vitsoe's brand-new Tumblr, which the 53-year-old German stalwart launched last month to show off rarely seen bits and bobs pulled from its company files. Every couple of days, staffers dig up old invitations, promo items, photographs, and catalogs and post them alongside a snippet of information about their origins; with Dieter Rams as Vitsoe's lead designer and Wolfgang Schmidt behind its graphic identity, there's been no shortage of eye candy on the site so far. A few of our favorite examples are shown here, but we advise you to bookmark the site and visit it often — we have a feeling the Vitsoe folks are just getting started, and there's no telling what they might turn up once they really dig in.

09.21.11

From the Archives

Antwerp’s Mode Museum

If Antwerp’s Mode Museum (MoMu) is desperately seeking a second storage space for its growing permanent collection, at least part of the blame falls on Bernard Willhelm. He may donate his designs each season alongside the likes of Dries van Noten, Martin Margiela, and his onetime mentor Walter van Beirendonck, but inside the museum’s existing archive rooms — which Sight Unseen had the exclusive privilege of touring earlier this year — it’s Willhelm who clearly holds the record for overflowing racks. In fact, MoMu’s curation team rarely turns down a donation from a legitimate source, whether for the historical collection it originally inherited from an old provincial textile museum or for its cache of contemporary fashions by talents born or educated in Antwerp, but Willhelm’s contributions are so generous that the day we visited, there were clothes waiting to be graciously returned to his showroom. It’s not difficult to understand the designer’s enthusiasm, though, or that of his peers: The MoMu’s prestige in Europe far exceeds its diminutive size, and since it opened a decade ago, it’s become the largest repository in the world for contemporary Belgian fashion.

02.01.11

From the Archives

Pierre’s Costumes

So you’ve decided to dress up as a pirate for Halloween. But have you given any thought as to whether you’d like to be a bloody pirate, a pirate captain, a captain’s mate, a cutthroat pirate, a Caribbean pirate maid, a pirate man, a pirate mistress, a pirate maiden, Lady Hook the Pirate Wench, a sea dog, a sea scoundrel, or Will Blackthorn? If you live in Philadelphia, and you’re plagued by these sorts of questions, you're probably already a customer of Pierre’s Costumes in Old City, which has been in its current location near the Wexler Gallery for more than a decade and in the costuming business since 1943, when the Philadelphia Mummers came ringing at this former medical and restaurant uniform-supply shop. But for the uninitiated — like Sight Unseen's editors were when we stumbled into the store quite by accident midway between Halloween and Christmas last year — Pierre’s is something of a revelation: a labyrinthine, two-floor facility housing thousands of rentals, professional mascot costumes, Santa suits, make-up kits, wigs, and accessories, with a workshop in back where seamstresses and tailors work furiously on repairs and custom designs for everyone from Fruit of the Loom to Bam Margera to Toys ‘R’ Us.

07.02.10

From the Archives

Paul Loebach on American Primitives

Two hundred years ago, when American pioneers were streaming across the country making homes for themselves in the uncharted wilderness, anyone who needed a corn grater or a mouse trap had to knuckle down and make one. “Everyone was a designer,” says Paul Loebach, who’s long been fascinated by such primitive, purpose-built objects, typically hand-carved in wood or crudely forged in metal. “Whereas Europe had a network of goods trading, for the settlers it was like, we’re limited to these five square acres. They had to be really clever to make the most out of what they had, and that kind of ingenuity is inspiring to me.” Already knowing this about the Brooklyn designer after interviewing him last November, Sight Unseen invited him to choose his favorite objects from the 1972 book American Primitives, which we found at an Ohio flea market for $2 and which contains several dozen annotated selections from Norris, Tennessee’s Museum of Appalachia.