06.27.24

Travel

Four Incredible Designer Villas You Can Rent This Summer in Europe, Or Just Admire From Afar

Every winter, when I start fantasizing about summer vacations I might go on that year, there's one form the daydreams always take: the enduring paradigm of the verdant country villa shared with family and friends, something straight out of a French or Danish film. But once you try to actually book a villa like that, the grounds may be picturesque, and the building pretty enough, but the interiors usually leave a lot to be desired. That's why we've been so happy to get to know the high-end home-sharing platform Boutique. Their offerings are geared towards design-forward properties rented by and for creatives, so your vacation can be both idyllic and aesthetic. We went hunting on Boutique's site for some of our favorite villas for rent across Europe and the UK that are lovely to look at, inside and out.
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06.25.24

Up and Coming

This Parisian Artist Translates His Work Across Three Ancient Art Forms

When a sentence or phrase is translated from one language into another — and perhaps another, returning eventually to its native tongue — the result is often a completely different set of words whose meaning ultimately remains unchanged. For his Traduslation project, French-Swiss artist Réjean Peytavin has created an objects-based version of this kind of kinked-up inspiration funnel. Peytavin's multi-step development process typically involves drawing a found vessel, translating it first to carpet and then to wildly textured ceramics, allowing him to move his concepts through a series of physical states, carrying commonality from one form to another, yet ending up with three totally distinct collections of work.
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06.13.24

Interiors

Everyone’s Favorite Affordable Scandi Rug Brand Just Opened a (Giancarlo Valle–Designed) New York Outpost

When Liza Laserow and Fabian Berglund founded Nordic Knots back in 2016, alongside Fabian's brother Felix, it was with a clear mission in mind: to channel Sweden's design aesthetic and history, from the rug colors they launched with, which were inspired by building facades in Stockholm, to the historical Swedish architecture they shot their campaigns inside. But it was also with a clear intention to market their rugs to audiences outside their native country, and in the eight intervening years, they've cultivated a presence in the US that's grown to make up 70% of their sales. Once the trio unveiled their first physical showroom in Stockholm earlier this year, it only made sense to hang a shingle amidst their biggest fan base, with a flagship in NYC that opened this week.
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06.12.24

Sighted

Danny Kaplan’s Earthy Ceramics Meet Lesser Miracle’s Warm Woods in a Pitch-Perfect New Collab

What began as a one-off turned not only into a furniture collection but also a friendship when New Yorkers Danny Kaplan of Danny Kaplan Studio and Vince Patti of Lesser Miracle started collaborating last year. In early 2023, Kaplan, known for his ceramics-forward furniture and lighting, asked artist and designer Patti to help construct a bed for his own home. What resulted is the Paravent, both massive and graceful, featuring a brass-hinged floating oak headboard and base, accented with geometric, jewel-like tile detailing. As the two worked on the piece, says Kaplan, “it became clear that our combined vision and skills could produce something more substantial, merging my ceramics practice with Vince’s woodworking expertise.” And so, the Delf collection was born.
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02.18.23

Saturday Selects

Week of February 13, 2023

A weekly Saturday recap to share with you our favorite links, discoveries, exhibitions, and more from the past seven days. This week: the hits from Zona Maco, an exhibition that's meant to recall an imaginary speakeasy by the sea, and our favorite new candy-like glass goblets, by the Franco-Russian designer Alissa Volchkova.
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06.11.24

Sighted

Saba Journeyed to Sardinia to Weave, and Photograph, Its New Cime Carpet Collection

Steeped in history and tradition, Sardinia is known — among many things — for its sheep farming and wool production, and a weaving method that’s distinct to the Mediterranean island. Handed down by generations of women, this ancient technique, called Pibiones (which means ‘cluster of grapes’ in the local dialect), creates small bumps of thread that are knotted around vertical bars. This highly textural effect has been employed for Italian design brand Saba’s latest collection of carpets named Cime, designed by Treviso-based duo Zanellato/Bortotto.
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06.07.24

Fair Report

10 Artists We Loved at New York’s Frieze, NADA, and Independent Fairs

In between the parties and the gallery openings and the furniture fairs and the dinners and the multiple Sight Unseen launches, we somehow managed to make it to three different art fairs last month — not because we felt obligated to transform them into content, but because we find stepping outside our realm to be something of a palette cleanser. That said, our taste it art tends to run on a grooved track alongside our affinities in design, and it's therefore unsurprising that the installations we found most rewarding often had elements of three-dimensionality or references to architecture, industrial design, domesticity, and the decorative arts. After the jump, find 10 of our favorite artists we discovered or became reacquainted with during our cross-disciplinary detour.
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06.04.24

Sighted

Is Design In an Age of Maximalism, Or Minimalism? The Answer Is Both — and Pelle’s New Collection Offers Proof

Are we currently in an age of maximalism, with wood paneling, hand-painted ceilings, ruffled fabrics, and decorative pillows constituting the reigning aesthetic in design? Or an age of minimalism, when sleek chrome and the High-Tech vibe have never been more popular? The answer, really, is both — the two styles have often happily coexisted in the past, and we've been happily embracing both for awhile now. That might be why the latest collection from the Brooklyn studio Pelle, released a few weeks ago during New York design month, appeals to us: It unabashedly embraces both extremes.
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06.03.24

Excerpt: Exhibition

How Do You Conceive Design That is “Correct” for Our Time? A New Exhibition Proposes Work by 10 Designers Answering the Call

Since opening in 2020, the Max Radford Gallery in London has consistently been showcasing some of the best contemporary and experimental collectible design from up-and-comers. With the Now 4 Then exhibition, ten of these designers are debuting new work at the recently opened 2000-square-foot gallery space from design store Aram. For this collaborative show, Radford was inspired by something Zeev Aram, the founder of Aram, once said regarding his enterprise, which is currently celebrating its 60th anniversary: "I decided that I will try my best to bring to the public designs which are contemporary and correct for the time.”
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06.01.24

Saturday Selects

Week of May 27, 2024

A weekly Saturday recap to share with you our favorite links, discoveries, exhibitions, and more from the past seven days. This week: highlights from a design fair for Sweden's independent talents, Caitlin Mociun's new 90s-inspired jewelry line, Giancarlo Valle's new showroom in New York, and the latest Modernist architectural icon to open its doors to overnight guests.
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05.30.24

Fair Report

Inspired by Italian Modernism, the Opulence of Paris, or a Brutalist Viennese Church, These Three Up-and-Coming Design Studios Wowed in Milan

Before we leave the spring design fair season entirely, we'd be remiss if we didn't call out three of our favorite up-and-coming studios from Milan. Milan Design Week this year was, as usual, awash with global brands whose impressive, big-budget presentations took up the majority of space around the city — not to mention air time on Instagram. But that doesn’t mean that the emerging and independent designers weren’t represented as well — they just required a bit more searching among the noise.
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