Happy 10th anniversary to the Louis Ghost Chair designed by Philippe Starck in 2002. To celebrate this postmodern triumph of technical innovation and historical style, we're having a Ghost Anniversary Sale. Save 10% for 10 days: October 22–31.
Perhaps one of the most amazing things about the National Design Awards is the trophy. The amount of thought, innovation, creativity – and the fact that it takes six to eight hours to complete one – is an award-winning effort. Beginning in 2011 and again this year, Corning, Inc. as part of the Corning Museum’s GlassLab initiative, has designed, sculpted and hand-polished each trophy.
DWR is proud to bring you a very special crossword puzzle, written for everyone who is passionate about design. Click on the puzzle for a larger image or click here for a printable PDF. This puzzle will also appear in the October 7 issue of T Design (see page 60) in The New York Times.
Keep reading for hints and answers.
Continue reading "New York Times + DWR = Design and Architecture Crossword." »
The Verner Panton suite at Hotel Alexandra in Copenhagen is labeled “a sight for sore eyes” in the hotel’s literature. The description then goes on to refer to the designer as “Verner Pant,” which they've assured me they will change. In the meantime, what do you think of the room? Is it the suite of your wildest dreams?
Guests sleep under the warm glow of Panton's Ball Lamp (1969) and a blanket in his iconic Design Geometri (1960) textile.
A wallhanging in the Verner Panton Suite.
Keep reading to see additional photos.
Ludwig Mies van der Rohe designed the Barcelona Chair in 1929 so the king and queen of Spain would have a comfortable place to sit at the International Exhibition in Barcelona. Such majestic modernism is 15% off for just one more day – the Knoll® Sale ends tonight at midnight. Shop it now right here.
A very happy Friday to you! Planning to so some furniture shopping this weekend? Our entire Knoll assortment is 15% off + free shipping through Sunday. DWR has the world’s largest assortment of Knoll product in stock and ready to ship – and as you know from reading our blog, this includes the work of Eero Saarinen, Harry Bertoia, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe and others. Click here to shop the sale. And either way, have a great weekend.
This week’s Knoll® Sale has given me a chance to do some exploring into the history and legacy of the iconic company. I found a gem in a June 17, 1959 article in the New York Times. Florence Knoll, then president of Knoll Associates, Inc., tells the author, Rita Reif, about that time when she was hanging out in her kitchen with Harry Bertoia. “While holding a rubber-sprayed dish drainer,” Reif relates, “Mrs. Knoll asked the sculptor-designer whether this was not the ideal technique for treating his seating pieces. It was.”
Though it’s now coated in the more eco-friendly polyamide Rilsan, the Bertoia seating still looks great in a kitchen. Click here to learn more about Bertoia and see the collection (which is on sale until Sunday).
I was thinking about Eero Saarinen when I stumbled across a post by Gwendolyn from October of last year about the architect’s 1962 TWA terminal at JFK Airport. I thought the pictures and sentiment were so beautiful they're worth resharing. Here’s what she said: “It is the most beautiful building I've ever been in, and when you are wrapped in its swooping, elegant curves, you experience the incredible genius of Saarinen.” (Smaller examples of Saarinen’s genius are now 15% off during the Knoll Sale. Click here to learn more about this lengendary architect and see his work.)
Inspired by bicyle handlebars and his friend Wassily Kandisky, Marcel Breuer originally designed his Wassily Chair in 1925 with canvas belting. MoMA – which includes the chair in its permanent collection – quotes Breuer describing it as “my most extreme work . . . the least artistic, the most logical, the least ‘cozy’ and the most mechanical.” It is also, of course, the most recognizable and it’s believed to be the first bent tubular steel chair. Perhaps the modernist master was being a bit modest. While calling it “cozy” might goes a bit too far, the chair’s intuitive ergonomic structure makes it a very comfortable seat to sink into. Design Within Reach is the only place to get the canvas version – and, through September 30, it’s on sale. Check it out here.
Dear Readers,
Happy September! Summer is over, school has begun, and at DWR we’re focused on dining and entertaining.
We’ve launched so many products over the past two years that this catalog is like a refresher course on design. From chairs by Philippe Starck, Møller, BassamFellows and Gubi, to our Mapp Dining Table, the Cross Extension Table and the classic Saarinen Pedestal, we have more choices to suit your modern needs than anyone in our industry – many of which are exclusive and in stock.
We build our catalog with you in mind and plan our photo shoots to demonstrate the many ways you can live with our products. Modern is not cold. Modern is not stark (even when designed by Philippe Starck). Modern is timeless. Visit your local DWR Studio and let us design your home with a 3-D rendering, or request an in-home visit and we’ll help you learn what goes with what. Our passion for design shows on every page of this “back to school education in design.”
Enjoy it, and thank you for believing.
It's been 10 years since Philippe Starck designed the Louis Ghost Chair, and yet, this transparent marvel continues to shock, amuse and amaze those who see it for the first time. For those of us who've loved it for a decade, the honeymoon isn't over. (Although, I would suggest that Starck design a Ghost in glow-in-the-dark plastic so I'll stop tripping over it at night.)
Above: Gorilla Biscuits is featured on page 7 of our August catalog.
As the owner of Stereotype Design – a New York City-based graphic design studio that develops projects for commercial, cultural and corporate clients – Mike Joyce is postering the walls of modern homes with music history. By branding bands with new personas, his Swissted Poster Project is both renewing public interest in seminal music acts and documenting the roots of today's most pervasive genre: indie rock.
"The project has a fiendishly simple premise: Joyce combs through flyers of old-school punk, hardcore, and indie rock shows, retains the vital info, and uses that text to create Swiss Modernist-style posters that often incorporate geometric patterns," says Reyan Ali of the The Village Voice. Joyce says his posters reflect "his love of punk rock and Swiss Modernism, two movements that have (almost) nothing to do with one another." And while this may be true on the surface, judging by his overwhelming success, perhaps it's in their relative obscurity that commonality exists.
Continue reading "Spotted in Our August Catalog: Swissted Posters." »
Olivetti: Innovation & Identity is currently at the Denver Art Museum.
Here are just a few exhibitions happening around the country. From 100 years of chairs in Florida to a celebration of George Nelson at Cranbrook to “House & Home” in Washington, D.C., there is richness to enjoy everywhere.
COLORADO
Denver Art Museum
What is Modern?
Olivetti: Innovation & Identity
FLORIDA
Tampa Museum of Art
A Hundred Years - A Hundred Chairs: Masterworks from the Vitra Design Museum
Continue reading "Craving Culture? Museum exhibitions to see now." »
A daredevil puts on a show in Thonet's classic chair.
This week we celebrate Michael Thonet, who was born on July 2, 1796. The inventor of one of the most important innovations in bent wood furniture making, Thonet patented a process of bending under heat several layers of wood veneer glued together and laminated – and used the new material to create curved back-rails and legs on chairs, contoured headboards and scrolled arms for sofas. This process eliminated the need for expensive and time-consuming hand-carved joints, and Thonet’s iconic 1859 chair has been in production for more than 150 years.
Congratulations to Amanda Ip, whose Innermix Desk is the winner of our Live/Work Design Contest with Dwell magazine!
In February, we challenged up-and-coming designers to create a new home-office solution that DWR could potentially manufacture and sell. We received 587 entries, and today at Dwell on Design in Los Angeles, Amanda Ip was announced as the winner of the contest.
The Innermix Desk was created with Ip’s own preferences for live/work solutions. She favors clean, organized spaces that are still fun and modern. Marrying these ideas together, the Innermix features a large workspace and simple storage solutions.
Congratulations Amanda! And a round of applause for all the designers who entered our Live/Work contest.
"More than ten years in the making, the designer's new chair pushes Emeco—a manufacturer long famous for its iconic aluminum furniture—in a whole new direction." That's how Marc Kristal begins his piece about the Broom Chair in Metropolis magazine.
Made of a new eco-friendly material, the Broom Chair is available for preorder at Design Within Reach and these chairs will ship in late July. Keep reading Kristal's article to hear the whole story, or place your order on dwr.com. The Broom Chair can be seen at Dwell on Design this week in Los Angeles, and you can take it for a test-drive at our Beverly Boulevard, Pasadena and Santa Monica Studios.
In honor of Charles Eames' birthday (June 17, 1907) we're sharing this 2007 TED talk by his grandson, Eames Demetrios. (Click image above to play video.) "We must take our pleasure seriously," said Charles Eames, who clearly embraced his own advice. For that, and everything that Eames did, we are forever grateful. On this day, we celebrate the masterful Charles Eames.
"Designing furniture is not exactly the same thing as designing a product, even if that product happens to be furniture," writes Martin C. Pedersen in Metropolis Magazine. "No, this is not a riddle or an industrial-design koan," he continues, "but a distinction between the creation of glorious, messy, inspired one-offs (god bless them) and products intended for mass consumption (or at least batches larger than ten)."
So begins the introduction to "So You Want to Be a Product Designer?" -- a special feature in the May issue. Seven "talent scouts" are interviewed for the piece, including DWR's John Edelman and Kari Woldum. Read their advice for getting your designs out of the studio and onto the market. And check out their Q&A on the Metropolis blog.
So You Want to Be a Product Designer? appeared in the May issue of Metropolis.
3X10 Runner designed by Anni Albers in 1959.
With the belief that aesthetics should be a consideration in every aspect of daily life, Anni Albers joined the Bauhaus as a student in 1922. Though she wanted to be a painter, Albers and other female students, including Gunta Stölzl, were encouraged to join the Weaving Workshop, which included a class taught by Paul Klee. Albers took to this medium enthusiastically, experimenting with new materials for weaving and elevating textiles from merely a craft to an art form.
Looking at her Runner above, one can only imagine how she might frost a birthday cake. Cheers to Anni Albers on this day!
