Curated Objects-Presentation Compilation PDF

Miami Chicago Los Angeles Miami Chicago Los Angeles Curated Object Narratives & Details Growth & Education At Luminaire, design is more than furniture, it’s a way of life. Educating our public starts with educating ourselves. Feel free to expand, send recommendations and make these packages yo...

Miami Chicago Los Angeles Miami Chicago Los Angeles Curated Object Narratives & Details Growth & Education At Luminaire, design is more than furniture, it’s a way of life. Educating our public starts with educating ourselves. Feel free to expand, send recommendations and make these packages your own. Nasir maintains that “Good design, like good architecture, must communicate silently and stand the test of time.” Forty years after Luminaire’s inception, it’s existence continues to evolve, while always maintaining a leadership role in bringing the best designs from around the world to the American public and making good design part of many lives. Curated Object Narratives & Details The following collection of items are to serve as a curated selection of stories, objects, and narratives for connecting and educating our patrons. Work through the package, learn the objects, do some research and use these as a design foundation for learning about what is within the Luminaire collection. Designer: Naoto Fukasawa Year Made: 2008 Vendor: Maruni Curated Object Narratives & Details Hiroshima Name: Hiroshima Information about the Designer A harmonious blend of tradition and craft, Naoto Fukasawa’s Hiroshima Armchair exhibits an honesty of materials and subtle warmth while utilizing advanced technology and hand craftsmanship within the production process. With perfectly seemed joints, the armchair appears to be hand-carved from a solid block of wood. Unaltered, the texture and color of the beech and oak wood gives the chair a feeling of freshness while recalling the traditional Japanese wooden chairs of the past. Fukasawa worked at IDEO in San Francisco,California and later helped establish the IDEO Tokyo office. He established Naoto Fukasawa Design in 2003. Since 2002, Fukasawa has been a MUJI advisory board member and worked on the development of many of their products. Representative works of Fukasawa include the “±0” brand of household electrical appliances and sundries. In recent years, he has released a host of new works with Italian companies B&B Italia, Driade, Magis, Artemide, Danese, and Boffi, as well as in Germany and Northern Europe, and they have garnered a great deal of attention. Curated Object Narratives & Details Hiroshima Information about the Product Designer: Gerrit Rietveld Year Made: 1935 Vendor: Cassina Curated Object Narratives & Details Utrecht Armchair Name: Utrecht Armchair Information about the Designer This was one of only a few of Rietveld’s upholstered designs that were taken into production. It was first sold by Amsterdam manufacturers Metz & Co in 1936, in an edition covered in dark brown canvas and finished with a visible festoon stitch. After the war, Metz and Co issued the chair in a felt with the signature distinctive white stitching. The design and was revived by Cassina in 1988, a century after Rietveld’s birth. The Utrecht chair, named after the city of his birth, was designed in 1935 and reveals Rietveld’s fascination with distilling a piece of furniture to its structural basics, revealing a form that is at once unconventional and soundly rational. A dissection into geometric planes and surfaces is evident in the new version of the Utrecht sofa as well. In keeping with Rietveld’s spirit of freedom, change and innovation Cassina introduces, in addition to the curved sofa already in the collection, and in agreement with his heirs, a two and three-seater sofa characterised by a straight backrest that can be rested against a wall. An interpretation that highlights the graphic rhythm and separation of structural elements that are recurrent themes in Rietveld’s work. Curated Object Narratives & Details Utrecht Armchair Information about the Product Designer: Raw Edges / Shay Alkalay Year Made: 2008 Vendor: Established & Son Curated Object Narratives & Details Stack Name: Stack Information about the Designer Challenging the conventions of a traditional drawer unit, Stack consists of individual, multicoloured drawers that appear suspended above one another and open in both directions, creating an irregular composition. “I think chests of drawers look more intriguing when the drawers are left partly open.” Shay Alkalay Appreciated from all angles as a sculptural object as well as an entirely functional, practical item of furniture, Stack creates a rich and wonderful spectacle of colour and form. The studio became a place where curiosity would be a prevalent factor in the creation of their designs, a place where they could embark on a continuous journey of discovery, turning the world upside down and inside out, cracking things open and studying their structure, always striving for surprise, wonder, humour. Colours, patternmaking and movement form a large part of the DNA at Raw-Edges. The ideas of energy and provocative illusion are aimed at bringing out the kid in all of us who engage with it, an ongoing battle against boredom perhaps! Some ideas include pouring expandable foam into folded paper cavities, cooking timber in boiling dyes, and making paper moulds for the production of industrial ceramic tiles. Curated Object Narratives & Details Stack Information about the Product Designer: Poul Kjærholm Year Made: 1956 Vendor: Republic of Fritz Hansen Curated Object Narratives & Details PK22 Name: PK22 Information about the Designer The discrete and elegant PK22 lounge chair epitomises Poul Kjærholm’s search for the ideal form and showcases the industrial dimension always present in his work. The profile of the steel frame structure originates from the PK25, his graduation project at the School of Applied Arts in Copenhagen. The PK22 was an immediate commercial and critical success. In 1957, the chair was awarded the Grand Prix at the Milan Triennale, the world’s premier design fair. Most of Kjærholm’s contemporaries opted for wood as their primary furniture construction material. Kjærholm chose steel as his primary, but always combined it with other materials such as wood, leather, cane or marble. “Steel’s constructive potential is not the only thing that interests me; the refraction of light on its surface is an important part of my artistic work. I consider steel a material with the same artistic merit as wood and leather,” he commented. Curated Object Narratives & Details PK22 Information about the Product Designer: Junya Ishigami Year Made: 2012 Vendor: Living Divani Curated Object Narratives & Details Family Chair Name: Family Chair Information about the Designer “Family Chair” are a series of chairs made from steel pipes and mesh and appear to be distorted. There is a wide chair, a tall chair, a short chair, a normal chair and a stool. It’s fun to choose which chair to sit on, depending on the day’s mood. It’s also fun to decide which is your favorite chair. Like a family sitting around a table, so the chairs are arranged around the table.” Junya Ishigami is a Japanese architect born in Kanagawa prefecture in 1974. He is one of the innovative voices in contemporary design. Formerly of the architecture firm SANAA, Ishigami established his own practice in 2004. Junya Ishigami created these playful wire chairs for the Italian manufacturer Living Divani. He says “Chairs that live in harmony, like a family. Whilst they are all similar, each chair has a slightly different shape, and its own personality.” Curated Object Narratives & Details Family Chair Information about the Product Designer: Shiro Kuramata Year Made: 1955 Vendor: Cappellini Curated Object Narratives & Details Revolving Cabinet Name: Revolving Cabinet Information about the Designer The Revolving Cabinet Chest Of Drawers is a highly distinctive storage solution that is ideal for modern offices. This eye-catching piece consists of 20 individual drawers that rotate around a vertical metal bar. The number of potential configurations is infinite, so you can create a slightly different look every day. The Revolving Cabinet Chest Of Drawers is made with a high-gloss acrylic plastic that is made to stand the test of time. Shiro Kuramata was the Japanese designer who best epitomized the spirit of the era in which he lived, through his highly significant products and creations. In 1965, he founded the Kuramata Design Office in Tokyo, where he remained until the year of his death, in 1991, working on numerous projects that entered the product and Design hall of fame. Kuramata first encountered Italian design through Memphis, then in 1987, with Cappellini, for whom he created the Progetti Compiuti chest of drawers series. All of the pieces Kuramata made for the company were incredibly well-received, such as the Steel Pipe Drink Trolly, the Sofa With Arms, the Ko.Ko. table, the Revolving Cabinet bookshelf and chest of drawers. Curated Object Narratives & Details Revolving Cabinet Information about the Product Designer: Jean Prouvé Year Made: 1930 Vendor: Vitra Curated Object Narratives & Details Cité Name: Cité Information about the Designer The Cité armchair is an early masterpiece by the French designer and engineer Jean Prouvé. Originally designed to furnish the student residence halls at the Cité Universitaire in Nancy, France. Prouvé also used this comfortable, expansive armchair with powder- coated steel runners and leather belt armrests in the living room of his own home. Generous dimensions and inviting upholstery contribute to the great comfort of Cité. Jean Prouvé was a French metal worker, self-taught architect and designer. Le Corbusier designated Prouvé a constructeur, blending architecture and engineering. Prouvé’s main achievement was transferring manufacturing technology from industry to architecture, without losing aesthetic qualities. His design skills were not limited to one discipline. During his career Jean Prouvé was involved in architectural design, industrial design, structural design and furniture design. He left his mark on architectural history again in 1971, when he played a major role in selecting the design of Renzo Piano and Richard Rogers for the Centre Pompidou as chairman of the competition jury. Prouvé’s work encompasses a wide range of objects, from a letter opener to door and window fittings, from lighting and furniture to façade elements and prefabricated houses, from modular building systems to large exhibition structures – essentially, almost anything that is suited to industrial production methods. Curated Object Narratives & Details Cité Information about the Product Designer: Jasper Morrison Year Made: 2015 Vendor: FLOS Curated Object Narratives & Details Superloon Name: Superloon Information about the Designer The serene, harmonious glow of the moon inspired this innovative and first-of-its-kind design from artist Jasper Morrison. Using revolutionary Edge Lighting Technology, the Superloon combines maximum performance and efficiency with visual comfort. This striking floor lamp includes a Dim-to-Warm function that responds to adjustments in intensity: As it dims, light transitions from a colder blue to a warmer tone, as with a well-loved filament lamp. Jasper Morrison is an English product and furniture designer. Morrison was born in London, England. He was educated at Bryanston School. He received a Bachelor of Design degree from Kingston Polytechnic Design School in 1982 and a master’s degree in Design from the Royal College of Art, London, in 1985. He also studied at the Berlin University of the Arts, formerly the Hochschule für Bildende Künste. In March 2007, he was awarded an honorary doctorate in design from Kingston University. Morrison’s belief in creating unpretentious products that “do their job without messing up the atmosphere” reflects in each of his unique designs. In 1998, he began a longstanding relationship with FLOS and his iconic Glo-Ball lamps are among the company’s bestselling lighting designs. Curated Object Narratives & Details Superloon Information about the Product Designer: Marcel Wanders Year Made: 1999 Vendor: Cappellini Curated Object Narratives & Details Knotted Chair Name: Knotted Chair Information about the Designer The iconic Knotted Chair is a brilliant adult interpretation of the tiny chairs used to decorate a doll’s house, a visionary creation by designer Marcel Wanders. This project has been officially consecrated by earning a place in the permanent collections of the MoMA in New York, the V&A Museum in London and the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam. Marcel Wanders is a Dutch designer, and art director in the Powerhouse studio in Amsterdam, who designs architectural, interior and industrial projects. He became internationally known by his Knotted Chair. By eliminating the distinction between artisanship and industrial production, Wanders has turned this chair into work of art to be cherished in the home and integrated into our daily lives. The macramé technique that inspired the design of the Knotted Chair has been revisited in a surprising structure made of carbon covered with aramide fibre cord and then coated with epoxy resin. Thus, an innovative object was born, with an intrinsically romantic allure: a collector’s piece, utterly unique in the history of international design. Curated Object Narratives & Details Knotted Chair Information about the Product Designer: Campana Brothers Year Made: 1993 Vendor: Edra Curated Object Narratives & Details Vermelha Chair Name: Vermelha Chair Information about the Designer The woven loops of the Vermelha Chair may appear random, but in reality there is a structured method behind their chaotic appearance. This chair design incorporates techniques that are similar to weaving. Intertwined threads form the ropes, which are then hand-woven to form upholstery for the base of the chair. Five-hundred meters of red cotton ropes were used to make the Vermelha Chair. Made of iron, aluminum, and cord, the Vermelha Chair was inspired by materials and traditions of Brazilian weaving. Thread was intertwined to form the ropes, which were then hand-woven into upholstery. “We always say that first comes the material, then the form, and finally we elaborate the function of the product by studying its ergonomics, limitations, and capabilities,” explained Fernando and Humberto Campana, brothers and design partners. “The streets of São Paulo are a sort of laboratory for our designs. Whenever we need inspiration, we rely on the chaos and beauty of the city we live in.” The brothers purchased a large bunch of rope from a street stall and brought it back to their studio. They carefully studied the chaotic shape that the construction of the ropes formed when piled on a table. “At that moment we both looked at each other and almost simultaneously remarked, this is the chair we want to build. It is a representation of Brazil in its beautiful chaos and deconstructiveness.” Curated Object Narratives & Details Vermelha Chair Information about the Product Designer: Marco Zanuso Year Made: 1949 Vendor: Cassina Curated Object Narratives & Details Antropus Name: Antropus Information about the Designer The armchair is also available in an iconic edition featuring red cloth upholstery.At the end of the1940s The Skin of Our Teeth (La Famiglia Antropus) by Thornton Wilder, was one of the first comedies performed at the Piccolo Teatro in Milan, for which Zanuso was commissioned to design the scenery and furnishings.These included an armchair for which he used new materials with which he had been experimenting and that he christened the Antropus. Marco Zanuso was born in Milano. He was one of a group of Italian designers from Milan shaping the international idea of “good design” in the postwar years. Trained in architecture at the Politecnico di Milano university, he opened his own design office in 1945. From the beginning of his career, at Domus where he served as the editor from 1947–49 and at Casabella where he was editor from 1952–56, he helped to establish the theories and ideals of the energetic Modern Design movement. As a professor of architecture, design and town planning at the Politecnico from the late 1940s until the 1980s, and as one of the founding members of the ADI in the 1950s, he also had a distinct influence over the next design generation coming out of Italy. Curated Object Narratives & Details Antropus Information about the Product Designer: Omer Arbel Year Made: 2005 Vendor: Bocci Curated Object Narratives & Details 14 Name: 14 Information about the Designer 14 is an articulated, cast glass sphere with a frosted cylindrical void that houses either a low-voltage xenon or LED lamp. Individual pendants are visually subtle, but gain an atmospheric quality when multiplied and clustered in groups. Omer Arbel is a designer and sculptor based in Vancouver and Berlin. He is known for his work in materials research, ambient lighting design, house design, and as the creative director of Bocci, a Canadian manufacturing and design company. Arbel’s designs are numbered in order of creation; some have commercial potential and move into production while others remain conceptual or collectible. Curated Object Narratives & Details 14 Information about the Product Designer: Eileen Gray Year Made: 1969 Vendor: ClassiCon Curated Object Narratives & Details Bibendum Name: Bibendum Bibendum is a one of a kind. Nowhere in the history of design will one find an armchair that compares to this. It is captivatingly harmonious despite its size and unites a majestic impressiveness with charm and esprit like no other leather armchair. Eileen Gray underscored the character of her endearing parlour lion with twinkling irony, she named it after the Michelin man, whose form this armchair calls to mind. Curated Object Narratives & Details Bibendum Information about the Product Eileen Gray was an Irish architect and furniture designer and a pioneer of the Modern Movement in architecture. Over her career, she was associated with many notable European artists of her era, including Kathleen Scott, Adrienne Gorska, Le Corbusier, and Jean Badovici, with whom she was romantically involved. Her most famous work is the house known as E-1027 in Roquebrune-Cap-Martin, France. In some circles, Irish-born Eileen Gray is the figurative “poster-child” for the 20th century woman whose work is dismissed by a male-dominated culture. These days, her pioneering designs are revered. The New York Times claims that “Gray is now regarded as one of the most influential architects and furniture designers of the last century.” Eileen Gray may be best known for her furniture designs, beginning her career as a lacquer artist. “In her lacquer work and carpets,” writes the National Museum of Ireland, “she took traditional crafts and combined them in a radical manner with the principles of Fauvism, Cubism and De Stijl.” The museum goes on to claim that Gray was the “first designer to work in chrome,” and was working with tubular steel at the same time as Marcel Breuer. Curated Object Narratives & Details Bibendum Information about the Designer Designer: Moritz Waldemeyer, Ingo Maurer and Team Year Made: 2014 Vendor: Ingo Maurer Curated Object Narratives & Details My New Flame Name: My New Flame Information about the Designer Encontros is a group of anthropomorphic slender and impressive figures. They observe us, they look at each other —from great heights or closer ones—, probably from a distant place, which the viewer attempts to understand. The inside light they shine is the subtle expression of the human being’s strength, of its vital energy and potential. They are families of individuals who intend to dialog among themselves, from their own perspective and singularity, with their nuances. Ingo Maurer started to design exceptional lamps, lighting systems and objects beginning in the middle of the 1960s, which his company produces and distributes worldwide. This is why they can realize their ideas without compromises. For over four working decades, Ingo Maurer and Team – as he refers to the co-workers – has constantly grown. We are now a group of more than sixty people. The address in Munich, Schwabing has remained the same since 1970. However, in 2005 they outgrew their production facilities in the courtyard at Kaiserstrasse 47 and a new location for production and shipping was established on the outskirts of Munich. In the former production hall, Ingo Maurer and his team created a spacious showroom, the second after New York, and the only one in Europe. Curated Object Narratives & Details My New Flame Information about the Product Designer: Gerrit Thomas Rietveld Year Made: 1934 Vendor: Cassina Curated Object Narratives & Details Zig Zag Chair Name: Zig Zag Chair Information about the Designer Designed by Rietveld in 1934, this chair sees the normal legs-seatback sequence replaced by a single sheet of wood in an overturned Z shape. It was also one of the first examples of a cantilevered seat. Gerrit Thomas Rietveld was a Dutch furniture designer and architect. One of the principal members of the Dutch artistic movement called De Stijl, Rietveld is famous for his Red and Blue Chair and for the Rietveld Schröder House. In the early 1930s, Dutch department store Metz & Co. asked Gerrit Rietveld to do something unprecedented: design a chair for mass production. The architect agreed, proposing a Z-shaped perch made from four slices of sturdy elm supported by dovetail joints and metal screws. It was no standard seat, but to everyone’s surprise the armless, legless, cantilevered form—a mere sliver in profile—was simultaneously comfortable and sturdy. “It is not a chair but a designer’s joke,” Rietveld famously said of his Zig-Zag. Curated Object Narratives & Details Zig Zag Chair Information about the Product Designer: Antonio Citterio Year Made: 2001 Vendor: Flexform Curated Object Narratives & Details Groundpiece Name: Groundpiece Information about the Designer It is a deconstructed line with new proportions – the Groundpiece sofa is low and deep, designed as a more relaxed and casual approach to seating. Aware that changes in lifestyle spark new behaviors and needs, Groundpiece introduced a new dimension to the way the sofa is used, investing it with new functions. On today’s sofas, people rest, watch TV, read, and often work and even have dinner. This also led to the brilliant idea of redesigning the armrest concept. Antonio Citterio was born in Meda in 1950, started his design office in 1972, and graduated in architecture at the Milan Polytechnic in 1975. Between 1987 and 1996 he worked in association with Terry Dwan and, together, they designed buildings in Europe and Japan. In 2000, with Patricia Viel, he founded a practice for architecture and interior design, developing international complex long-term projects, at all scales and in synergy with a qualified network of specialist consultants. Curated Object Narratives & Details Groundpiece Information about the Product Designer: Piero Lissoni Year Made: 2008 Vendor: Living Divani Curated Object Narratives & Details Extra Soft Name: Extra Soft Information about the Designer Modular sofa with a casual aspect and a soft, more yielding and malleable comfort. Cosy and restful Piero Lissoni is an Italian architect and designer, known for his contemporary furniture design. seats which can be placed next to each other in a geometrical configuration, but with irregular contours. In 1986, he and Nicoletta Canesi founded the interdisciplinary studio Lissoni Associati in Milan, focusing on architecture as well as interior and product design. This was followed in 1996 by the agency for visual communication, directed by Massimo Lissoni, Graph.x, which specialises in brand identity, including catalogues, advertising campaigns, videos, web design and packaging, responsible since 2007 for the visual coordination of the Venice International Film Festival, organized by La Biennale di Venezia. Lissoni and his multinational team cover the areas of architecture, interior and product/light design, graphics, art direction and corporate identity. Projects extend globally to include private villas, residential buildings, offices, factories, theatres, restaurants and hotels, yachts. Curated Object Narratives & Details Extra Soft Information about the Product Designer: Roberto Barbieri Year Made: 1999 Vendor: Zanotta Curated Object Narratives & Details Lia Chair Name: Lia Chair Information about the Designer Leading the topic of chairs with an aluminium frame, Zanotta presented the chair Lia that proved to be innovative due to the increasingly advanced use of die-casting: the chair side is made of one single element in aluminium alloy which holds the front and back legs and the chair back. Roberto Barbieri’s skill in designing this chair was also that of expertly merging an important technological innovation with a neutral, unimposing idea of shape which can easily adapt to any environment and furniture style. Roberto Barbieri was born in Milan in 1942. He received his degree in architecture from the Milan Polytechnic in 1969. During the same year he and the architect Marco De Carli began working in the fields of design, architecture and graphic design. In 1970 his architectural and decorative designs were part of the exhibition “Living Space for 1970s Homes,” staged by the Lissone Furniture Body and the Faculty of Architecture. In 1975 he participated in the exhibit “Living Space in Public Buildings” organized within the 15th Milan Triennale. From the ‘80s, he designed and been art director for furniture makers. He has been working for Zanotta since 1994. He died in 2012. Curated Object Narratives & Details Lia Chair Information about the Product Designer: Ennio Arosio Year Made: 1991 Vendor: Santambrogio Curated Object Narratives & Details Simplicity Table Name: Simplicity Table This collection is based on the use of glass, “immaterial” material par excellence : assembled by Ennio Arosio according to a rigorous logic based on elementary planes and orthogonal projections, this material expresses new potentialities never experienced before and finally frees of those functional supports in wood or steel that for a long time assigned it the “secondary” role of simple finish. Curated Object Narratives & Details Simplicity Table Information about the Product Well-known Italian designer, in the business since the Seventies in the Furniture field, he cooperates constantly with national and international Brands. For him “planning” means to interpret reality and observe needs and wishes, to take inspiration from emotions and suggestions. He is convinced that design is everywhere: in a rock, in a drop, in a smile, in a sound. The designer’s duty is to pick out these sources of inspiration, and interpreting them. His job has two directions: one is research, the other is daily experience. In other words: theory and practice. His creations are solid, aimed to satisfy the needs of the always changing ways of modern living, because social and cultural changes are continuously in evolution and trends more and more evanescent. His projects are characterized by clean design, care for details, and use of quality materials. He was capable of overcoming cultural and geographical barriers combining western pragmatism with sensitiveness typical of the East. Fully versatile consultant for several Companies in the furniture branch, he follows the whole creative process, from research and development to market strategy, from product selection to stand set-up, from exhibition layout to communication. Curated Object Narratives & Details Simplicity Table Information about the Designer Designer: Mario Bellini Year Made: 1970 Vendor: Cassina Curated Object Narratives & Details CAB Chair Name: CAB Chair Information about the Designer Cab was the first-ever chair to feature a free-standing leather structure, inspired by how our skin fits over our skeleton. The pieces are sewn together only when their outer edges have been trimmed to ensure a perfect fit. Once assembled, the cover is attached to the chair’s steel skeleton and held in place by means of a zipper fastening, as in a bespoke tailored garment. “This was a new kind of chair, constructed totally out of leather, much cloned since then.” Thus Mario Bellini describes Cab, a best-seller that he designed in the 1970s, which is now a signature piece in Cassina’s I Contemporanei collection. Curated Object Narratives & Details CAB Chair Information about the Product Designer: Ingo Maurer Year Made: 1997 Vendor: Ingo Maurer Curated Object Narratives & Details Zettel’s 5 Name: Zettel’s 5 Information about the Designer Stainless steel, heat-resistant satin-frosted glass, Japanese paper. 31 printed and 49 blank paper sheets DIN A5. The Zettel’z 5 is one of Ingo Maurer’s best known lamps. It gives the user plenty of room for his or her own creativity, and can be set up so that it is space-consuming and loose or narrow and dense. The blank sheets of paper supplied with it are designed to be used for your own messages or sketches. The Japanese paper is very thin and translucent. Two bulbs provide good light. Ingo Maurer started to design exceptional lamps, lighting systems and objects beginning in the middle of the 1960s, which his company produces and distributes worldwide. This is why they can realize their ideas without compromises. For over four working decades, Ingo Maurer and Team – as he refers to the co-workers – has constantly grown. We are now a group of more than sixty people. The address in Munich, Schwabing has remained the same since 1970. However, in 2005 they outgrew their production facilities in the courtyard at Kaiserstrasse 47 and a new location for production and shipping was established on the outskirts of Munich. In the former production hall, Ingo Maurer and his team created a spacious showroom, the second after New York, and the only one in Europe. Curated Object Narratives & Details Zettel’s 5 Information about the Product Designer: Franco Albini Year Made: 1959 Vendor: Cassina Curated Object Narratives & Details Tre Pezzi Name: Tre Pezzi Information about the Designer The deep set, the back support ring that traces a perfect semi-circle and the half moon headrest, all have their own clean and distinct sharp geometric shape. Large, padded and embracing, they combine simplicity of form with a feeling of absolute comfort The tubular metal of the armrests borrows the detail of the Milanese underground handrails, another design by the same Master. He was a major figure in the Rationalist Movement, excelling in architectural, furniture, industrial and museum design. After receiving a degree in architecture from the Politecnico di Milano in 1929, he worked with the Ponti and Lancia design studios. His work for the magazine Casabella also played a key part in his development, marking his conversion to the Rationalist Movement and his becoming its spokesman on the Italian cultural scene. When he set up his own practice in Milan in 1931, he took on the challenge of workers’ housing and continued in this vein after the war, thanks to the opportunities offered by the reconstruction projects he worked on with Franca Helg from 1952. During the 1940’s, Albini expanded his collaboration with Cassina, which started with chair designs that paved the way for his signature style. He also pursued his furniture designs with other firms, such as Poggi. Curated Object Narratives & Details Tre Pezzi Information about the Product Designer: Patricia Urquiola Year Made: 2014 Vendor: Glas Italia Curated Object Narratives & Details Shimmer 1 Name: Shimmer 1 Information about the Designer Shimmer on. Multicolored glass pieces are meticulously cut and fastened together by hand to form an iridescent work of art. Finished with a light-reactive gloss, its enchanting spectrum magically changes hue depending on the vantage point of the beholder. Spanish by birth, and Italian by choice, Patricia Urquiola was born in Oviedo, Spain and studied architecture in Madrid before graduating from the Milan Politecnico in 1989. She was mentored by some of the masters of Italian industrial design: Achille Castiglioni oversaw her graduate thesis, and Vico Magistretti, with whom she designed her first projects. She learned her craft in Italy, and opened a studio in Milan in 2001. She has won numerous international accolades, including: The Medalla de Oro al Mérito en las Bellas Artes from the Spanish government; the order of Isabella the Catholic, presented to her by His Majesty King Juan Carlos I of Spain; “Designer of the decade” for the magazines Home and Häuser; “Designer of the Year” for the magazines Wallpaper, AD Spain, Elle Decor International and Architektur und Wohnen. Curated Object Narratives & Details Shimmer 1 Information about the Product Designer: Corbusier Year Made: 1928 Vendor: Cassina Curated Object Narratives & Details LC4 Name: LC4 The LC4 is the definitive chaise longue: built in a shape designed for relaxation, the chair was created when the three designers teamed together to put man at the centre of their design, taking the idea that form and function should be at the service of relaxation, creating a perfect balance between its geometric purity and its ergonomic intent. The stability of the frame – for any angle of inclination – is guaranteed by the friction through rubber tubes that cover the crossbar of the base. Curated Object Narratives & Details LC4 Information about the Product Charles-Édouard Jeanneret, known as Le Corbusier was a Swiss-French architect, designer, painter, urban planner, writer, and one of the pioneers of what is now called modern architecture. He was born in Switzerland and became a French citizen in 1930. His career spanned five decades, and he designed buildings in Europe, Japan, India, and North and South America. In his architecture, he chiefly built with steel and reinforced concrete and worked with elemental geometric forms. Le Corbusier’s painting emphasized clear forms and structures, which corresponded to his architecture. Le Corbusier placed systems of harmony and proportion at the centre of his design philosophy. His faith in the mathematical order of the universe was closely bound to the golden section, which he explicitly used in his Modulor system for the scale of architectural proportion. He saw this system as a continuation of the long tradition of the works of Vitruvius, Leonardo da Vinci and Leon Battista Alberti, and others who used the proportions of the human body to improve the appearance and function of architecture. Curated Object Narratives & Details LC4 Information about the Designer Designer: Charlotte Perriand Year Made: 1972 Vendor: Cassina Curated Object Narratives & Details Ventaglio Name: Ventaglio The special configuration of the top and the leg placement allow dynamic and flexible table usage, also by a greater number of persons with respect to a traditional configuration. Known for her collaborations with Le Corbusier and her Asian inspired designs, French architect Charlotte Perriand designed the Ventaglio 511 in 1972. Reissued by Cassina in 2004 as part of the Masters Series. Curated Object Narratives & Details Ventaglio Information about the Product Charlotte Perriand was a French architect and designer. Her work aimed to create functional living spaces in the belief that better design helps in creating a better society. In her article “L’Art de Vivre” from 1981 she states “The extension of the art of dwelling is the art of living—living in harmony with man’s deepest drives and with his adopted or fabricated environment.” Her approach to design includes taking in the site and appreciating it for what it is. Perriand felt she connected with any site she was working with or just visiting she enjoyed the living things and would reminisce on a site that was presumed dead. At Le Corbusier’s studio, she was in charge of their interiors work and promoting their designs through a series of exhibitions. Perriand described the work as being highly collaborative between Le Corbusier, Pierre Jeanneret, and herself; they were “three fingers on one hand.” In 1928 she designed three chairs from Corbusier’s principles that the chair was a “machine for sitting,” and that each of the three would accommodate different positions for different tasks. At Corbusier’s request a chair was made for conversation: the B301 sling back chair; another for relaxation: the LC2 Grand Confort chair; and the last for sleeping: the B306 chaise longue. Curated Object Narratives & Details Ventaglio Information about the Designer Designer: Nendo Year Made: 2014 Vendor: Desalto Curated Object Narratives & Details Softer Than Steel Bench Name: Softer Than Steel Bench “Softer than steel” is a poetic and delicate collection consisting of three benches, a chair, a collection of small tables, a coat stand and a range of shelves, created by the Japanese designer Nendo for Desalto.” A section of the bench has flipped up and turned into the backrest. Poles wrap around each other to become a coat stand. By adding flipped, bent and wrapped details to metal sheets and rods, the ordinarily hard metal gain new functionality and a light, flexible feel, as though the metal has become paper or cloth”. Nendo Curated Object Narratives & Details Softer Than Steel Bench Information about the Product Giving people a small ” ! ” moment. There are so many small ” ! ” moments hidden in our everyday. We’d like the people who’ve encountered nendo’s designs to feel these small ” ! ” moments intuitively. But we don’t recognize them. and even when we do recognize them,we tend to unconsciously reset our minds and forget what we’ve seen. That’s nendo’s job. But we believe these small ” ! ” moments are what make our days so interesting, so rich. That’s why we want to reconstitute the everyday by collecting and reshaping them into something that’s easy to understand. Curated Object Narratives & Details Softer Than Steel Bench Information about the Designer Designer: Sebastian Herkner Year Made: 2012 Vendor: ClassiCon Curated Object Narratives & Details Bell Side Table Name: Bell Side Table Hand-blown in the traditional manner using a wooden mold, the transparent tinted glass base asserts a sculptural presence recalling the elegant curving silhouette of a bell, contrasting intriguingly with the solid metal frame on top. With its appealing reflective surface and different materials, the side table celebrates the artisanal tradition and adds a distinctive touch to domestic interiors. Each table is handmade, meaning that small bubbles or bumps in the glass are a characteristic feature. Curated Object Narratives & Details Bell Side Table Information about the Product It took the German designer Sebastian Herkner only a few years to convince the whole design scene of his talent with his unusual material mixes and timeless shapes, always managing to communicate an impression of sensibility. Today, he is contributing to the collections of the most important design houses worldwide and has won numerous awards for his design. When designing everyday objects, Sebastian Herkner is influenced by his observations of people and their actions. In this context it is important to look beyond your own disciplines in order to achieve a value-added for the user. Herkner is not so much influenced by trends or current consumer criteria, because what interests him is a collage of simple techniques and traditional materials coupled with a simple mechanical principle and an unambiguous function. His idea of sustainability consists of employing traditional manufacturing techniques and their unique character. He then combines and interprets this by employing new technologies and finishing methods. Curated Object Narratives & Details Bell Side Table Information about the Designer Designer: Campana Brothers Year Made: 1928 Vendor: Edra Curated Object Narratives & Details Corallo Armchair Name: Corallo Armchair The free-form construction and orange hue of the Corallo Armchair mimic the natural structure and color of coral, the material that inspired it. Short fragments of steel wire are hand-bent and welded each onto the next, much like the budding and branching process by which coral grows underwater. A coat of epoxy paint protects the steel and seduces the eye with dazzling color. The result is a highly expressive sculptural seat perfectly suited for indoor or outdoor use. Curated Object Narratives & Details Corallo Armchair Information about the Product The Campana Brothers are Brazilian designers. In 1983, the two brothers teamed up to make furniture made of ordinary materials including scrap and waste products such as cardboard, rope, cloth and wood scraps, plastic tubes and aluminium wire. Wire is hardly a new material in furniture design. Charles Eames and Harry Bertoia recognized the mass- manufacturing potential of the material in their classic chairs of the early 1950s, and their rational form- follows-function approach to structural applications of steel wire continues to this day in the designs of Enzo Mari and Alfredo Haeberli. The Corallo Armchair distinguishes itself from this tradition and allies itself with a very contemporary design concern: emotional and psychological appeal. The Campana brothers avoid rectilinear, geometric construction suited for mass production in favor of a liberated, vital tangle of sensuous lines that make a virtue of the charming imperfections created by the maker’s hand. The evocation of coral lends the chair an appearance of having blossomed organically through its own DNAencoded growth patterns, completely free of the strictures of mass production. Indeed, no two Corallo chairs are alike. Curated Object Narratives & Details Corallo Armchair Information about the Designer Designer: Vico Magistretti Year Made: 1977 Vendor: Cassina Curated Object Narratives & Details Nuvola Rossa Name: Nuvola Rossa Information about the Designer Simplicity and essentialism are the main characteristics of this bookcase designed by Vico Magistretti in 1977 and produced in the same year. His first great success came with the world famous Carimate chair produced by the Cassina company. The chair was a bestseller for years and mixed rural simplicity (the straw of the seat) with urban sophistication. There were the smooth lines of the wooden supports and legs, the colour, the pop-art bright red frame and elements of Scandinavian design. A foldable bookcase which, according to Magistretti’s modus operandi, sprang from an analysis and reinterpretation a product type and the sum of its parts, the sides and shelves. From here, the object was reduced to the diagonal brace elements, used also as a support for the shelves, thus eliminating the sides. Curated Object Narratives & Details Nuvola Rossa Information about the Product Designer: Achille and Pier Giacomo Castiglioni Year Made: 1957 Vendor: Zanotta Curated Object Narratives & Details Mezzadro Name: Mezzadro Information about the Designer Acting out of both practical and intellectual motives, Achille and Pier Giacomo Castiglioni designed the Mezzadro Stool by bolting a tractor seat to a chrome and wood base. They were also inspired by the readymades of early 20th-century artist Marcel Duchamp, which combined preexisting objects into inventive constructions with new uses. By engaging in similar acts of appropriation, designers were able to create surprise and novelty with forms made from found materials. The Italian architect and designer brothers Achille Castiglioni and Pier Giacomo Castiglioni are among the greatest names of modern Italian design. Their father was a notable Italian architect Giannino Castiglioni, and also their brother Livio Castiglioni became an architect and designer. Achille and Pier Giacomo both studied architecture at the Politecnico di Milano and later worked there as teachers. Their collaboration was productive and innovative, and the designs were often radical and humorous. Some of their best-known works include the Mezzadro chair featuring a tractor seat, and many lighting designs for Flos, including the Snoopy table lamp and the floor lamp Toio that is lit by a car headlight. Pier Giacomo, who passed away in 1968, won six Compasso d’Oro awards during his career, and Achille was awarded the prestigious design award nine times. Curated Object Narratives & Details Mezzadro Information about the Product Designer: Carlo Mollino Year Made: 1949 Vendor: Zanotta Curated Object Narratives & Details Cavour Name: Cavour Information about the Designer Cavour table, design by Carlo Mollino in 1949 and Zanotta is now producing the piece, partially as a tribute to the great artist. This desk is as streamlined as the racing cars Mollino so admired. The sleek frame in natural or black stained oakwood contributes to the table’s light and dynamic presence. He was once credited as saying, “Everything is permissible as long as it is fantastic.” That credo was certainly reflected throughout his body of work. Mollino’s architecture and furniture are famous for their ability to enable occupants to manipulate volumes at a whim. The transparent 12mm glass top also keeps the piece’s appearance light and futuristic, while also giving it a touch of elegance. Curated Object Narratives & Details Cavour Information about the Product Designer: Jader Almeida Year Made: 2012 Vendor: Sollos Curated Object Narratives & Details Bizzet Name: Bizzet Information about the Designer The distinction in Almeida’s designs starts with the process itself. He begins designing without the intention of arriving at a specific piece and instead works to understand materials, manufacturing realities, and the assembly required to create. This method of working was ingrained early on in his childhood when he worked at his cousin’s classic furniture shop and absorbed the technical side of fine wood craftsmanship. With a clear approach to design, Jader Almeida fuses the spirit of modernist architecture with the poetry and vitality of Brazilian customs and craft. The young designer builds on his native culture, skillfully mixing elements from Nordic design and other international movements to create pieces that exude an honesty of materials and an attention to detail and form. From these inspirations, Almeida has created a design language that is distinctly his own, fueling a collection of over 150 pieces designed since the launch of his collection Sollos in 2004. Almeida tends to categorize human behavior as his “Alphabet”. Every “letter” symbolizing the process of examining methodically how to use a chair, how to talk when sitting on that chair, how it feels when paired with a table. He explains that when introducing his new collection, the next one does not replace the previous one. Each new piece is placed as if it were a word that joins the others forming an increasingly rich poem. Curated Object Narratives & Details Bizzet Information about the Product Designer: Nendo Year Made: 2011 Vendor: Cappellini Curated Object Narratives & Details Drop Name: Drop The bookshelf in our 2011 ‘dancing squares’ collection, released commercially by Cappellini. The tilted angle of the top shelf provides a variety of options for storing books – they can be opened to display particular pages, for example, draped over the angled top or stacked on a slant. We took away the back of the shelf so that it can be used from either side, expanding the places where it can be used, and offer the bookshelf in three sizes: two, four and five shelves. Curated Object Narratives & Details Drop Information about the Product Giving people a small ” ! ” moment. There are so many small ” ! ” moments hidden in our everyday. We’d like the people who’ve encountered nendo’s designs to feel these small ” ! ” moments intuitively. But we don’t recognize them. and even when we do recognize them,we tend to unconsciously reset our minds and forget what we’ve seen. That’s nendo’s job. But we believe these small ” ! ” moments are what make our days so interesting, so rich. That’s why we want to reconstitute the everyday by collecting and reshaping them into something that’s easy to understand. Curated Object Narratives & Details Drop Information about the Designer Designer: Piero Lissoni Year Made: 1999 Vendor: Living Divani Curated Object Narratives & Details Frog Lounge Name: Frog Lounge Frame in chromed tubular steel or painted with epoxy powders in grey aluminium colour, or in satin finished AISI316 stainless steel. Woven with the following materials: trim in natural and coloured rawhide (black, brown),hemp cord, profile in transparent and coloured PVC. The armchair can also be padded with the seat and back in polyurethane foam and acrylic fibre covers. Felt, leather or fabric upholstery. The covers of the fabric version arefully removable. Curated Object Narratives & Details Frog Lounge Information about the Product Piero Lissoni is an Italian architect and designer, known for his contemporary furniture design. In 1986, he and Nicoletta Canesi founded the interdisciplinary studio Lissoni Associati in Milan, focusing on architecture as well as interior and product design. This was followed in 1996 by the agency for visual communication, directed by Massimo Lissoni, Graph.x, which specialises in brand identity, including catalogues, advertising campaigns, videos, web design and packaging, responsible since 2007 for the visual coordination of the Venice International Film Festival, organized by La Biennale di Venezia. Lissoni and his multinational team cover the areas of architecture, interior and product/light design, graphics, art direction and corporate identity. Projects extend globally to include private villas, residential buildings, offices, factories, theatres, restaurants and hotels, yachts. Curated Object Narratives & Details Frog Lounge Information about the Designer Designer: Dagma Mombach, Ingo Maurer & Team Year Made: 1998 Vendor: Ingo Maurer Curated Object Narratives & Details Poul Poul Name: Poul Poul Information about the Designer Like a giant fortune cookie glowing with possibility, the Ingo Maurer Poul Poul Floor Lamp features a body that is formed and gently molded by pulling and wrapping delicate paper around a stainless steel frame. The Poul Poul goes through an elaborate paper dyeing process invented by textile artist Dagmar Mombach and is then transformed into a unique lighting fixture. Ingo Maurer started to design exceptional lamps, lighting systems and objects beginning in the middle of the 1960s, which his company produces and distributes worldwide. This is why they can realize their ideas without compromises. For over four working decades, Ingo Maurer and Team – as he refers to the co-workers – has constantly grown. We are now a group of more than sixty people. The address in Munich, Schwabing has remained the same since 1970. However, in 2005 they outgrew their production facilities in the courtyard at Kaiserstrasse 47 and a new location for production and shipping was established on the outskirts of Munich. In the former production hall, Ingo Maurer and his team created a spacious showroom, the second after New York, and the only one in Europe. Curated Object Narratives & Details Poul Poul Information about the Product Designer: Charles and Ray Eames Year Made: 1948 Vendor: Vitra Curated Object Narratives & Details La Chaise Name: La Chaise Information about the Designer Comprised of two bonded fiberglass shells, a chromed base, and natural oak feet, the chair exhibits a captivating elegance and allows for a wide range of sitting and reclining positions. The Eames La Chaise was never sold during Charles and Ray’s lifetime, as it proved too costly to produce; however, their Armchair design, which they entered into the same competition, won a prize and was produced in fiberglass to great success. Charles Ormond Eames, Jr. and Bernice Alexandra “Ray” Kaiser Eames were an American married team of industrial designers who made significant historical contributions to the development of modern architecture and furniture through the work of The Eames Office. Among their most well-known designs is the Eames Lounge Chair. Charles and Ray designed this lounge chair for The Museum of Modern Art’s 1948 “International Competition for Low-Cost Furniture Design.” Its name references both its function as well as Gaston Lachaise’s Floating Figure sculpture, whose shape the Eameses thought would fit the chair perfectly. Curated Object Narratives & Details La Chaise Information about the Product Designer: Piero Lissoni Year Made: 2017 Vendor: Porro Curated Object Narratives & Details Materic Name: Materic The Materic table, designed by Piero Lissoni, is a sculptural object where the absolute simplicity of design is juxtaposed to the sophistication of materials and workmanships. Materic features a round and tapered table top, laying on a turned truncated cone as a base. The top comes in marble, available in 6 fine nuances ranging from verde rameggiato to the more traditional white Carrara marble. The table top can also feature a rotating tray in the middle. Curated Object Narratives & Details Materic Information about the Product Piero Lissoni is an Italian architect and designer, known for his contemporary furniture design. In 1986, he and Nicoletta Canesi founded the interdisciplinary studio Lissoni Associati in Milan, focusing on architecture as well as interior and product design. This was followed in 1996 by the agency for visual communication, directed by Massimo Lissoni, Graph.x, which specialises in brand identity, including catalogues, advertising campaigns, videos, web design and packaging, responsible since 2007 for the visual coordination of the Venice International Film Festival, organized by La Biennale di Venezia. Lissoni and his multinational team cover the areas of architecture, interior and product/light design, graphics, art direction and corporate identity. Projects extend globally to include private villas, residential buildings, offices, factories, theatres, restaurants and hotels, yachts. Curated Object Narratives & Details Materic Information about the Designer Designer: Foster + Partners Year Made: 1948 Vendor: Vitra Curated Object Narratives & Details Nomos Table Name: Nomos Table Information about the Designer The frame of the Nomos table is conceived as a rigid, zoomorphic skeleton. The table can be adapted to satisfy wide range of needs, at home and in the office. A design which changed our way of thinking about the object that is the table forever. Nomos is the pioneer of all shared structure systems and a recognized icon of industrial design. Norman Foster is an English architect whose company, Foster + Partners, maintains an international design practice famous for high-tech architecture. He is one of the most prolific British architects of his generation. In 1999, he was awarded the Pritzker Architecture Prize, often referred to as the Nobel Prize of architecture. Curated Object Narratives & Details Nomos Table Information about the Product Designer: Poul Kjærholm Year Made: 1951 Vendor: Republic of Fritz Hansen Curated Object Narratives & Details PK25 Name: PK25 Information about the Designer The chair was designed by Poul Kjærholm in 1951, for his final graduation project at the School of Applied Arts in Copenhagen. Also known as the “Element” chair, is a fine example of the young Kjærholm’s eagerness to work with common, industrial materials. Kjærholm was determined to reduce the chair to a single piece of each material, resulting in the overarching hallmark of the chair: the continuous and rather complex steel frame that is bent from a single piece without joints and connections. Most of Kjærholm’s contemporaries opted for wood as their primary furniture construction material. Kjærholm chose steel as his primary, but always combined it with other materials such as wood, leather, cane or marble. “Steel’s constructive potential is not the only thing that interests me; the refraction of light on its surface is an important part of my artistic work. I consider steel a material with the same artistic merit as wood and leather,” he commented. Curated Object Narratives & Details PK25 Information about the Product Designer: Poul Kjærholm Year Made: 1955 Vendor: Republic of Fritz Hansen Curated Object Narratives & Details PK61 Name: PK61 Information about the Designer Despite the extreme distillation of the structure into a set of identical elements, the square and aesthetic design has the power of a manifesto and shows Kjærholm’s development from industrial designer to furniture architect. Most of Kjærholm’s contemporaries opted for wood as their primary furniture construction material. Kjærholm chose steel as his primary, but always combined it with other materials such as wood, leather, cane or marble. “Steel’s constructive potential is not the only thing that interests me; the refraction of light on its surface is an important part of my artistic work. I consider steel a material with the same artistic merit as wood and leather,” he commented. Curated Object Narratives & Details PK61 Information about the Product Designer: Alessandro Mendini Year Made: 2009 Vendor: Cappellini Curated Object Narratives & Details Proust Geometrica Name: Proust Geometrica Information about the Designer Proust was originally created in 1978 for the Palazzo dei Diamanti in Ferrara. It was immediately recognized as an icon of twentieth century design and one of the most renowned and essential reference points in the quest for form and aesthetic perfection. Cappellini inherited the piece in 1993 and today Proust Geometrica, upholstered and hand-finished according to tradition, preserves the forms of the original armchair while refreshing them and breathing new life into the image and value of the original design. Born in Milan, Alessandro Mendini is the former director of Casabella, Modo and Domus. The winner of a Compasso d’Oro and designer of the Groninger Museum in Groningen, the Casino in Arosa and the Forum in Omegna. He is a designer, architect and image consultant for Philips, Swarovski, Swatch, and Bisazza. Curated Object Narratives & Details Proust Geometrica Information about the Product Designer: Tom Dixon Year Made: 1991 Vendor: Cappellini Curated Object Narratives & Details S-Chair Name: S-Chair Information about the Designer The S-Chair Tom Dixon is an iconic piece that embodies its name with a smooth S-shaped structure that instantly catches the eye. The construction is simple yet ingenious, featuring a base of dark lacquered metal and a wickerwork seat and backrest. British designer Dixon established his brand Tom Dixon in London in 2002 and specialises in lighting and furniture design. High-profile works include the Restaurant at The Royal Academy in London, the Jamie Oliver restaurant Barbecoa and Shoreditch House. His works are exhibi