BEST OF MILAN DESIGN WEEK 2013

Valcucine makes a case for the artisan in the kitchen. Milan 2013.

Jul 19, 2013

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The artisan appears in 1993 when the ‘Fabula‘ model was launched, the first kitchen with colored wood and doors inlaid with pictograms. For the designer Gabriele Centazzo, it represented the Mediterranean dream. In 2009 Valcucine presented ‘Invitrum‘, the first 100% recyclable base unit in glass and aluminum. In 2013, both art and tech reappear together as Valcucine’s Milan showroom creatively presents their master craftsmen who set up real workshops showing how they create inlays, mosaics and carvings. We also see the reappearance of Centazzo designing SineTempore (without time), a kitchen conceived to express the values of tradition through the recovery of various ancient handicraft techniques.

With Invitrum, the production process of recycled aluminium has the advantage of consuming only one-twentieth of the energy needed to obtain primary aluminium. Traditional kitchens usually supply base units that are installed side-by-side which means that the chipboard side panel is doubled; Valcucine’s structure has simply a single carcass side in glass. The new glass system is designed to be easily disassembled using only mechanical joints instead of glues.

In the showroom product technicians shared the tests, here Diego Skerlic, a quality official, uses an eyedropper of various stain producing ingredients such as coffee and red wine, as he helps develop fully resistant long-lasting materials.

Laura Carraro and Lisa Battistutta were introduced to Valcucine as mosaic art students and the two continue to collaborate and create for them.

above and below, kitchen program SineTemporare | 2013

Wood sculpture Padovan Giovanni carves away.

Most recently, after three years of research, Valcucine has developed a technique to make inlaid art on glass. The highly technological process is rooted in handmade craft and makes it possible to personalize a kitchen with ideas offered by artists, architects and designer or even by the home owner.

artematica vitrum arte programme

And even more recently Chicago graphic designer Rick Valicenti and John Pobojewski of (thirst) alerts us to the very same process used for the Valcucine Chicago showroom for NeoCon 2013. The installation of The Elizabeth Project (formally named E) consist of ribbons of colored vinyl cut by hand and infused in glass. ‘Elizabeth’ is the daughter of Chicago architect Gordon Gill: the collaboration done in 2009 when Elizabeth was nine. thirst used motion capture technology and custom software to sample Elizabeth’s energy as she danced in place. [ details ]

e | thirst | 2009

[ valcucine ]

My nose my stekkerdoos: studio job for lensvelt. Milan 2013.

Jun 25, 2013

We were quite looking forward to talk to Job Smeets and Nynke Tynagel of Studio Job, whose creations can stress art as the counterpoint to design, can be wildly fun, unpredictable and we anticipated an equally lively chat. A healthy body of work affirms modernism though their sculptural translations also resemble sophisticated contraptionisms of time-traveling with Jules Verne. Tonight, Studio Job is presenting their new ‘Job Office’ collection for Lensvelt. The collection consists of a buffet cabinet, a desk, and an LED lamp and is an extension of the Job Cabinet launched by Studio Job in Milan 2011 – a metal cabinet with a single door that also comes with a gold-colored key. The venue, the refectory within the monastery within the Museum of Science and Technology. The walls and ceilings covered with beautiful 18th-century Sala del Cenacolo frescoes. ‘The Wall’ is our background music.

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[DA] The chosen space is extremely surreal. And the installation’s teaser promotion is of famous people with golden noses. Job, please explain this concept for us.
[JOB] Do you know what stekkerdoos means?

[DA] Please tell us.
[JOB] The concept is ‘stekkerdoos’ translated from Dutch means multiple socket, in this case, my nose, my socket. And you know, I have a strange nose. In high school I was told my nose looked like a socket. But on the other hand, the nose is also a handle to open a drawer in an office desk.

[DA] This is a story about turning a negative into a positive.
[JOB] I think so. Yes feel the handle, feel the nostrils. Finally you can open a drawer by putting your fingers in the nostrils and you don’t have to worry about your mother saying you can’t do that. After all these years.

[DA] An ultimate revenge.
[JOB] Yes, exactly.

[DA] When did you think of this concept.
[JOB] I knew it when I was 15. It just took 25 years to make it happen.

[DA] Tell us about the ‘Job Office’ collection.
[JOB] Lensvelt makes office furniture and people today are working more and more in their home. So we are trying to personalize this experience. These pieces are very modernistic, in a modern style, like this lamp that goes back to the 50s and we also merged a sculptural presence to the pieces. A merger of the right industrial product with the gilded sculpture.

[DA] The nose is a very organic statement and the gilded button is huge.
[JOB] Yes, regarding the nose I was looking for a handle and maybe we were looking for a human statement. An the most iconic thing about the lamp is this big on/off button. And there are 100 lamps in this installation celebrating 100 years of Lensvelt. Like a big KGB office with all these lights for interrogation.

[DA] This space, this installation. Reminds me of the crazy offices in the movie ‘Brazil’.
[JOB] Exactly. This reminds me of the Pink Floyd movie ‘The Wall’ where you could see all the hammers. That’s the reason for ‘The Wall’ background music.

[DA] How does humor play into your design concepts.
[JOB] Humor is quite important. Human beings are already too serious, especially taking themselves too serious.

[DA] Several designers we talked to mention noise and chaos and they are providing ‘peace’ and ‘natural’.
[JOB] Peace and natural is not new in design. All of us are just mirrors. I feel our design is reflecting what we are up to and our environment isn’t that peaceful. And our environment is very surreal, it’s never what you think it is.

[DA] What expression are we looking for here. Something good looking?
[JOB] No. We must all admit that we are like those sparrows who try to steal the bling. We are all attracted to stuff that shines. And of course we are attracted to beautiful things and I like to play with that a little bit. But I’m not interested in aesthetics at all. I’m interested in how humanity functions, in the seducing quality of the bling bling. The sculptural aspect can be seen in our work: We have created a lot of huge gold sculptures. And the office is all about function and we about are looking for a fresh a personal look for office furniture.

[DA] Is there a sustainable aspect of the office collection.
[JOB] Sustainable is important but the term is a marketing term. What we do is make unique pieces that are well made, and some of the pieces cost quite a bit. These pieces will be handed down from generation to generation, never thrown away. Some are museum quality and they will last a long time. It could be that 100 years from now there will be more Studio Job products around than Ikea and they are so much bigger.

job and nynke in the studio | photo: t. wolzak

[DA] What is your office environment like?
[JOB] Nynke and I work in a concrete environment, like a bunker. We are surrounded by modern design from the 50s and 60s. I like the period a lot, the post war reconstruction period. If I had lived in the 50s our work would reflect that period. I’m sure if Pierre Jeanneret or Jean Prouvé lived today their work would look so different. That’s what I mean about reflecting time, the work is really a diary. It’s such a tragic thing to be a designer when the only thing we can do is dematerialize. But this can be inspiring, if you can be as less a designer as possible and maybe make art. The conflict of design and art is quite interesting.

[DA] Everything here tonight for Lensvelt are production pieces. Though your body of work includes a great deal of collectables.
[JOB] Studio Job is in the collections of maybe 40 museums. And we have many solos exhibitions around the world. So we enjoy and thrive on limited edition sculptural pieces but we are also invited by producers to create production objects.

[DA] Is the function different with limited vs production.
[JOB] It can be. It really has to do with the working with the brands and their objectives. But our mindset is to push the solutions as far as we can. I see this philosophy in fashion, in haute couture, which has a strong sculptural aspect to it. And haute couture inspires the creation and production of products which still possess the sculptural quality but becomes more reachable to the larger audience.

[ Dutch Profiles ] are short documentaries about architects, graphic, product and fashion designers in the Netherlands. The series debuted in 2009 and there are currently 85 videos plus 10 in production to date.

[design miami basel 2013 ] 10/12> chartres | carpenters workshop gallery | 2013
13/15> black cat | carpenters workshop gallery | 2013

[ neocon 2013 ] 16/17> aftermath | maharam | 2013
18> bavaria | maharam | 2013

[ studio job ] [lensvelt ] [ salone internazionale del mobile ]

mirra 2 herman miller. milan 2013.

May 6, 2013

We’re in the Milan Herman Miller showroom with designer Clauda Plikat and engineer Roland Zwick, two of the four-person team with Studio 7.5 who designed Mirra.

mirra 2 | studio 7.5 | 2013

Created in 2003, ten years (and 1.5M sold) later, Mirra 2 is yes, smaller, lighter, stronger and greener than the original At first glance you can see a more svelte profile but it takes a bit more to see the new details. Sitting in Mirra 2 you can feel a difference and if fine-tuning while sitting in the chair is an important criteria the new chair is more intuitive.

mirra | studio 7.5 | 2003

[Claudia Plikat] Herman Miller had called us and said they were thinking about when Mirra would be ten years old in 2013. They asked if we would be willing to revisit the project and see if the concept as a whole is still valid, or are there elements we would like to rethink. We were eager to look at Mirra again though it’s quite a challenge to reinvent your work because as a designer and an engineer, you already the gave blood, sweat and tears the first time.

Mirra was designed as a one-size fits all chair which means it’s adjustable. From the beginning we wanted to have both active and passive adjustments. So when you sit in the chair for the first time it begins to adjust to your body on it’s own. Mirra 2 soul and essential DNA remain intact.

[Roland Zwick] On the new chair we aimed for a more adaptive chair back. We created a patented new system of support: a refined shell with larger holes; a new ‘butterfly back’ structure with controls to vary the tension of a new membrane surface.

[CP] The membrane is much like nature and it’s structure of the leaf, the veins providing rigidity and the skin completes the support, very adaptive to the shape of your body. The seat itself is new. The foam pad from under the seat is gone and uses the new membrane to create a very breathable chair. The new ‘dial-up’ controls give you immediate feedback.The chair’s name “Mirra is a synonym for ‘mirroring your body’ and Mirra 2 advances this idea.

[RZ] We are most proud of the new ‘engine’ which is an assemblage that holds all the parts in place: the chair easily assembles or disassembles without the need for tools and is now produced and assembled in-house at Herman Miller. The new chair is 25% lighter because aluminum was substituted for steel and plastic, aluminum is corrosion-proof and only needs a blast of ceramic paint. Aluminum is 90% recyclable.

[DA] Tell us about the actual design thru production process.
[RZ] We may be unusual in that we don’t sketch. We immediately start building prototypes ourselves. We may start with foam then move to a 3-D computer rendering and use the print to make aluminum parts for testing. These studies are only for our own nosiness and see how the parts go together. To test we eventually need the real part and eventually make very accurate one-off parts. We make a few prototype chairs that lack detailing, but these unfinished chairs will go through boot camp designed to mimic 10,000 sittings, or movements to see what if anything shows unusually quick wear-and-tear, or breaks.

[DA] How do you determine what material to use?
[RZ] Actually most of the solutions are about geometry and not materials. Once we have the geometry and the function determined we can determine the material. As a designer you want to have this honesty of the material. We usually use polypropylene for it’s strength/weight, ease of use, and it recycles well and we now use more aluminum.

[CP] Of interest, the fancy materials are difficult to recycle because they are not well-known enough. A well-known material, the recipe is well-known and the industry knows how to handle it. You really don’t know what’s in many new materials and that’s a risky environmental problem.

[DA] Tell us about the designer / engineer relationship.
[CP] A designer is not an expert, whereas an engineer is an expert in their specialty. To arrive at something new you have to forget conventional methods. An experienced designer knows enough to operate in between specialties. Engineers working with designers are more comfortable experimenting and taking some risks. Roland and I are always talking. Can we take out material here, can we make this side wider and this thinner: form and function at the ground level.

[DA] Which comes first, form or function?
[CP] We don’t start with the form. From our perspective it doesn’t make sense. If you observe how the object functions, how it is used, the form is always the expression of the performance. When we work on objects, we wind up giving parts names. Like ‘fly-back’ which is pretty much the function we are trying to achieve. That’s our inspiration, the bionic universe. Maybe you look at nature very close and see how nature does things.

8>13 brian rea illustrations
14>17 studio 7.5
16> Claudia Plikat, Burkhard Schmitz, Carola Zwick, Roland Zwick

[ herman miller ] [ studio 7.5 ] [ illustrations > brian rea ]

The masters: jean nouvel project. Milan 2013.

Apr 28, 2013

French designer Jean Nouvel tells an intriguing story with his Office for Living Project. 30 years from now if we look back at today’s office we will be stunned to find them — unlivable. In this installation there are several components. One is ‘il maestro’ a tribute to the masters amid a rejection of corporate environments.

standard desk, metropole chair n 308 | jean prouvé | 1943/50

Renault x ross lovegrove. Milan 2013.

Mar 21, 2013

images courtesy renault | click > enlarge

Ross Lovegrove has done a car for Renault. It will be shown in Milan on 8 April, part of a search for new forms of Renault design language in the future. The images suggest Lovegrove’s biomimetic vocabulary at work: check the branching wheel forms. [ renault ] [ ross lovegrove ]

spoiler detail

nature-influenced wheel

ripple pattern

fog lamp detail

nature-influenced alloy design