cranbrook academy of art – DesignApplause

design miami 2014. preview.

Nov 17, 2014

above> peter marino: design miami/ 2014 design visionary award winner

above> zaha hadid’s site-specific installation at design.05 miami / recent photo of the moore building

ten years ago, a small fair for collectible design named design.05 miami launched concurrently with art basel miami beach. located in the moore building in the miami design district, it offered a selection of fifteen invited exhibitors, with the stated aim of bringing museum-quality galleries together with the best collectors, connoisseurs, and designers from around the world in one of the premier destinations for art and design.

fast forward 10 years. rodman primack, executive director of design miami/ stated, “the fair grew out of the need for a consolidated marketplace that would act as a platform to showcase the range and strength of what was then a fledgling market.” adding, “since then, the collectible design market has really changed in scale; it’s internationalized and diversified, and this is reflected very clearly in the fair. design miami/ has changed the way galleries engage with their audiences. i am excited to see this ecosystem bringing so many distinct viewpoints and aesthetics together.”

above> a rare photo (designapplause can never get him to pose) of muecke with a model of the pavilion concept

[ pavilion commission ]
minneapolis-based designer jonathan muecke has been commissioned to create the pavilion for the tenth anniversary of design miami/.

the design miami/ pavilion commission has become an important feature of the fair. an ephemeral extension of the fair space itself, the pavilion is at once an exhibit and a piece of functional temporary architecture. while the commission is traditionally given to an early career architect or studio, for its tenth anniversary design miami/ has selected a designer whose practice reflects the multifaceted nature of the fair itself.

alexandra cunningham cameron, creative director at design miami/ commented, “for our tenth anniversary, we wanted to pay homage to the type of young designer that design miami/ wishes to champion – one who experiments with materials, form and scale; who is as much a theorist as a maker; and who challenges us to consider how we relate to the world built around us.”

muecke studied architecture at iowa state, interning at the architectural office of herzog & de meuron in basel, switzerland before studying design at the cranbrook academy of art. muecke has evolved a design practice that resists standard divisions between design, art and architecture, instead focusing on refined forms that investigate notions of positive and negative space that relate to humanscale.

centered around a double-layered circular structure with apertures at both poles, muecke’s design miami pavilion (dmp) is designed on a human scale, rejecting monumentality in favor of lightness and variability.

above> in a not so rare photo of peter marino in leather on metal on leather. a leather vest pricked all over with metal studs, leather wrist guards with metal spikes, a leather hat with a metal skull, a strand of leather hanging from his neck which holds some metal knives, leather belt, metal belt buckle, metal knuckles with skulls, leather pants, leather boots. all the leather is always black.

[ new initiatives ]
design miami/ is launching two new forward-looking initiatives this year: the exhibition strand design curio, and the design visionary award.

conceived as contemporary ‘cabinets of curiosity’, the four independently curated design curio booths scattered throughout the fair will take the widest possible view of design practice. they will go beyond the scope of collectibledesign to embrace diverse fields from science and technology, to handcraft,and from unrealized prototypes to esoteric collections.

[ design visionary ]
the inaugural design visionary award recognizes peter marino. with this award, design miami/ recognizes marino for his achievements as an architect, for his knowledge and status as a collector of design, art and the decorative arts, and for the impact he has had as an advisor on contemporary and twentieth century design to his numerous clients.

commenting on the first edition of this award, primack stated, “this award is about recognizing the figures that have really propelled the world of design in the broader sense. peter is a great talent, and is also an amazing patron of others’ talents. his knowledge of furniture, his ability to create collections in design and his work with leading brands to help them understand the importance of bringing design voices into their world have substantially impacted the market and the language of design”.

marino founded his eponymous architecture, planning and design studio in new york in 1978 having trained with i. m. pei and george nelson. early clients included andy warhol, yves saint laurent and pierre bergé, and gianni and marella agnelli.

[ 2014 exhibitors ]
ammann gallery – cologne
antonella villanova – florence
caroline van hoek – brussels
carpenters workshop gallery – london & paris
carwan gallery – beirut
casati gallery -chicago
cristina grajales gallery – new york
demisch danant – new york
edward cella art + architecture – los angeles
erastudio & apartment-gallery – milan
galerie jacques lacoste – paris
galerie kreo – paris
galerie maria wettergren – paris
galerie pascal cuisinier – paris
galerie patrick seguin – paris
galerie vivid – rotterdam
galleria o. – rome
gallery diet – miami
gallery seomi – seoul & los angeles
hostler burrows – new york
jason jacques inc. – new york johnson trading gallery – new york
jousse entreprise – paris
laffanour – galerie downtown – paris
louisa guinness gallery – london
magen h gallery – new york
moderne gallery – philadelphia
nilufar gallery – milan
ornamentum – hudson
pierre marie giraud – brussels
priveekollektie contemporary art + design – heusden aan de maas
r & company – new york
southern guild – cape town
victor hunt design art dealer – brussels
volume gallery – chicago

[ special exhibitions ]
of the 35 galleries at design miami/ 2014 11 are among those that participated in the first year of the fair in 2005. several of these founding galleries present special exhibitions that celebrate the growth of the collectible design market over the past decade. these include a display dedicated to public commissions in france from the 1960s and 70s from demisch danant; an exhibition on the functional, durable furniture created for universities by charlotte perriand, jean prouvé and le corbusier from galerie patrick seguin; a monograph on rick kauffman’s new york art et industrie gallery and the creative crossover surrounding it from magen h gallery, and newly commissioned works debuting at the fair with cristina grajales gallery, galerie kreo, r & company and nilufar.

[ special commissions ]
design miami/ 2014 features a significant number of special commissions, including works in glass, stone and acrylic. ammann//gallery presents the sakala vase by satyendra pakhalé, his first work in blown murano glass; galerie vivid presents commissioned works by finnish-born designer janne kyttanen, which take the designer’s 3d printed aluminum sedona bench as their point of departure; max lamb creates a granite lamp for johnson trading gallery made over six days using stitch drilling, and jeweler ted noten unveils a table – his first foray into furniture – at ornamentum.

[ a bronze age ]
it may have associations with the earliest days of human craft, but bronze is very much the material of the moment at design miami/. from artist jewelry to monumental decorative works, via furniture and lighting, the cast metal is deployed across multiple formats at this year’s fair. casati gallery introduces the work of chicago-based designer steven haulenbeek with a collection of bronze mirrors, furniture, lights and objects all distinguished by the ‘chaotic texture’ produced by casting in ice. carwan gallery debuts furniture pieces combining bronze, onyx, mother of pearl, resins, fine inlaid wood and silver-plated brass by italian architect vincenzo de cotiis. carpenters workshop gallery shows a new collection of iconoclastic architectural-themed bronzes from studio job; and new furniture pieces and jewelry by claude lalanne are exhibited by louisa guinness gallery.

[ cabinets of curiosity ]
spanning the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, design curio/ presents four immersive environments of objects, textures, artifacts and ideas that truly challenge and contextualize familiar design narratives. this first edition, in celebration of the fair’s 10th anniversary, emphasizes surprising installations of scientific research alongside handcraft and creative production. these include oceanic art and design endeavor coral morphologic’s blue room, offering a coral-eye view of miami’s aquatic waterscapes; beijing’s gallery all presenting naihan li’s latest installation from her i am a monument series, recreating beijing’s cityscape to a scale of 1:100 with billowing smog rising amongst buildings reimagined as furniture pieces. koenig & clinton and joe sheftel gallery partner to present a collection of sottsass objects interacting with works by the memphis group in a jewel-box space; patrick parrish gallery invites visitors to experience the vertiginous grid-based exhibition: surfaces on which your setting and sitting will be uncertain, displaying a group of sculptural furniture objects by ro/lu with matching clothing designs by various projects.

event> design miami/ 2014 @designmiami #designmiami
dates> 3 – 7 december 2014
venue> meridian & 19th street miami beach, usa
december 3-4/ 10am-8pm
december 5/ 11am-8pm
december 6/ 12-8pm
december 7/ 12-6pm

Alessi in love. Design contest.

Aug 1, 2013

NEW: The stakes have been raised. Three additional seats are available for the workshop and the deadline is extended to 3 December 2013.

Italian ‘Design Factory‘ Alessi invites you to rethink the product as an act of love. The aim is to interpret a love token in a contemporary way, designing a new object that celebrates this universal emotion. The best proposals, selected by a jury headed by Alberto Alessi, will grant you access to an exclusive workshop conducted by Laura Polinoro, for the development of the new Alessi collection. [ details ] [ alessi ] [ cranbrook academy of art / alessi workshop ]

contest dates: 1 august > 7 october 2013 EXTENDED > 3 December 2013

Cranbrook for alessi unbelievably successful. Design miami 2012.

Dec 13, 2012

entranceway to alessi store in miami design destrict | click > enlarge

Last Spring Alessi introduced ‘Metal Workshop Cranbrook for Alessi’ at ICFF 2012, and to also celebrate the of reopening of their remodeled Soho storefront. That same exhibit was moved to Alessi’s year-old Miami Design District store for Design Miami 2012. Tomorrow the design fair opens. We’re here to check out ‘Workshop’. Paolo Cravedi, Alessi’s Managing Director North America is there to greet us.

[ DesignApplause ] Paolo, please tell us about Metal Workshop.
[ Paolo Cravedi ] Our collaboration with Cranbrook started back in 2009 when Alberto Alessi was invited to Cranbrook for a lecture. And of course you probably know that Cranbrook has an incredibly important modern American design history which gave us people like Charles Eames, Harry Bertoia and Florence Knoll.

Alberto was really fascinated by the beautiful campus which was designed by Eero Saarinen, and Saarinen directed the school for many years. It was magical and Alberto felt like Cranbrook was the last link to this chain of Arts & Crafts movement that’s been going on and on, for centuries really. These things really hit Alberto to the point where there was this spark between Cranbrook and him. Cranbrook was interested in collaborating with an Italian design factory and experimenting with Alessi. For Alberto the interest was working with an institution with a powerful design heritage like Cranbrook.

The workshop was quite open. The only condition that Alberto gave to Cranbrook was that the alumni and students selected had to be metal experts at the hands-on level. That’s one thing that’s very important, if there was one thing that was very visible during this vist to Cranbrook was the knowledge that Cranbrook indeed was hands-on. The school also has state-of-the-art equipment, 3D rendering.

The selected team worked in very different typologies. Some typologies are very familiar in the Alessi catalog and some were very new and experimental. All through the workshop the contact between Cranbrook and Alessi was kept using a blog. With the distance and time difference the blog proved to be an amazing long-distance collaboration tool. The students posted all of their ideas and sketches, and pictures of the prototypes and Alberto and his team would look at the presentations and they could then give direction to the students.

Off all the projects that were presented, four were produced in 2012. They are hitting the stores as we speak. One is called them is called ‘Trellis’ designed by Scott Klinker. It’s a basket in steel colored with white epoxy resin. Scott also was the director of this particular workshop. It’s a perforated sheet of metal then bent on the four corners. The inspiration for ‘Trellis’ came from elements found around the campus.

trellis | scott klinker | 2012

Another project is called the ‘V Tray’ by Adam Shirley. It comes in two versions: black metal and polished stainless steel. This is a concept born from the idea of what a folded piece of metal can do. He experimented with many shapes but liked the simple accordion fold. ‘V Tray’ can be used both for the desk or the kitchen.

v tray | adam shirley | 2012

Yet another project is call ‘Pinch’ also by Adam Shirley. His goal was to take a very raw steel industrial pipe and give it a very simple manipulation, in this case, a pinch at one end. This solution created a flower vase. There are some nice details in this shape like making it easier to display flowers.

pinch | adam shirley | 2012

The last of the four pieces that’s in production is from John Truex and he calls it ‘Dear Charlie’ which is a banana tree. In the words of the designer ‘this is just a tree waiting for its fruit’. The tree can also be used to hang jewelry, keys, and of course definitely perfect for grapes and bananas. The bottom of the base is rubber and the base is heavy. No wobble in ‘Dear Charlie’.

dear charlie | john truex | 2012

[DA] Paolo, what have we learned to date from this workshop?
[PC] The workshop model is important to Alessi and offers many advantages. One is to experiment and try this and that and obviously also to be introduced to new talent. We have learned that the Cranbrook workshop was very fertile, it produced four very very nice products. And as of today, ‘Dear Charlie’ is one of our best sellers during this period. And Alessi has a new typology: the banana holder. Unbelievably successful.

[DA] A new product is like shooting an arrow in the air, you don’t know exactly where it’s going to land, meaning which ideas are grasped by the public.
[PC] That’s exactly right. Although we believe everything we place into production has been carefully selected you don’t know really. Yet we have been pleasantly surprised by the success of many projects through the years. Like ‘Dear Charlie.’

[DA] Alessi opened this space a year ago at last year’s Design Miami. This building is filling up and I can’t help but notice your neighbors in this courtyard. I see Arclinia, Driade, Flos, Maxalto, Moroso, Zanotta…
[CD] That’s right, we’ve been here one year. The retail consultant who leased space for our neighbors and us too likes to call this little Milan. There’s also a new and excellent Italian restaurant right over there, MC Kitchen.

paolo cravedi

[DA] What a wonderful story behind each of these new products. It should inspire the design students for sure. Grazie e ciao Paolo.
[PC] Ciao Ron, and thank you for the visit.

exhibition runs from 4 > 31 december 2012 | 4141 n.e. 2nd avenue [ alessi shop ] [ aless fall/winter 2012 ] [ miami design destrict ]

ICFF 2012: alessi and cranbrook show off metal workshop.

May 23, 2012

click > enlarge

To celebrate New York Design Week and the reopening of Alessi’s Soho storefront after two months of renovations, the renowned Italian metalworks manufacturer and design house presented “METAL WORKSHOP: Cranbrook for Alessi,” an exhibition of products from their collaboration with the Cranbrook Academy of Art, the country’s top ranked, graduate-only program in architecture, design, and fine art.

In 2009 Alessi initiated a workshop co-directed by Cranbrook 3D Designer-in-Residence, Scott Klinker, and Metalsmithing Artist-in-Residence, Iris Eichenberg. Ten participants were chosen for the week-long, hands-on experiment in metal working. The studio was loaded with metal types from a local supplier that included sheet, rod, tube, solid block and I-beams, and the participants had 24-hour access to the shop to play with the materials and develop product proposals and pre-production samples. They met for loose critiques throughout the week and brainstormed about “American Typologies,” products specific to American culture.

According to Alberto Alessi, “The idea to organize this workshop came to me during a visit to Cranbrook in 2009. This visit gave me the opportunity to experience the existence of a clear attitude typical of the Arts and Crafts movement, and also typical of silver and metalsmiths, that has always intrigued me so much because it is so rare in European design.”

Klinker added that “When Alberto Alessi visited Cranbrook in 2009, he seemed especially impressed with the material experiments in the studios. His vision for a collaborative workshop was very specific: search for new forms in metal through a hands-on, craft process in the metal shop. The workshop addressed two main questions. First, what forms will metal take? Then later, what Alessi products might come from those forms? The final products seem to capture this fascination with the physical manipulation of metal.”

Four the products created during the workshop will be made by Alessi and released later this year. You can see a few of them pictured here, including Scott Klinker’s Patterned Bowl Studies and my personal favorite, the Pinch Vase by Adam Shirley. The banana easel is Dear Charlie by John Truex. Stop by Alessi Soho (130 Greene Street), which was, coincidentally, designed by Cranbrook graduate Hani Rashid (1985) , or follow the project on their blog.

about perrin drumm