Studio 7.5 – DesignApplause

Events planner. ICFF 2014

May 7, 2014

the 26th annual [ international furniture fair ] is at new york city’s jacob k. davits convention center. we’ll alert you to events of interest, adding them to this post as they come in. we will be attending. following @ICFF #ICFF @wanteddedsign #wanteddesign @IndustryCityBK @NYCxDESIGN #nycxdesign

[ be original ]

sunday, 18 may | 2 > 3p / [ be original americas ] returns to [ wanted design ] with a hard hitting look at why original design is important – to everyone. amanda dameron (editor-in-chief, dwell), will lead a prestigious panel to explore how in the advent of our Internet age, good design is available to the consumer through myriad channels. so how can the design industry continue to educate the public about making informed choices, honoring authentic design and eschewing the convenience of knockoffs? panelists include felix burrichter (editor & creative director, pin up), giulio cappellini (art director and creative managing director, cappellini), paolo cravedi (managing director, alessi na), nasir kassamali (president, luminaire), bonnie mackay (bmackay consulting) and mark schurman (director, corporate communications, herman miller

event> be original americas panel: design for our times: authentic or bust! #BeOriginal @BeOriginalUSA
where> wanteddesign | conversation lounge | 11th avenue at 27th street
[ more information ]

[ wanted design ]

friday, 16 may | noon > 10p / wanted design [ pre-view – by invitation only ] a whole gamut of time-slots for bloggers, press, interior designers, vip’s and everyone else taking place at the terminal stores, the tunnel [ WANTEDDESIGN 2014 ]

event> wanted design: preview
where> 269 11th ave / between 27th & 28th

[ wallpaper* handmade ]

friday 16 thru 31 may / wallpaper* handmade in new york | fresh from milan’s salone del mobile, the exhibition dedicated to the marriage of craftsmanship and design, will arrive in new york for ICFF with several newly commissioned design pieces created in collaboration with british car manufacturer jaguar. the exhibition will be held in the 345meatpacking building, a new luxury development from ddg. [ more handmade ]

event> wallpaper* handmade in new york
where> 345meatpacking | west retail 345 West 14th Street

[ herman miller ]

friday, 16 may | 4 > 6p / alexander girard: an uncommon vision [ pre-view – by invitation only ] on the occasion of the first archival reintroductions of furniture and screen-printed fabric panels by iconic 20th century designer alexander girard, herman miller and maharam celebrate his life and work with a special exhibit and installation. an uncommon vision will be open to the public 17 > 28 may 17-28 at .

event> alexander girard: an uncommon vision
where> 446 west 14th street

[ herman miller ]

saturday, 17 may | 4 > 6p / herman miller collection [ pre-view – by invitation only ] join us in celebrating the herman miller collection and get a sneak peek at new designs from bassamfellows and Studio 7.5, as well as exciting reissues from the archives.

event> herman miller collection
where> 848 washington street / the standard hotel, highline room, 3rd floor

[ flos ]

saturday, 17 may | 6 > 8p / michael anastassiades string & ic lights | celebrate north american debut of string lights and IC lights and view local artist shantell martin’s one-of-a-kind drawings. refreshments served.

event> michael anastassiades string & ic lights | opening reception
where> 152 greene street (at houston)

[ cappellini> ]

saturday, 17 may | 6 > 8p / branching light | cocktail reception | exhibition of new works by ivan butorac 17 > 31 may 2014.

event> branching light | cocktail reception | rsvp-americas@cappellini.it
where> 152 wooster street

[ cassina> ]

saturday, 17 may | 6 > 8p / avante-garde retro

event> avante-garde retro | cocktail reception | rsvp-americas@cassina.it
where> 151 wooster street

[ chicagoland> ]

friday, 16 may | noon > 10p / chicagoland in new york | is an exhibition of design work by 14 chicago designers that will be shown during NYCxDesign. it’s challenging to see it all opening night, so we invite you to join us again saturday at 4pm. we’ll be serving beer from the chicago-based revolution brewery. press preview noon > 4p

event> chicagoland in new york | opening reception 7 > 10p
where> 269 11th avenue terminal stores

>> EXHIBITIONS / POP-UPS <<
[ rational x intuitive thought ]

17 > 19 may / rational x intuitive thought | drawing from the spirit of duality between designers george yabu & glenn pushelberg, the exhibition will launch new collections for pampaloni, stellar works, avenue road, van rossum and the rug company. public viewing 17 > 19 may.
where> swiss institute, 18 wooster street

[ empasso ]

thru 3 june / empasso gallery: compasso | usa launch of newly re-issued furniture pieces designed by oscar niemeyer & jorge zalszupin, two of brazil’s most celebrated and influential architects. public viewing thru 3 june.
where> 38 north moore street (hudson street)

[ industrycity/design ]

thru 20 may / industrycity/design | a historic, thirty-acre manufacturing and innovation complex on the waterfront in sunset park, brooklyn, as part of NYCxDESIGN. open to public all day noon > 7p / sunday noon > 4p / closed monday, 19 may.
where> 220 36th street / brooklyn

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 ]

Why design. Herman miller asks questions

Sep 12, 2012

click > enlarge

Herman Miller launched a design series [ “Why Design” ] 10 September. Here’s there the official announcement:

At Herman Miller design is the language we use to ask questions and seek answers to the problems our customers face. The design process is a journey into the unknown—or as George Nelson once quipped, “I have never met a designer who was retained to keep things the same as they were.” Before we decide what we do and how we do it, we like to begin by asking the question “Why?” In Why Design, a new video series, we explore the world through the eyes of our designers, and share something of why we value their point of view.

Each Monday morning, from September 10th through October 29th, we will launch a new designer profile at Why Design. The series includes:

9.10.12 – Yves Béhar – “Surfing Is Like
Improvisational Jazz”

9.17.12 – Don Chadwick – “The Camera Becomes an Extension of Your
Eyes”

9.24.12 – Ayse Birsel – “Your Life Is Your Most Important
Project”
10.1.12 – Irving Harper – “Paper Is a Versatile Medium”

10.8.12 – Gianfranco Zaccai – “Great Food Should Be Like Great
Design”
10.15.12 – Studio 7.5 – “Design by Its Nature Is
Collaborative”

10.22.12 – Steve Frykholm – “It’s the Breaks That Allow My Mind to
Refresh”
10.29.12 – Sam Hecht + Kim Colin – “We Need Contrast and Tension to Be
Able to Create”

Accompanying each video is a series of candid photographs from the designers’ daily lives, offering a glimpse into their world and thought processes, and a profile of their design work for Herman Miller and beyond.

[ why design ] [ herman miller ]