#HTE

Luxury Design as Theater and Digital Craft at the 2016 New York Design Week Satellite Shows

This year’s New York Design Week lineup proved the week of festivities have much more to offer than the go-to design fairs. Whether you scoured Brooklyn, downtown, or even way uptown, there were a wide number of shows from designers big and small to enjoy. On top of several small shows, we also saw collaborations from unlikely partners—take for one, Hermés and theater director Robert Wilson came together to create a refined furniture collection (presented in an avant-garde and highly theatrical setting). All in all, the landscape of presentations were diverse enough to satisfy every kind of design enthusiast. 

View of Collective Influence: Nendo at Collective Design

Each year, Collective highlights the career and work of a single designer or studio. This year, Tokyo-based nendo is front and center with an installation of lighting and cabinets located in the entrance to the fair. The exhibit highlights the studio’s iterative process with several dozen variations of cabinets that translate a sense of movement through an abstract notation of the way drawers swing open and close.

Photo credit: Core77

CW&T and A/D/O present Roto-Jam at Collective Design

Art and design studio CW&T was on site, working on their process piece, Roto-Jam. Their material exploration has led them to a process of particle jamming, to produce thin-shelled casts out of re-usable, dynamic molds.

Photo credit: Core77

Danh Circled the World by Austin Swick at Collective Design

This sinuous bench made of solid white oak was shown as part of an exhibition put on by Cranbrook Academy of Art’s 3D design department, entitled Fine Design for the End of the World. Each student responded to apocalyptic ideas in a series of critical, reflective design objects. The form is inspired by the mythology of snake-god Danh, who circled the world like a belt “binding it and preventing it from flying apart in splinters.”

Photo credit: Core77

Drift Sofa by Fernando Mastrangelo Studio at Collective Design

The Brooklyn-based designer has extended his Drift series with this sand and cement sofa, upholstered in silk velvet.

Photo credit: Core77

Ian Stell at Patrick Parrish Gallery’s booth during Collective Design

Ian Stell is showcasing the latest works in his spellbinding series of transforming pieces, painstakingly crafted out of wood and brass pivots. The latest evolution of the work features the use of color laminate, a move that further complicates the way we read the surface of each piece as it contracts and expands in its various incarnations.

Photo credit: Core77

Studio Proba x Bower for Sight Unseen at Collective Design

Studio Proba and Bower teamed up to explore forms, materials, textures, and colors in an immersive, multi-sensory exhibit. With recurring themes of water and reflection, the collection included their Nirvana rug, Waterline chair, Water mirrors, and the ever-present tranquil sounds of the Pivot fountain.

Photo credit: Core77

Chris Wolston for Sight Unseen at Collective Design

The Brooklyn and Medellín-based designer expands on his trademark technique of aluminum sand-casting in this new collection, shown against a bespoke wallpaper he collaborated on with Designtex. Wolston applies the technique to aluminum foam sheeting most commonly found in architectural sound-proofing to create a discordant collection of tables, lighting, seating and tabletop objects.

Photo credit: Core77

Fort Standard booth at Collective Design

The Brooklyn-based studio showed their latest collection, Qualities of Materials. Instead of pursuing new materials, the duo decided to experiment with the most traditional, natural materials—wood, stone and leather—and find new structural and expressive potentials within them. The collection includes a chair made of layered and rolled leather, a dining table and bench set made up of hundreds of thin maple wood slats assembled into structural triangular tubes, and a stone cabinet.

Photo credit: Core77

Material samples at Fort Standard’s booth at Collective Design

Photo credit: Core77

Lamp Show at the 99¢ Plus Gallery booth at Collective Design

An exhibition of objects made by over 30 contemporary artists and designers. Ranging from “designed,” functional works to conceptual explorations of the function of light, the show aimed to provide a platform for designers and artists to expand their practice and challenge definitions of art, design, and functionality.

Photo credit: Core77