Visitors to this year’s Salone del Mobile were in for a treat when they strolled through Zona Tortona into a quaint, Italian courtyard on Milan’s Via Borgospesso to encounter Christoph Klemmt’s stunning vortex-shaped OR installation. Composed out of polygonal, photoreactive segments which respond to ultra-violet light, OR’s captivating powers lie in its capacity to correspond its appearance to changes in weather and daylight. Its ’skin’ emits flourishing hues of blue and green when exposed to sunlight and maintains a subtle translucency when the installation is overcome by shade. Best of all, OR’s effects are not limited to daytime - at night, it generates ample atmosphere by becoming a ‘chandelier’ which lavishly floods its surrounding areas with a dramatic dispersement of light.
Think a luxury pillow has to be made of silk? Think again- African-born, London-based designer Bridget West crafts gorgeous housewares, pillows, and throws, from vintage labels and tags that critique the throw-away nature of our consumer existence in a really beautiful way. Her Handle With Care pillow is made from clothing tags, while the Delicate Cube and Made in Cube pillows are quirky and comfy, featuring inked graphics and organic cotton or hemp.
If you are looking for a cool alternative to your average, run-of-the-mill upholstered furniture, the latest buzz (and one of the stunners of the HauteGREEN show) is the Emir chair by Lars Urheim of the Norwegian design house Trokk16. A beautiful specimen of classic Scandinavian design, the Emir chair is constructed out of natural latex foam, sustainable wood, wool fabric and woolen felt. The biodegradable Emir is as much about form as it is about substance. According to Urheim, the chair’s components can easily be separated and reused or recycled after its initial use has run its course.
During the week of Milan’s Salone Internazionale del Mobile, we put a call out for eco-loving, freelance correspondents to help us out with our coverage. Our plea was met with much enthusiasm from, among others, a design class from Kansas State University, who braved the ruckus of the event to bring us some exciting reports and tips from Salone. Read on for a run-down of some of their favorite and ‘greenest’ finds…
Biomimicry proved to be all the rage at the Salone Internazional del Mobile this year, with designers drawing big-time inspiration from the wonders of the natural world. Though Finnish textile design studio Woodnotes falls in the same category, their apparent love of ecological structures doesn’t render their work any less unique than that of other eco-emulators. An eye-catching aspect of their booth at the Salone was the Flake Blind which hung delicately amidst their designs. As implied by its given moniker, the Flake Blind was inspired by memories of wintertime bliss and the geometric qualities of a snowflake.
After being alerted to all the Inhabitat-worthy designs that had yet to be uncovered in the Tortona district of Milan during the week of the Salone Internazionale del Mobile, we made our way towards the site of the Zona Tortona Design Event. An initiative of Recapito Milanese, the event was inspired by a smaller affair organized by Giulio Cappellini from Superstudio in April 2001. Last year, Zona Tortona generated 60,000 visitors with over 194 companies from all over the world displaying their wares. For the design community, the event has become synonymous with ‘alternative’ or ‘independent’ design garnering a reputation for more experimental work than the mainstream-oriented Salone Internazionale del Mobile. Read on for more details of all the great stuff we found!
The veteran furniture manufacturer Swedese is notoriously associated with classic Swedish style in their Scandinavian homeland. Since its founding in 1945, Swedese has run in the same circles as fellow Scandinavian design pioneers such as Arne Jacobson and Alvar Aalto in its quest to create sensible and ecologically-evocative design. At the Salone Internazionale del Mobile this year, their simple yet stunning work proved that the initial appeal of ‘Scandanavian Modern’ had yet to fade into the sidelines. A particularly notable piece in the exhibit this year was their Breeze side table designed by Monica Forster.
At Salone Internazional del Mobile’s Euroluce in Milan, designers fearsomely competed for attention by decking out their booths with high-tech light displays. But the one that caught our eye and held our attention was a series of innovative light structures from the always creative Ingo Maurer. And this year, Mr. Maurer’s fixtures were particularly green, integrating an array of everyday and reused objects including toothpaste tubes. Leave it to him to make Colgate beautiful.
From April 18 to 23, Milan IS the Salone Internazionale del Mobile as designers, tourists, and journalists flock to the trade fair for the most anticipated design event of the year. On Day One, Inhabitat made its way to the Rho-Fiera fairgrounds on the outskirts of the bustling Italian city where the latest international designs were being unveiled before a crazed, but decidedly stylish, public. We’ve seen some great stuff and have tons to report- read on for some highlights!
[Re] design, the non-profit organization established by designers specializing in sustainable design, hit Bluebird restaurant in London recently with a showcase of quirky, smart designs snagged from their previous exhibition during London Design Week last year. One of the show’s highlights was without a doubt, the Anglo-Italian design studio, Studiomold who won approving looks from the restaurant’s fascinated clientele by raiding the recycling box and crafting beautiful lamp bases out of used plastic, fizzy drink bottles. Sustainable and aesthetically pleasing, Studiomold’s Big Crush and Little Crush table lamps instill the notion of creating ambiance with a sense of humor.
Image by Kalevi A. Makinen, courtesy of the Barbican Art Gallery
If you happen to be in London, you should hightail it over to the Barbican Art Gallery where one of the most talked about architectural shows in the city, Alvar Aalto Through the Eyes of Shigeru Ban, is being showcased from now until mid-May. Beautifully curated by world-renowned Japanese architect Ban, the exhibition traces the life and work of legendary architect Alvar Aalto whose modernist designs made him a national treasure in his native Finland and put him on par with the likes of Le Corbusier and Mies Van der Rohe.
As a nod to childhood treehouses and those good old days of youthful splendor, Dustin Feider obsessed himself with developing the perfect eco-friendly version of the tree sanctuary. After much trial and error, the 23-year old freelance furniture designer came up with a unique and green take on the conventional kiddie sanctuary which he dubbed the O2 Sustainability Treehouse. Inspired by the construction of Buckminster Fuller’s infamous geodesic dome, Feider discovered that by following Bucky’s lead, he could use less material and construct a more stable structure than that of the ‘traditional’ treehouse - most importantly, without at all harming the tree.
If you’re a greenthumb in spirit but just can’t keep your favorite leafy pets alive, fret not - the answer to your problems has arrived in a clever new human/plant communication project. Four students from NYU’sinfamous ITP program - Robert Faludi, Kate Hartman, Kati London and Rebecca Bray – have recently devised a brilliant solution to keep you from throwing in the trowel on gardening altogether. Dubbed Botanicalls, the innovative concept establishes a way for thirsty plants to effectively communicate their needs to humans – by placing phone calls to their owners.
Marie-Louise Gustafsson specializes in creating interior designs that fuse utility and humor. Recently shown at the Salone Satellite furniture fair in Milan, the Stockholm-based designer’s unusual creation, Table of Trash quirkily references the relationship between the workstation and the waste-basket by introducing an element of fun into an activity that one would normally consider completely mundane. The slide-like table top allows one to literally push those useless papers to the side and straight into the bin – forgoing the loathsome task of crumpling and searching under your desk for that bin.
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