Paolo Deganello cont.

Born in Este in 1940, the Italian architect and designer Paolo Deganello studied architecture at Florence University from 1961 to 1966. In 1966 Paolo Deganello joined Andrea Branzi, Gilberto Corretti, and Massimo Morozzi in founding Archizoom Associati in Florence, named after the British group of architects known as Archigram and the journal "Zoom". Archizoom was part of the radical design movement in Italy, designing anti-design furniture, such as the corner set "Safari" and the "San Remo" palm-frond lamp (both 1968 for Poltronova). 
In 1973 Paolo Deganello collaborated with Gilberto Corretti on designing "Archizoon", a line in office chairs manufactured by Marcatré. By 1972 Archizoom Associati had disbanded itself. From 1972 until 1974 Paolo Deganello taught design at Florence University and the Architectural Association in London. With his students, Paolo Deganello investigated the requirements for good, comfortable seat furniture. These seat-furniture studies conducted by Paolo Deganello and his students bore fruit in such pieces as "AEO" (for Cassina), designed in 1973. In 1981 Paolo Deganello opened a studio in Florence. In 1982 Deganello designed "Torso", an asymmetrical chair for Cassina. In 1987 Deganello showed his "Documenta Chair" at "documenta 8" in Kassel. In his designs for chairs, Paolo Deganello wants the invididual structural elements of the chair to be visible and he often uses different materials for them. For Zanotta Paolo Deganello designed the unusually shaped pair of chairs "Re" and "Regina" in 1991. The legs and frames of these chairs are of steel, the seats are wickerwork, and the backs of leather.
Paolo Deganello showed work at numerous exhibitions, including "Italy: The New Domestic Landscape", the 1972 exhibition mounted by the Museum of Modern Art in New York.

‘Cloud’ table by Lorens (PL)

Anna and Marek Lorens, the duo behind their namesake Warsaw-based architectural and design practice Lorens have recently realised this modular table whose unusual structure – as well as the colour – reminded us of that of a honeycomb. Composed from a number of hexagonal elements, the multifunctional table can either be used as a desk within an office environment or as an (undoubtedly decorative) element of a living room

‘Dag & Natt’ carpet collection by Petra Lundblad-Fridén for Kasthall (SE)

Earlier this year, designer Petra Lundblad-Fridén has created this series of hauntingly beautiful, inkblot-like printed carpets for the Swedish rug manufacturer Kasthall. Called ’Dag & Natt’ – Swedish for ‘Day & Night’ – the dreamlike collection stems from Lundblad-Fridén’s ‘passion for experimenting with different images and colours, and using layers to create new expression’ and encompasses four different designs inspired by the weather and sky phenomena: Haze, Thunder, Summer Dawn and Autumn Dusk.

Neu 31 by SUPERBLOCK ZT GmbH (AT)

SUPERBLOCK ZT GmbH, the Austrian architectural practice established in 2003 has realised this 840-square-meters building located on Neuwaldegger Straße 31 in Vienna. Based on a ‘concept of the overlapping spatial structure’, the house boasts a number of residential apartments as well as office units and a centrally-located 30-square-meters courtyard, and its current residents amount to ’22 working and residing persons, one dog and two cats’.

Birds Nest treehouse by Bertil Harstrom

This concept is based upon the contrast between exterior and interior. From the outside it appears as a big nest, only the scale separating it from other nests in the vicinity. Discreet windows are almost hidden by the network of branches.

Inside it’s a high standard room with modern design. A coachwork panel decorates the inner wall. There is space and beds for a family with two children. The bedroom is a separate room with sliding doors. You access the nest by a retractable staircase.

Bricking It: innovative applications of man’s most trusted material

• In the classic children’s story, three little pigs build houses to hide from a hungry wolf. The hungry wolf huffs and puffs and blows down the first little pig’s house of straw and the second little pig’s house of sticks, but the third little pig was too clever for him. The third little pig built his house out of bricks, which saved his bacon. The safety and robustness of brick remains the key to its enduring appeal, particularly for residential purposes.
• Bricks made from shaped mud dating back to 7500 BC have been found in the Tigris region of Mesopotamia and, since then, brick has helped define the built environment of many developed nations. While production methods may have changed, the capability of brick to offer reliable protection from the elements over a prolonged period has helped it retain its popularity in the building trade. ‘The main benefit of building in brickwork is longevity,’ explains Dr Ali Arasteh, Principal Structural Engineer at The Brick Development Association. ‘There is no other construction material that offers such long-lasting performance with minimal maintenance and ongoing costs.’

Hallway and Bedside Tables, Cashmere and merino hand knit framed by a solid walnut top and hand turned legs.

Experimenting with hard and soft materials and textures has been the muse for the Safety Vase series. The Safety Vase series empathises with wood and wool’s emotional and physical qualities to create a safe hideaway for one’s treasures. Knit holds connotations of safety, warmth and softness. Wood is a traditional furniture material that represents strength and longevity. The Safety Vase series explores and celebrates these qualities. It questions current furniture typologies and asks whether the emotional warmth of knit can be introduced to the hard world of wooden furniture.

A safe hideaway for those treasures that have a tendency to be misplaced has been created. The vase like form invites the user to touch and feel the softness of the wool whilst playfully hiding objects away, this furniture series is about experiencing the knit. It poses the question of why cant the first thing you touch when you wake up in the morning or come in from work be soft and comforting.

The knit is framed and contrasted by the hardness of the wood, both the minimal legs and the table top create a frame around the vase without distracting from it.

‘Rhyholzertischli’ coffee table by Adrian Wicki (CH)

Inspired by his life-long fascination with one of Europe’s longest rivers, the Rhine, the young Swiss carpenter-turned-designer Adrian Wicki has created this driftwood coffee table. Enigmatically called ‘Rhyholzertischli’, the table is composed of a smooth glass plate which is juxtaposed with the raw natural form of the base created from driftwood found on the banks of Rhine.

Chouchin' pendant light by Ionna Vautrin for Foscarini (IT)

Following her previous design for Foscarini, the young French designer Ionna Vautrin has recently created this elegant, glossy pendant light called ‘Chouchin’. Taking its name from the traditional Japanese paper lantern, the design is Vautrin’s contemporary reinterpretation of this ‘ethereal, poetic and almost magical object’. The lamp is available in three various sizes, each of them in a different earthy hue: orange, grey or olive green, and its modern form has been ‘obtained through a single blowing process.’

Simplissimo by Jean Nouvel

The Parisian Pritzker-prize-winning architect Jean Nouvel has designed this ‘fitness-inspired’ series of smart, minimalist furniture for the renowned French manufacturer Ligne Roset. Aptly called ‘Simplissimo’, the pared-down collection consists of banquette, chaise longue, fireside chair, footstool and bench, all of which are made of soft, black upholstery, which ‘hugs the curves of the metal structure and deliberately allows gathers in the four corners, which contribute to the overall aesthetic of the piece.

‘Slim Jim’ table by Roland Graf for Fredericia Furniture (DK)

With no previous intention to venture into the area of furniture design, the Austrian artist Roland Graf has realised this simple wood-and-steel table, his first piece of furniture, following a personal request from his father who needed a large dining table for his retirement party. The oversized prototype, which Graf has hand-assembled from seven pine planks and metal without the use of any nails or glue, has now been scaled down and is produced by the famous Danish manufacturer,

P-Tree by Aandeboom

The P-Trees were a great success at the Roskilde Festival 2011 in Denmark, with more than 100,000 visitors and many of them using the P-TREE more than once. For Roskilde AANDEBOOM produced 50 P-Trees in the typical Roskilde Orange color. The P-Trees were placed on 2 different spots near the main stage. By using the P-Tree the festivals problem with public peeing was significant reduced.

Jerszy Seymour - Flux

Resembling a squiggly crayon drawing and described as ‘liberating itself from the modernist grid’, Flux is the latest chair designed earlier this year by the Berlin-based Canadian designer Jerszy Seymour. Manufactured by Magis, Flux is created from two metal wires which are ‘treated as an axis with unlimited directions representing unlimited life possibility’ and the design is available in three vibrant primary colours.

Paolo Deganello

Paolo Dagenello was, with Andrea Branzi one of the founders of the Archizoom group of radical designers who came together in Florence 1966. When Archizoom petered out, Dagenello founded the Colletivo Technici Progettisti to continue his campaign for furniture design that appeals to the imagination. His 'torso' lounge chair of 1982 for Cassina rivalled the collections of Memphis in oerversity but was also a serious re working of furniture ideas and forms from the fifties.

Nendo, Galleria Jannone

The Japanese design practice Nendo will present some new works within a solo exhibition at the Galleria Jannone, 125 Corso Garibaldi, during this year’s Salone del Mobile from 12 – 17 April. ‘textured transparancies’ is a collection of objects which explore transparency’s infinite nuances. For the ‘transparent table’ – the first object of the collection – the designers cast clear acrylic in a wooden form with a strong grain. The result is a table top with a very unique optical effect.

Brodie Neill

Designed by Brodie Neill

Flowing lines and surfaces fold, expand and merge. They form an alluring three-dimensional, enveloping and open structure. This is a sculptural-lamp of extreme visual lightness.  It is a kind of ultra contemporary and dream-like mobile.  A shape intended to diffuse light in an evocative way.
Inspired by natural form, it calls to mind the organic lines of a clover leaf. The light source, hidden at the meeting point of the three petals, casts light onto the internal surfaces in a continuous play of reflections and rebounds. Clover is the result of research into new luminous expressions by Brodie Neill and Kundalini.
Suspension Lamp. Molded polyurethane body with opaque finish, aluminum reflector.

Buckminster Fuller 1895-1983

Richard Buckminster Fuller was one of the most ardent and prolix supporters of high technology. Although his actual material creations were relatively few, the apocalyptic, prophetic character of his writings and thought have in recent years made him the darling of high tech architects and of all designers who are concerned with the earths resources.

Fuller was born at Milton, Massachusetts. He never had any formal architectural training; in fact he never had formal training of any sort. Traditinal building techniques came to antagonize him. and in 1972 he created the concept of a 'dynamic' with 'maximum'. It was not to use bricks and mortar, timber and lathe but was to be a tensile, domed structure where the fabric would be used as a grid to supply the services man needed for survival.
Fuller was very influential and was an idealist who viewed the world as a single entity, without national boundaries and who was commited to the idea that design should serve the needs of man not industry.

I love it

Achille Castiglioni 1918-2002

Achille Castiglioni is on of three Milanese brothers who were all designers. Achille's interests in design was first inspired by his elder brothers, Pier Giacomo and Livio, who designed dramatic plastic cased radio receivers for Phonolain in 1938 with the help of Caccia Dominioni. Achille read architecture at Milan Polytechnic, graduating in 1944 and was one of the founders of the Association per il Disegno Industrial in 1956. He designed furniture, lighting and appliances and his products won awards in 1955, 1960, 1962, 1964, 1967, 1979 and 1984.

Six of his pieces are in permanent collection of New York's Museum of modern Art. Among his best known pieces are a kneeling stool for zanotta and his Arco light for Flos. After the second world war, Achille Castiglioni was one of the most prolific of all Italian designers and he evolved a unique philosophy which derives from 'ready made' concept of Marcel Duchamp, like his chair inspired by a tractor seat. His clients included BrionVega, Flos, Gavini, Knoll, Kartell, Zanotta, B&B, Ideal standard, Siemens, and Lancia. He contributed to design magazines and the Italian national press. His philosophy of design was that it is an attitude arrising out of critical habit.. an art insofar as it invents a function and translates it into form. Wit was the central element in his designs: sometimes incongruous materials, such as found objects are bound together in pursuit of functional elegance. His 'Arco Lamp' for flos uses a marble base weighing about 100 pounds to support a thin arc of pressed aluminum and a light spun aluminum reflecto; his 'tolo' lamp for the same company uses a car headlamp.
In his ingenuity with materials, his sense of joy, his imaginative use of industrial components and techniques, Achille Castiglioni was an absolute definition of what a great Industrial designer should be. 

Straight from Paris

The Paris based designer duo Amandine Chhor and Aïssa Logerot realised these fantastic projects in cooperation with local associations and skilled workers from Cambodia and Morocco. ‘artisanat du sud’ is the newest series of furniture handcrafted by women from Akka oasis in Morocco. The tables tops are made from woven palm leaves.

Giant Flat pack

 Giant timber parasols above the Plaza de la Encarnacíon in Seville – this sunday the Berlin based architectural practice Jürgen Mayer H. can finally unveil their most recent urban development project – a new icon for the medieval inner city of Andalusia’s capital. The timber-constructions offers an archaeological museum, a farmers market, an elevated plaza, multiple bars and restaurants underneath and inside the parasols, as well as a panorama terrace on the very top of the parasols.

Marc Newson Hour Glass

The Hourglass by Marc Newson
Ikepod has over the years sought to convey something different to the watch collector’s world, something that introduces elements from the worlds of art and design into the world of fine horology.
It is always a challenge to cross between worlds and between cultures, but Ikepod designer Marc Newson has done so, for over 20 years, by designing everything from limited edition furniture that has set auction records to the new airbus A380 for Qantas.
Ikepod, which has produced Newson’s timepieces now  brings timekeeping, design and sculpture together in the form of The Hourglass.
Marc Newson’s Hourglass is a feat of engineering made using borosilicate glass and millions of stainless steel nanoballs.
Borosilicate is a specialized and unusually durable type of glass. It is used in laboratories and aerospace applications because it is able to withstand high pressure and weight loads.
Our glass blower based in Basel Switzerland individually produce each piece by hand, closely reproducing Newson’s design.
The Hourglass is the consummate Ikepod anachronism , a merger of an age old time keeping mechanism crafted by hand, filled with millions of high tech metallurgical nanoballs, resulting in a 10 or 60 minutes chronometer unlike any other.

Sustainable Bulb from Phillips

A Bulb from the Future! It Looks Like it Belongs on a Spaceship
The Philips AmbientLED 12.5-watt A19 LED lightbulb (quite a name!) is probably the favorite LED bulb that I've tried so far. It beats the competition when it comes to light output (800 lumens vs. 450-590 lumens for the other LEDs that I've tried), the design of the bulb is very innovative, and light quality is excellent.
Technical Specifications for Philips AmbientLED Bulb
The Philips LED produces 800 lumens, which makes it a 60-watt incandescent equivalent . Its efficiency of 65 lumens per watt made it earn an Energy Star rating, and at 12.5 watts, it uses only about 20% of the energy of a 60-watt bulb. The socket is the A19 standard.
The unit that I am reviewing is warm-white (2700K) and has a CRI of 80. Warranty is 6 years, and Philips rates it at 25,000 hours of operation (it should last for decades if you take good care of it).
And yes, it is dimmable!

KD house

Japanese architects Geneto installed diagonal walls across the interior of this houe in Shiga, Japan, to block views through to neighbouring houses and create new spaces in between the rooms.
Called KD-House, the renovation project also involved installing built-in wooden tables and storage to make best use of the new areas created.
We did a renovation for a two-by-four construction unit house by Sekisui Heim that is located in a new residential area in Shiga prefecture. Although the site is relatively broad, the way it is built makes the site strangely narrow.

We believe this is because each houses were built only thinking about concluding within the site and without regarding the connection to the surroundings.

NZ Architects

New Zealand architects Gascoigne Associates have completed this Japanese restaurant lined with wooden slats in Auckland, New Zealand.
Called Cocoro (meaning ‘heart and soul’ in Japanese), the restaurant is located in a former warehouse.
Wooden slats hang over the exposed concrete walls and ceiling, with LED lighting and sound insulation concealed between them.

New download section

Checkout the free training manuals we have just added to design heist we are here to help, so stay tuned for a lot more to come.

Simple Danish Joinery

simple danish joinery really gets me going and this is a nice example of what can be done, designed by a student this piece is light and playful and very current.

AWESOME NEW BOOK

Change by Design: How Design Thinking Transforms Organizations and Inspires Innovation

The myth of innovation is that brilliant ideas leap fully formed from the minds of geniuses. The reality is that most innovations come from a process of rigorous examination through which great ideas are identified and developed before being realized as new offerings and capabilities.
This book introduces the idea of design thinking‚ the collaborative process by which the designer′s sensibilities and methods are employed to match people′s needs not only with what is technically feasible and a viable business strategy. In short‚ design thinking converts need into demand. It′s a human−centered approach to problem solving that helps people and organizations become more innovative and more creative.
Design thinking is not just applicable to so−called creative industries or people who work in the design field. It′s a methodology that has been used by organizations such as Kaiser Permanente to icnrease the quality of patient care by re−examining the ways that their nurses manage shift change‚ or Kraft to rethink supply chain management. This is not a book by designers for designers; this is a book for creative leaders seeking to infuse design thinking into every level of an organization‚ product‚ or service to drive new alternatives for business and society.

AKITA

The Japanese practice Sekkei-sha, founded by Yoshichika Takagi in 2005, recently unveiled its newest residental project, a single family home in the centre of Akita City. With a quiet convoluted floor plan and wide gaps and openings the young architects demonstrates again his sense for the interplay of inside (privacy) and outside (extensity).

Emotional Design: Why We Love (or Hate) Everyday Things

I have just attended a lecture purely on why we love or hate everyday objects, some interesting comments where made and my eyes are truly wider after this one. Form function or simply just prescence.
Form is the obvious one but what forms do we warm to more often, studies show that curved soft floating forms, ideally the circle is the perfect form and the one that makes us warm and fuzzy inside will always refer to this basic principle.
Function is critical and all good design just works it performs it's duty seemlessly and hides all technical aspects, apple technologies is a beautiful example of this.
Product prescence and reputition is a human sub conscious way of warmer to something, through familiarity we feel most comfortable, like turning up to the same work place each and everyday we feel comfortable much like Bering in contact with familiar products or ways we interact with them draws us closer to them. Click the link above for further reading. Dh

State of design

After a few days off from posting, I have had time to think and collect my thoughts. I have a new outlook I would like to share about being a designer and time management.
Outsourcing from as many different angles as possible. My initial thoughts on this is great, if I'm not doing the work and someone is doing it for me I will have more free time or more time to invest in research or new content. There is floors in this process as much as there are huge benefits. With quality control you must very careful with who you use to represent what you do, if done incorrectly or you fail to employ the right person for your business this could destroy your reputation. So you may ask how do you get this right? I'll reveal all in the next post. So for now happy designing. Dh

Burn

Kaspar Hamacher uses fire to create furniture. Fittingly named 'ausgebrannt' which means 'burned out' in german. Tree trunks have been cut into segments varying in length

Flat pack hood

The young Swedish designer trio Form Us With Love realised this new pendant light which serves, due to its acoustic characteristics as well as a sound barrier. The lamp shade is made from modular felt panels, which can be assembled on site making 'Hood' a flat pack product

New york design

The New York based designer Lindsey Adelman recently exhibited her beautiful glass lamps at E.R. Butler & Co is Soho, manufacturer of her most recent work. The 'Ceres' collection – a series of technical yet sculptural appearing constructs – consists of brass branches with cylindrical light fittings combined with coloured glass tubes

Bio shoes

Dutch company OAT have designed a range of biodegradable shoes with seeds embedded in the tongues.

Award winning office design

Designed several years ago but just making the blog rounds now is this beautiful office space in Paris, by Christian Pottgiesser ArchitecturesPossibles

Dubbed "A table through the forest," Pottgiesser & co. turned a 19th-century factory into a multi-leveled wooded wonderland where trees grow through the desks, curves reign supreme over straight edges, and workstations are equipped with what look to be Plexiglas sneeze guards to prevent you from spraying germs all over your co-workers. (Please do not send me corrective e-mails, yes, I know they're "telephone bubbles.")

Stouby

Finn Juhl meets FurnID: 'Frost' by the Danish designers FurnID for Stouby

The manufacturer Stouby is one of these numberless old-established, family-run furniture companies you can find in the Danish provincial backwater. Founded in 1902 Stouby has always been specialised in upholstered furniture. Have a look at Stouby's novelties, presented at the Stockholm Furniture Fair for the first time

Tissi

The Swiss born and Berlin based designer, architect and former gallery owner Clemens Tissi developed during the last couple of years his first furniture collection, a number of cubic, very architectural appearing pieces. 'Lichtkiste' for example is a rather simple side table and floor lamp consisting of two spacial elements – one contains the light source the other one is the adjustable reflector and table top at the same time

Rhubarb by Emma

Called Rhubarb, the lamps are made from folded polypropylene and fan outwards from their bases, creating a cluster of precise but organic forms when positioned together.

Multifunctional simplicity

Another simple form that is well executed.
OCC, a cheese bell with a "new, complementary function", a compartment that can hold the products that you usually have while enjoying cheese (fruit, crackers, jams, etc ).

Handmade production

Handmade Mass Production by Folkform
Stockholm-based art and design duo Folkform were invited to create an exclusive collection for fashion brand Whyred.
The duo describes the new work as a celebration of old industrial processes and traditional manufacturing techniques.
This exhibition will show limited edition pieces, including lighting, in brass and bronze as well as a new collection of cabinets.
For their new collection Folkform collaborated with Rosengrens, a brass foundry in Limhamn, situated about 5 kilometers outside of Malmö on the south coast of Sweden. Folkform is committed to working with local manufacturers.

Low occupancy pressurised tent

Pre-war buildings have relatively tiny windows, and it's no secret why. Residents back then spent so much time in crowded public spheres, jammed shoulder-to-shoulder with their fellow citizens in marketplaces, factories, communal parks and so on, that when they got home they wanted not only to keep out the elements, but to gain some privacy from the rest of the world.

Designer Pierre Stephane Dumas' Bubble Tree pressurized tent, which he started selling last year for roughly $12,000, is like the opposite of a high-density pre-war. It's low-occupancy, provides sweeping views, affords zero privacy, and is cool as heck. And we suppose if you needed to change clothes you could smoke a couple of cigarettes first.

Beam lamp

'Beam' table lamp by Holm Giessler / halloessen, a steady and a movable light source in one lamp

Simple things may amuse simple minds but it is simplicity that really gets me going. This may resemble a form similar to a lamp by konstantin gricic but I am very impressed non the less. A fixed downlight that provides ambient lighting is an obvious and beautiful answer. With the additional task light this luminair is very thought out.

watchsession

The second post this month on watches i must be getting obsessed. Although this one is beautiful, im sure most of you agree.

Designed by young Italian designer Denis Guidone and manufactured by Italian brand Nava, the Ora Lattea watch pays homage to celestial time. The minimal white face features just three black dots: one marking the position of the hour hand; another the second hand; and a third the centre of the watch. The first two dots orbit the third like planets in the solar system while the name Ora Lattea is a play on Via Lattea, the Italian phrase for Milky Way.

Ribbon

Tom Vaughan, a machine sculpted chair made of one continuous "ribbon" of wood.

Rattan

WWF initiated the design and production of contemporary, sustainable rattan furniture together with Swedish designers, graduates from Lund University, in cooperation with local producing companies. The European Union funded programme focuses on sustainable production and processing of rattan in the Mekong region. The first results were exhibited during this year's Ambiente Fair in Frankfurt

Vege swing

Gone are the days when you stored your fruits and vegetable in a refrigerator or simply displayed the best ones on the dining table. Now it all has to be designer, unconventional and must complement the décor. Cocoon, which has been designed for your ultra-modern kitchen, is a treat to watch. Designed in an organic shape, it's used for storing fruits, cultivating li'l kitchen garden thingies and as a unique decoration for your kitchen window. Cocoon refreshing to have in the kitchen. Designer Mans Salomonsen have actually rendered quite a creativity with something as basic as fruit storage or kitchen cultivation.