We love seeing two of our favorite materials — chairs and concrete — married into the stunning amphitheater designed by artist Armand Pierre Fernandez for Milan’s Parco Sempione, Milan in 1973. Embedded into the concrete steps are the personalities that chairs inevitably evoke, each seat curiously special and intentional. It made us think of artist Maria Lassnig’s view of chairs…
Read More
The art consultant and dealer Peter Heimer’s postwar Berlin townhouse has all sorts of cunning details. We love the yellow daybed Heimer designed himself. The slanted pillows are brilliant, forming a comfortable backrest when reading or lounging. I’ve discovered that you can get the same effect with a simple DIY.
Read More
Over the years, one of the very best purchases I have made were two bamboo Wave Room Screens, made of thin bamboo slats that unfurl to create an organic wave shape. They have proven to be endlessly useful. They are a relatively inexpensive, stylish, bamboo alternative to the beautiful, classic Eames screen.
Read More
The corrugated aluminum screen designer Jacques Boris made in the 1990s set off a firestorm in my head. Its elegant, visionary use of an ordinary material reminded me of Lino Schenal and Max Lamb’s transformations of styrofoam. If I had the means to cut through thick wavy metal and finish its edges and hinge it…
Read More
Recently I stumbled an article about lighting designer and photographer Christopher Baker and potter Odette Heideman’s home in Maine in House & Garden. Amidst a trove of clever ideas was one I plan to steal.
Read More
Designer Seung Jin Yang’s whimsical furniture appears to be made of the kind of twistable balloons used to entertain kids. OMG, we thought, could we make furniture out of balloons?
Read More
Whenever we look at designer Paola Navone’s homes, we come away with a zillion ideas that we could actually do, without a ton of dough. Here are our favorite steal-able ideas.
Read More
How swell to see Improvised Life mentioned in New York Magazine’s ’31 Low Lift Home Improvements for Under $100′ for our decoding of Donald Judd furniture. We got a lot of ideas for jazzing up our space….
Read More
Stylist Lotta Agaton’s clever day be made out of flat files got us considering the very practical and chic possibilities for these sophisticated storage beds…
Read More
Artist Donald Judd’s iconic plywood tables are made with materials you can get anywhere, with methods just about anybody can do: his response to the lack of useful, well-designed furniture he was unable to find.
Read More
For need-of-a- refresh sofa or chairs, we take a cue from this chill 12th Century château in France transformed with the artful use of draped cloth.
Read More
A budget apartment overhaul by a Brooklyn design student reminded us of the great design possibilities inherent in salvaged cuts of marble and other stone.
Read More
In yet another high-design, uninhabited space recently sold at auction in Australia, we discovered a surprising design flaw at odds its superlative description. It made us look closely into kitchen islands, and the mixed messages they can inadvertently be made to send.
Read More
While wandering through the Guggenheim Museum, we stumbled on its cafe with Bauhausian tables and chairs made from Baltic Birch, one of our favorite materials. The stylish simple furniture would be easy to make ourselves.
Read More
Lately we’ve seen some classic old second-hand store chairs transformed with paint in a way we hadn’t considered, to very cool effect.
Read More
Ann Richardson emailed us her selection for inclusion in our ever-growing Annals of Bad Design: Blu Dot’s $499 Cat’s Pajama Chair. Her thoughtful commentary that made us laugh, as good dishing of bad design does. (This $39 Ikea chair blows it out of the water).
Read More
We can only imagine the process of making this strangely-compelling foam-wrapped sofa…It made us think of British architect Richard MacCormac’s useful insight…
Read More
We always scouring cool home ideas the are easy to do. Are we secretly lazy? We sew but try to avoid it or having carpenters come or buying major pieces of furniture. We just want to have a pleasurable, unencumbered time making something fresh out of what we have. Here are two three examples…
Read More
After 2 months of test-driving a Flexispot Sit Stand Desk, I’m smitten, fitter and thinner. Here’s my honest review, with pros, cons and what to look out for.
Read More
We’re smitten with HomeMade Modern’s stylish, DIY-able home goods — from beds to planters — and really smart, detailed designs that empower you to improvise.
Read More