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People, products, and events to look for at this year's Fair.
By Kristi Cameron
May 2003
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Live@ICFF
Don't miss Live@ICFF, Metropolis's annual coverage of the show floor. See last year's
Live@ICFF. |
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May is possibly New York City's finest month. The chill is off, the
days are long, parks and gardens fill with flowers--and new furniture
blooms in store windows from Midtown to Soho. That's be-cause for four days
Javits becomes the center of gravity for the world's design community as
manufacturers, retailers, and designers gather for the International Contemporary
Furniture Fair, now in its 15th year. And when the day is officially
over, fairgoers spill onto the streets to celebrate and socialize. These
pages are a sneak peek at what you'll see at ICFF 2003 (May 17-20),
including Ron Arad's Bad Tempered Chair for Vitra, Dave Simon's Waterfall
Table for Offi, Nanna Ditzel's Hallingdal textile distributed by Maharam,
Kasper Salto's Ice chair for Fritz Hansen, Kenny Scharf's Blobs laminate
for Wilsonart, and Michael Cannamela's Stretch Stool for 3 Square Design.
We're also featuring a prototype by one student from each of the four schools
chosen to exhibit this year. On Monday, May 19, fair sponsor Metropolis
will host a conference on the challenges faced by young designers on the
path to success. Learn what it takes to design, make, and market a successful
product. Speakers include Niels Diffrient, Angela Adams, Mike Kielhauer,
Rob Forbes, Jennifer Carpenter, and Paul Makovsky.
WATERFALL TABLE BY DAVE SIMON, OFFI, 2002
Offi started in 1996 as a home-office company. We're not so focused
on the home office anymore but on the challenges of modern life throughout.
We're taking many of the same approaches--wire management, technology--and
bringing them into other parts of the home. A lot of our designs are storage-driven
dual-function pieces. The initial concept for the Waterfall Table was the
idea of creating space just through a shift of plane. It allows you to sit
at your sofa and work. It's a coffee table that could also be a bench. I
could see it floating throughout the house. It fits the Offi
approach--very easy to manufacture with very simple components.
Eric Pfeiffer, Vice President of Design, Offi
www.offi.com
ICE CHAIR BY KASPER SALTO, FRITZ HANSEN, 2002
Because our core business is dining furniture and stacking chairs, it's
important for us to bring new stacking chairs to market. But every one of
them has to have a unique concept so we don't confuse our customers. We
also want to establish ourselves not only as the supplier of Arne Jacobsen
but as a manufacturer of brand-new design that points into this millennium.
This is reflected in the indoor/outdoor Ice chair. Our ambition was
to make a chair that stands out as a modern contrast to our classics--in
both the material and the design language.
Bjorn Stegger, Director of Product Development and Design, Fritz Hansen
www.fritzhansen.com
BLOBS LAMINATE BY KENNY SCHARF, WILSONART WONDERLAND BOOTH, 2003
We want to go back to a time before design became Design, when it was an
innocent, unpretentious exploration of shape, function, and materials. We've
teamed up with Kenny Scharf, John Maeda, and Judson Beaumont to whisk you
back to Wonderland--a three-hole putt-putt golf course. Our booth is meant
to bring people together under the auspices of play. And miniature golf,
which began as a DIY business, is something historic that we wanted to revive.
Design can be a sculpture that spits out a golf hole. It doesn't have to
be the most beautiful chair that Vitra's going to accession. It's about
humility and fun, and human interaction.
Grace Jeffers, Design and History Consultant, Wilsonart
www.wilsonart.com
HALLINGDAL TEXTILE, KVADRAT, DISTRIBUTED BY MAHARAM, 1965
I designed Kvadrat's complete first collection, out of which the upholstery
cloth Hallingdal is still in production. Hallingdal lives so well because
it is an ideal upholstery cloth. My reason for designing textiles originally
was that as a furniture designer I could never find textiles I wanted,
particularly not in the right colors. Hallingdal is an important tool to
promote the colors I feel like using. I think most people I work with have
a certain idea about what sort of colors I use, a bit like a painter's palette.
Nanna Ditzel, Designer
www.maharam.com
STRETCH STOOL, 3 SQUARE DESIGN, 2003
The Stretch Stool is something I worked on when I was a student at
Pratt. It was originally a chair that was too busy, so I simplified it
to a stool. Its sling seat is formed by the tension between the fabric
and the plywood. There's no cushion or anything inside, just a stretchy
fabric. I like the concept of using the negative space as the form for
the fabric. There are two plywood nesting shells. One has a layer of
durable canvas stretched around it, which is covered by another layer of
fabric. The canvas bears most of the weight. The shells are molded at
the same time so that they fit perfectly together.
Michael Cannamela, Designer, 3 Square
BAD TEMPERED CHAIR BY RON ARAD, VITRA, 2002
The Bad Tempered Chair is the successor to the Well Tempered Chair, but
it actually behaves better than its well-tempered predecessor. The Well
Tempered Chair (1986) was Ron Arad's first product for a company other
than his own, One Off Ltd. It's based on the idea of offering flexibility
not through upholstery or a mechanism but through the actual construction
of the chair. Steel leaves are folded in a way that makes the seat and the
back flexible. Production of the Well Tempered Chair ended in 1993
when the steel used was no longer manufactured. In 2002 Arad had the idea
to use a new material--a sandwich of carbon fiber and Kevlar held together
by polyester--which has better flex properties than the steel did.
Rolf Fehlbaum, Chairman, Vitra
www.vitra.com
FUN SEATING BY SUN HAN, SENIOR
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Courtesy Art Center College of Design
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Sun Han is from Korea, where there is a long tradition of floor furniture.
At the same time she's very much into things that are new, young, edgy.
The idea of trying to cross what appeals to Han with her historical roots
produces this wonderful hybrid. Her piece can be produced in two different
ways--in an injection rotational mold, which would make it an inexpensive
yet multifunctional piece, or in cast fiberglass, which is not terribly
pricey yet is durable. The prototype was produced on a CNC machine, so she
has computer files on that. It's a project that can go from the classroom
to production in moments.
David Mocarski, Professor, Illustration Department, Art Center College of Design
DETERIOR-EAT BY JOHANNA NILSSON, SENIOR
Changes in technology and the quick obsolescence of products encourage a
fashion frame of mind when it comes to introducing products into the market.
Mac computers get removed from the market like fashion items to make way
for the new version. Johanna Nilsson's ceramics are completely degraded
before they're even fired by dripping water on the greenware. So the
design is really about the ephemeral nature and transience of the object
as opposed to an object that appears to be essential and then is suddenly
out of fashion or obsolete. The water puts holes in the pieces, giving them
a fragile, irregular edge.
Tony Whitfield, Department Chair, Product Design,
Parsons School of Design
SEASHELL BAG BY SHIPRA MISRA, GRADUATE STUDENT
Our theme is "Night Fever." We were really interested in doing
something connected to a particular part of the day, and examining how products
and objects change from day to night or are used strictly at night. It seemed
like an interesting starting point from which to look at design. One project
examines the exotic quality of night--the things you'll wear at night that
you won't wear during the day. We have a fairy-tale backpack that you would
wear with an evening gown rather than take to school.
Debera Johnson, Chair, Department of Industrial Design, Pratt Institute
VT SOLAR HOUSE, VIRGINIA TECH
This house was the result of a competition sponsored by
the
Department of Energy and installed on the Mall in Washington, D.C. The
projects had to generate their own power and accommodate all normal
household functions.
Robert Schubert, Associate Dean for Research
College of Architecture and Urban Studies, Virginia Tech
The whole house is one big space, within which are
modular rooms and plug-ins. The walls are no longer walls: they have
another utilitarian dimension. For example, the north wall
is a kitchen. We tried to integrate all elements inside the house
through the language of plug-ins and modularity.
Yousef Nawas, Graduate Student
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