CRETUS Magazine by CRETUSMag

CRE T US VISUAL ART / DESIGN / PERFORMING ARTS / CRAFT

THE DESIGN ISSUE FEATURING

Alireza Massoumnia | Ian Stell Infographics | Stationery | Interactive Design FALL 2014 • VOL. 1, NO. 1

Issue 01

“If you can design one thing, you can design everything.” – Massimo Vignelli (1931-2014)

THE DESIGN ISSUE FALL 2014

Shao Huang

Founder & Creative Director

Aniella Perold Editor in Chief

Tessa Maffucci Web Editor

Nicky Ruan

Director of Business Development & PR

Natalie Holt Photo Editor

Wendong Wu and Qishen Li Web Developers

Special Thanks to Tzu Huan Lin Haisam Hussein Spencer Ni Ann Liu Nina Allen JC Huang HW Huang Kuan Hang Huang

CRETUS is published quarterly by Braincast Works, Inc. and printed at Symmetry in New York City. An interdisciplinary arts magazine, it aims to illuminate and comment on the creative process and connect readers to an array of emerging artists. Each issue focuses on one of four art disciplines.

Braincast Works is a design-driven marketing firm based in New York City. With a specialty in bridging the gap between Eastern and Western professional cultures and aesthetics, we bring together innovative creative work and attuned branding to expertly hone our clientsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; international personality and presence.

ISSN: 2372-3807 Copyright ÂŠ 2014 Braincast Works 252 Java Street, Suite 302 Brooklyn, NY 11222 General Information: info@cretusmag.com Advertising: advertising@cretusmag.com

CONTENTS

1 3 5 7 2 1 3 3 3 9 5 1 6 1

Contributors

Editorâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Note Round-Up: Product Design Picks The Crafted Collection: Alireza Massoumnia Parts In Concert: Ian Stell The Silent Power of Design Map Men: John Grimwade and Haisam Hussein The Modern Stationery Shop CRETUS Contest: Designing for New York

CONTRIBUTORS

Andrew Gardner Writer

Andrew Gardner is a writer and researcher based in New York City. He writes about the intersection of design and material culture with food, architecture, technology and urban landscapes. He’s currently a graduate student at the Bard Graduate Center and is working on an exhibition about interface design experience in the last 30 years. A native of the San Francisco Bay Area, Andrew loves exploring the nether-regions of upstate New York and cooking for friends in his cramped (yet lively) Lower East Side apartment.

Tadzio Koelb Writer

Tadzio Koelb holds a Master’s degree in painting from the Winchester School of Art and another in creative writing from the University of East Anglia. His writing about art and literature has appeared in numerous publications on both sides of the Atlantic, including the New York Times Book Review, the Times Literary Supplement, the Guardian, the New Statesman, and Art in America. He is currently working on a novel.

Dana Kopel Writer

Dana Kopel is a curator, writer and poet based in New York. She has organized exhibitions at TEMP Art Space, New York, and Big Law Country Club, Brooklyn (where she was previously a co-director). She was an Assistant Curator for the Maldives Pavilion at the 55th Venice Biennale, and has assisted on exhibitions at Kunsthal KAdE, Amersfoort (NL) and the Museum of Contemporary Art Tucson. Her writing has been published in the Brooklyn Rail and the exhibition catalog of the Maldives Pavilion, among other publications. (Photo: Benedict Brink)

Wendy Ploger Photographer

Wendy Ploger is a portrait and event photographer who shoots in the studio and on the street. Born and raised in California but now based in Brooklyn, New York, she brings a discerning eye enhanced by her 15+ year career in graphic design. Her work has appeared on the New York Times website, in the New York Press, Associated Press and other publications, as well as in the documentary A Nation Remembers: The Story of the Pentagon Memorial. Her fine art photography has been featured in galleries around the country and the UK. (Photo: Diane Bondareff)

Naomi Krupitsky Wernham Writer

Naomi Krupitsky Wernham’s fiction and poetry has appeared in several small literary magazines, in print and online. She loves getting the chance to get to know artists and craftspeople through the work she has done for CRETUS. She has spent the past few months traveling, and to find more of her writing, you can follow her cross-country adventure at www.twowheeldrive.net.

PHOTO: WENDY PLOGER

CRETUS Editor Aniella Perold walks with furniture designer Ian Stell to his studio in Red Hook, Brooklyn

EDITOR’S NOTE

You have in your hands the very first quarterly print issue of CRETUS, and I couldn’t be more pleased to introduce it to you.

Born as a website in December 2013, CRETUS is focused on featuring and conversing with emerging artists within four art disciplines: fine art, craft,

performing arts, and—as evidenced here—design. We are gourmands when it

comes to art: relishing all forms and especially enjoying work that overlaps them. In this issue you’ll meet designers who bring sharply discerning eyes, confident

hands, and unmistakable originality to their work. On our cover, fashion designer

Alireza Massoumnia makes the case for rarity, elegance, and craft in an age of brandcentric clothing. Furniture designer Ian Stell lets us in on his process, which draws

inspiration from choral structure and textile, among other things. Infographics artists and longtime colleagues John Grimwade and Haisam Hussein reflect on their field’s evolution from layered hand drawings to 3-D modeling and interactive design.

We also look at the delightful proliferation of stationers around the globe who are bringing writing accoutrements to a generation nostalgic for more tactile times,

while an essay by Tadzio Koelb takes up the role of the designer as digital interfaces

become increasingly inseparable from real life. Last but not least, we reveal the work of three talented young finalists in our inaugural contest, Designing for New York. We feel that a look at one artist’s creative process is a look at art-making itself, and in that spirit we present CRETUS: The Design Issue, no. 1.

Cheers!

Aniella Perold Editor in Chief

1: PHILLIP VAN NOSTRAND, 2: JASON WYCHE, 3: SIR JACK’S, 4: HELMET: JONAS INGERSTEDT AND HANNES SÖDERLUND, 5: ROSENDAHL DESIGN GROUP A/S

1 3

ROUND-UP: PRODUCT DESIGN PICKS THE STAFF AND CONTRIBUTORS BEHIND THIS ISSUE SHARE THEIR FAVORITE FINDS

1. VAYU CUSTOM CASHMERE SCARF fromtheroad.com Using natural dyes made from herbs, plants, nuts, and fruits, each of these scarves is hand-tinted to the customer’s specifications. While deeply tied to generations-old weaving and dying traditions in Nepal, the scarf’s design is cutting-edge modern and the hand-woven fabric (crafted with cashmere strands from Inner Mongolia) is impossibly sheer. I love high-end/low-tech pieces like this. – Andy Omel, art director, judge for “CRETUS Contest” (p. 61) 2. TROLL TONGUE PIPE alldayeveryday.com It’s a ceramic tongue—handmade by TROLL, a collaboration between artists Aine Vonnegut and Maia Ruth Lee—that’s also a pipe. A beautiful object, each one is obviously handcrafted and glazed in pink or brown or green. When you smoke out of it, it looks like you’re sticking out your (big, strangely colored) tongue. I think that’s brilliant. –Dana Kopel, writer, “The Crafted Collection” (p. 7) 3. BALMORE SPIRITS DECANTER sirjacks.com A great-great-aunt in my family coined the term “losoling” which stands for Lowering Our Standard Of Living. To losol is regrettable: it means putting the milk carton on the table, rather than filling a pitcher with milk. I love her discerning approach to life, though perhaps more in theory than in practice. This spirits decanter by Sir Jack’s is made in England of hand cut crystal with a sterling silver collar around the neck. I came across it on Fancy and now I’m dreaming of decanters. –Tessa Maffucci, CRETUS Web Editor 4. HÖVDING BIKE HELMET hovding.com I usually don’t mind wearing a helmet, though it can be pretty uncomfortable in the summer. This particular helmet caught my eye, because I’d love to be able to ride helmet-free and still feel safe. It looks goofy when inflated, but I imagine that looks won’t be a concern when your fast-moving head is ensured a soft landing against the city asphalt. –Haisam Hussein, infographics artist, interviewed in “Map Men” (p. 39) 5. PICTO WATCH dezeenwatchstore.com These sensational watches by Picto use a rotating dial mechanism. The steel dot represents the hours of the day and the clock’s face rotates as hours tick by. Watches are one of the few “man accessories” so my collection continues to grow every time I travel. I discovered these on a recent trip to London and have been lusting after the beautiful color combos and simplicity of their design ever since. –Andrew Gardner, writer, “The Modern Stationery Shop” (p. 51)

THE CRAFTED COLLECTION FASHION DESIGNER ALIREZA MASSOUMNIA BRINGS TECHNICAL MASTERY TO HIS SCULPTURAL, HIGH-CONCEPT CLOTHING

By Dana Kopel • Photographs by Natalie Holt

In the living room of Alireza Massoumnia’s

in an ethereal, light pink transparent knit. A

Kitchen, a row of windows offers an improbably

trimmed in black lace, with an oval of sheer

small apartment-cum-workspace in Hell’s

gorgeous view of the Hudson River and New

Jersey. Light filters in through the slats of the Venetian blinds, forming a striped pattern on the white wall above the couch where we’re

sitting. It strikes me that this pattern—lines of

bright light against the darker wall—recalls the way the pieces in the fashion designer’s recent

collection evoke a provocative tension between light and dark, concealment and revealing.

A floor-length gown, modestly cut with long

sleeves and a high neckline, is rendered entirely

sheer nude veil that falls below the elbows is black geometrically patterned fabric directly

over the face. It’s strange, and strangely elegant, simultaneously concealing the face and drawing attention to it. “I really wanted to do that [with

the veil], the mystery and the darkness but at the same time transparency and light,” Massoumnia reflects. “That was my challenge, to try to

accomplish the darkness without the weight.” His process, the designer tells me, usually

begins with an idea, which he works over in

his head before turning to materials. “I develop 8

The mood board for Massoumnia’s first collection, featuring black and pink-nude silks and tulles

ideas as I’m on the subway and walking down the street.

Sometimes I don’t even sketch it, I just make the pattern: it goes from my head directly to the actual piece.” For

this first collection, most of which is hanging on a single clothing rack in front of the window, he began thinking about techniques and craft rather than any overarching concept, and then discovered Maurice Sand’s turn-of-

the-century illustrations of harlequins and jesters. The repeated diamond patterns that run across the bodice

of a black gown, or down the billowy raglan sleeves of a sheer pink top, were inspired by these drawings.

“I took that idea of the diamond and the harlequin,

and I decided I wanted to break it up and then mix it

with formalwear,” Massoumnia explains. Further design inspiration came from Marlene Dietrich’s iconic tailcoat (“Which was on auction today!” he tells me, “I wish I

had $25,000. $25,000—and nobody bid on it!”) He picks up where he left off: “I started working with lapel shapes of a tailcoat. I wanted to do an all-black collection and make it very dark, but somehow I kept gearing toward

that delicate quality, so I went for the dark romance of it,” he says, all blacks and pink-nudes, structured silks and flowing tulle. The pieces feel innately sculptural, a reflection of his preoccupation with each garment’s

construction in three dimensions: “Every time I’m putting it on paper, it kind of takes something away from it. It

disrupts my process.” For Massoumnia, garments are best conceived in patterns and muslin samples and fittings. 9

At right: Massoumniaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s library of art and fashion books. Below: a diamond-patterned dress based on turn-of-thecentury harlequin illustrations by Maurice Sand

In Tehran, where the designer grew up, his

mother and grandmother often made clothes

for themselves, working in their house. “They used to make patterns from newspapers, cut a dress on the floor,” he remembers. “I was

always around there playing with the fabric

scraps and watching them.” Observing the two of them as they transformed newspaper and

fabric into dresses was a formative experience for the young Massoumnia, who also helped his “very fashionable” mother choose her

outfits. “When I was little,” he recalls, “people would always ask me if I was going to grow up and be a doctor like my father.” His

response? “I want to be a fashion designer!” Tehran at the time was a very cosmopolitan

city: “If you wanted to wear a miniskirt you

could wear a miniskirt, if you wanted to wear

a hijab you could,” Massoumnia tells me. “My family was very open-minded. My father was

not religious,” taking the family traveling and to movies. Then, in 1978, when Massoumnia

was in middle school, the Iranian Revolution happened, and the Iran-Iraq war began soon

after. He remembers the transformation from a

very Westernized Iran to one in which “Western films were illegal—on TV they showed only

Chinese and Russian movies, always very serious movies about war and [with few] women.”

With his mandatory military service looming,

Turkey, which was the only country he could

get to without a visa; from Istanbul he applied

for an Italian visa, but was rejected: “The Italian government was not issuing visas to teenage

Iranian boys, because they knew that we were

going there to stay.” He managed, however, to get a student visa—and eventually political asylum— in the United States. He tells me, “Believe it or

not, at that time it was the easiest place to come.” In 1985, Massoumnia arrived in Boston,

where he attended English school and quickly

became fluent. After six months or so, one of his sisters moved from Italy to the San Francisco Bay area, and he soon followed her there to

finish high school. After graduating, he studied for two years in a fashion program at a small

community college in San Francisco’s East Bay. The summer after his second year, he interned for a menswear designer. “They kept asking

me if I could help the pattern-maker, if I could

help the designer—it was a very small company and they could see that I was very open to

trying anything. When it was time to go back

to school, they offered me a job.” Massoumnia

came to the conclusion that there was “no better education than actually having a real job,” and

so, rather than returning to college, he worked as an assistant designer for the menswear

company and took a few courses on the side. Though Massoumnia left the company, and

Massoumnia says, “my parents wanted me to go

San Francisco, after a couple years—“the fashion

living in Italy at the time. So he left Iran for

he explains—his background in menswear

and live with my sisters,” both of whom were

industry in San Francisco was very small,”

remains an obvious influence. In addition to his tie

company, Monsieur Gris, his recent collection includes several tuxedo-inspired pieces for women, including

experimental, architecturally draped suit jackets and vests and a pink silk skirt with a cummerbund. He

tells me, “I love tailoring and I love menswear. I always find it exciting to take something that’s so tailored

and so classic, give it a twist, and put it on a woman.” He continues, “I’ve always been fascinated by that,

taking something classic and kind of messing it up.” Once in New York, Massoumnia took a job as a

pattern-maker, working nine to five and dedicating his nights, weekends, and vacation days—and much of his salary—to working on his own collection. “Because

I couldn’t afford to pay sample-makers and pattern-

makers, I started doing my own patterns and samples, which kind of went full circle to the way my mom

and my grandmother worked. And in the beginning

I didn’t even have a table to work on; I worked on the floor.” Developing this early collection while serving

as a full-time pattern-maker and freelancing on other projects for companies like Cartier and Calvin Klein, was both exhausting and rewarding, Massoumnia

remembers. Among his favorite projects from that time was a collaboration with Thierry Mugler for Cirque du Soleil, which Mugler initiated after seeing a women’s tailcoat Massoumnia had designed and tracking him down. “I was a huge fan, and still am,” he says of

Mugler’s work. “In college I used to save every tear

sheet. I still have them. So that was really exciting.” “But I found myself working seven days a week and

At left: Massoumnia flips through some vintage fashion magazines

really long hours, never being able to take vacations, spending every dollar I made on fabrics and shows,” he admits. “And [though] I was enjoying it, it got to

Above: a hand-cut lace detail in the works for Massoumnia’s forthcoming collection. Opposite page: pieces from his first collection

a point where it took the pleasure out of the

Perhaps the most influential, most creatively

creative process, and I decided to stop and

rewarding of these jobs was working as the head

amazing—my first job as a full-time designer

Mizrahi is “very creative and he has a lot of

just work as a designer for others. Which was was for Zac Posen.” Like Massoumnia, Posen

visualized clothing ideas in 3-D and also “loved to drape.” After a few years, Massoumnia

switched to freelance, working with Marchesa and Monique Lhuillier, a designer known primarily for bridal. “It was a lot of fun to

take her bridal language and translate it to

womenswear,” he reflects. And it wasn’t all

that different from his own work: “I’ve always had a love for lace and delicate fabrics like

tulle, and I find myself kind of gearing towards that, the romance of something so delicate.” 15

designer for Isaac Mizrahi’s high-end collection. knowledge,” Massoumnia says admiringly,

especially when it comes to the fine details of working with fabric, an obvious passion for

Massoumnia.“[Mizrahi] was unlike anybody else I’ve ever worked with,” he continues. “I would show him sketches, and he would sketch, and

he would tell me about the grain line, how the grain line should be”—a technical aspect that most big-name designers would leave to their

drapers. “There was a lot of mutual respect, and the fittings were fun,” Massoumnia tells me.

“He could take a lot of pleasure in the simplicity

of an idea. He would be happy if he saw a simple shift

dress but it was perfect—which is not an easy thing to accomplish. I learned that from him, which helps me

take a step back and make sure that I don’t overdo it.” Mizrahi helped develop Massoumnia’s evident gift of

giving a more traditional piece “a twist, without overkill.” He remained at Isaac Mizrahi until they closed the

high-end division, though he continued working with Mizrahi on special projects. But, he says, the closure

led him back to the idea of his own collection, which he “missed terribly.” So he got to work on his own again, first developing the concepts for the collection—the dark yet weightless romance, menswear influences,

harlequin prints—then making patterns, which he does himself even today: “I prefer it, because when I design

something I know exactly how I want to approach it and make it into 3-D.” From the patterns, he creates muslin samples and fits them to dress forms and, eventually, At left: the designer’s trusted sewing machine. Below: sketches from the first collection

real models; laughing, he tells me about one piece that the model couldn’t even get her arm into—he hadn’t

realized until that moment that there was only space

for one arm. Then he starts looking for fabrics, both in the garment district and in less likely places. “One of the laces that I use is a hundred-and-thirty-five-euro

antique lace that I found on eBay. That was a lucky find. I don’t like using lace as is, I like to do something with it that breaks it apart, so I trimmed it to the shape that I wanted it to be and got rid of certain flowers in it.”

The result—applied asymmetrically to a sheer gown, for

instance—is at once classically elegant and experimental. Now fully committed to his own line, Massoumnia

is driven to take risks, to push the limits of what’s considered wearable, salable, and interesting in

contemporary fashion. For this he looks to another

major influence, Alexander McQueen, who produced

rigorously conceptual, sometimes shocking collections

for Givenchy and then at his own label until his suicide in 2010. “What I loved about him,” Massoumnia tells me, “was that he pushed so many boundaries and, the

majority of his career, never cared what people thought.

He did what he wanted, he always told a story. There was 18

always an intellect behind it.” When McQueen died,

Massoumnia reflects, “in a way it killed the excitement

Right: a dramatic yet ethereal veil and dress ensemble

for me.” At the time of every show, he says, he would

calculate the time difference and “I would be on Getty

Images waiting for the images to load up because I didn’t want to wait until the next day to see them. It always

gave me chills and inspired me to take things further.” Massoumnia references a few up-and-coming British

designers whose work he admires—Jonathan Saunders, Mary Katrantzou—but says that, outside of London,

he doesn’t see much conceptual energy and risk-taking in fashion these days. “Every six hours there’s a new

designer,” and much of the clothing ends up looking

similar—easy to wear but not terribly original. “And

there’s a place for it, you know, I think there’s plenty of

people that do beautiful, wearable clothes,” he concedes, “but for me, the conceptual art is kind of missing.”

Massoumnia wants his next collection to be even

more conceptual, and less commercial, than the first

one—not that he considered selling the first one. “The idea never even crossed my mind,” he admits. Though

deeply influenced by the history of fashion—evidenced as much in our conversation as in the massive bookshelf of magazines in his apartment—Massoumnia situates his

work outside of the mainstream fashion industry. With this next collection in particular, he hopes to push his

aesthetic “to a more artistic place, but without taking it too seriously.” Yet it seems that this has, in a way, been his goal all along: to make clothing that seems, at first

glance, classic and elegant, but that reveals an unexpected twist or complexity—clothing that is resolutely not

practical, clothing that requires confidence above all.

He recalls an early collection he worked on, recounting, “I did these tailored tuxedo jackets but they had long kimono sleeves.” Massoumnia showed one to a buyer at Barney’s, whose response was, “You can’t eat soup with that. That was her comment. I was like, Okay?

[laughs] It wasn’t meant for someone that eats soup!”

COLLECTION PHOTOS: COURTESY OF THE ARTIST MODEL: EYEN CHORM, HAIR: ROBERTO DI CUIA, MAKEUP: CLAIRE BAYLEY

designers’ monographs, photo books and vintage fashion

PHOTO: CARL BELLAVIA

Views of the Sinan side table in various states of expansion

PARTS IN CONCERT ARTIST-DESIGNER IAN STELL BRINGS MUSIC AND METAPHOR TO FURNITURE

By Aniella Perold • Photographs by Wendy Ploger

When I first encountered Ian Stell’s complex

The through-line for much of Stell’s creative

yet elegant pieces, they made me think of dance.

life, he told me recently, is in fact vocal music.

at Sight Unseen OFFSITE, all featured moving

and New York City Opera choruses as a boy,

His large desk, side table, and chair, on display

wooden parts; the desk alone, I discovered, was comprised of fifteen hundred pieces and when

manipulated at opposing corners, could smoothly and gracefully transition from a rectangle to a long, lean parallelogram. Simultaneously strong as oak (literally), beautifully fluid,

and curiously light-seeming, the piece was

admirable in just the way of a ballet dancer: a beautiful illusion of ease belying great effort.

The Manhattan native sang in the Metropolitan and he has held on to the sense of power created when many voices join and blend in song.

“It’s something that I feel I understand the

mechanics of intellectually,” he explains, “but mostly it’s just this incredible, rich, intuitive thing.” Though singing is more of a private act for Stell these days—an acoustic guitar sits as quiet proof in the living room of his

Brooklyn apartment—the notion of disparate 22

Above: in his studio, Stell spreads out a drawing made with his self-constructed pantograph. Right: Stellâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s home workspace and current reading

parts coming together to comprise a sophisticated,

multi-layered whole is at the heart of his artistic work. Stell studied painting and sculpture as an

undergraduate at the Art Institute of Chicago, and then returned to New York to begin his working life as most young artists do: by waiting tables. After some time in

the restaurant world, he and a friend (sculptor Michael Drury) opened a bar on the Lower East Side, followed

by several other bars and restaurants. Stell says of those now-closed establishments that although he and Drury

“were really good at opening them… we were terrible at running them.” But Stell took note of how the spaces, which he designed, drew people in: “People really

responded to the way that they were built. That began

to make me think more about building, making things that people interact with, things that people negotiate with in a broader way.” Although he didn’t see it as a

career development at the time, something was clearly

clicking into place. “I wasn’t even so conscious of it being design, per se. It was just something visual. It didn’t

feel like art, but I didn’t think of myself as a designer.” Today, whether Stell is a designer or a visual artist

seems like a vitally unanswerable question. After

leaving behind the last of his restaurant ventures, Stell focused for a time on showing his work as an artist.

During this time, some of the themes now central to

his practice began gestating. Interestingly, Stell says of

that period, “people I knew who were designers thought I was an artist and artist friends of mine thought I

was a designer. It was this funny place,” he continues,

but eventually he grew to inhabit this borderline more

comfortably. “Well,” he recalls concluding, “maybe I’m doing something right if I’m confusing everybody!”

Stell explains the construction of his Bookish chair (shown). At right, The expanded Big Pivot desk, made of ebonized white oak 25

about that work, Stell moved to Providence

to begin his MFA in the furniture program at Rhode Island School of Design. The program

appealed to him for its integration of contrasting approaches: “It was founded by studio furniture makers,” he explains, “but they brought in a

lot of people that came from much more of a

strict [industrial design] methodology, people that license for manufacture.” Stell adds,

“in the crits there would be people from the

sculpture department as often as people from

ID. There’s this really interesting set of voices.” It was during that time, in fact, that Stell

became aware of how a childhood spent singing had colored his approach creatively. Talking

about it now, he still marvels at how one can

be an “individual entity singing in relationship to these other parts... this smaller part of [an]

enormous force.” A sense of interconnectedness and cohesion, and yet beautiful and natural

variation, is strongly present across Stell’s body of work. In addition to the pivoting pieces of

his Pantograph Series—like the Sinan side table and Big Pivot desk—works like the magical

Telecandela, a golden candelabrum comprised of five telescoping, tube-like oil lamps, show the harmonic ensemble that can be made of

individual components. “It took years to realize

how connected what I do, how I think creatively, is really, in a very fundamental way, connected

to that,” Stell reflects. Not surprisingly, his MFA thesis, Singing Fabric, explored the integration of choral structure into furniture design.

Stell writes exceptionally well about his work—

although he calls it a “minor miracle” that he was

able to turn in his thesis on time, while designing and building his final projects, and giving a show in Milan. Even his website copy, in introducing each piece of furniture, takes up topics like the

shared Latin root of text and textile. In addition,

words themselves figure increasingly in his recent work; using materials as varied as metal, yarn,

leather, and wood, Stell has been experimenting with using text in unexpected ways.

Many of the pieces he is developing use

anamorphic text, meaning that the words

are “optically distorted” so that they are only legible from a certain vantage point or under certain conditions. For example, Last We

See involves a message cast when the sun hits the vertical structure at just the right angle. Newdrift looks like an intricate, irregularly cut leather bench surface, until you view

it from one of two specific angles: the first

reveals the text “BLOW ACROSS,” and the

PHOTO: COURTESY OF ARTIST

Taking what he had learned about building

and designing, as well as his deepening curiosity

second, “IF I LET GO WILL I MAKE IT

EASTWARD OR DRIFT ON TO SHORE.”

experience: “It really interests me,” he says, “when things have to be seen from different vantage

The genesis of these projects is an interesting

points in order to get the full picture. [When] all

process in general. The text, he admits bashfully,

them all at the same time.” Engaging with one of

from overheard conversations. Either way,

it on all sides, experimenting with your eye level,

no intention of holding onto because then I

sun to align properly. It’s a bit like investigating

edit this—which of course edits every aspect

pleasure on first look, but far greater satisfaction

window onto Stell’s exploratory, interdisciplinary

of the elements are there, but you can’t process

often comes from songs he has written, or else

Stell’s anamorphic pieces means walking around

he says, “I will write something that I have

tilting your head, maybe even waiting for the

won’t get precious about it, and then kind of

a finely wrought poem; there is a degree of

of it, the way it looks, the way it would work

once you ascertain better how it’s working.

relationship between [these] different things.”

forth from his home computer to his studio,

structurally, the content that it carries, the

Stell is drawn toward the idea of anamorphic

text because of the way it complicates the viewing

The phases of Stell’s work take him back and

a space in Red Hook that he shares with the design and manufacturing company Token.

PHOTO AND DRAWING: COURTESY OF ARTIST

Below: a visual detail from Stell’s diagram of the Newdrift bench. At right: one of two views of the bench’s anamorphic lettering

Although it tends to start in software these days,

to construct a solution for himself rather than

physically into the world always involves real

he says, “although I used to be really bad at it.”

Stell says, “my process in bringing an object

negotiations with material.” Material certainly reigns in this space, where CNC mills and

sliding table saws are interspersed with glass

projects and scraps of wood. The artist seems in his element here, and speaks admiringly

of the staff we see operating their particular

machinery, who wave to us over the noise. I ask

Stell if he was always a hands-on type, preferring

purchasing something ready-made. “Absolutely,” Today, thanks in part to his time

experimenting with different modalities at RISD, he has the technical chops to serve

most all his needs, whether around the house or in the studio. “I kind of know how to fix

everything and work with everything from a

fine paintbrush to a TIG welder to drawing an STL file or a mesh file for rapid prototyping,”

he says. Not only does he genuinely enjoy taking

integrity, functionality, and the harmony between

but, he says, “I strongly believe that when I’m

involve text running in two directions, seeming to

all the phases of production into his own hands, generating new ideas, I draw from that well of different vocabularies… If I didn’t have that spectrum of stuff to draw on, then not only

would I not be able to solve the problems, the problems wouldn’t even really be there.”

all of those choices. Further, Stell’s latest pieces

“cross each other out” but still produce a readable result. Stell scrunches his brow when I ask about some complex-looking computerized drawings lying on his kitchen table. They look like an

architectural plan for a peculiar ocean liner; it

The anamorphic work, in particular, presents

turns out they’re for another two-way anamorphic

scale (which alters the optical effect), structural

“It’s a crazy process,” Stell says, shaking his head.

“problems” on multiple levels: textual meaning,

bench piece that will be laser-cut out of leather.

At left: Telecandela, made of five telescoping oil lamps. Opposite page: Last We See, at peak legibility

But radical simplicity is not where this artist-

designer’s passions lie. He is frank on the point that his is “definitely not a reductive process… it’s sort of the

opposite.” Stell continues, “I take a certain amount of

joy and pride out of not working that way, not boiling

things down to their essences.” For a person who draws deeply and enthusiastically on art history, science,

architecture, language, and music, it seems obvious that

both process and product must be richly complex. “I have respect for those who don’t like to think that way,” he

says, referencing work more rooted in the here and now or ultra-streamlined, “but for me,” he concludes, “that

would be sort of like drinking wine and thinking red.”

THE SILENT POWER OF DESIGN IN THE DIGITAL ERA, HOW IS DESIGN MEDIATING HUMAN EXPERIENCE?

By Tadzio Koelb

For design, as for other things, it seems that Pop Art

was destined to tell the future. While one ostensible promise of Pop—that it would establish a universal

priesthood in which all believers could have a personal relationship with the beauty of the everyday—was at

best misguided, and at worst a bait-and-switch, it has

nevertheless provided an outline of the (Western) world to come, particularly in aspects relating to the role of design. This is not because Pop highlighted or celebrated the

jobbing craftsmen behind the things it reproduced—the

comic books, the dance steps, the packaging. In fact, the Romantic idea of an interpreting spirit, the individual genius, is, if anything, more powerful than ever when the physicality of individual creation is removed from the equation by mechanical reproduction. Talent is

supplanted by magic. What makes one man’s Ben-Day

dots better than another’s? Only the alchemical touch of a highly exalted being can transform the base metal of

the Brillo box into the gold of art—otherwise, each of the millions produced every year would be worth a fortune.

In this sense, Andy Warhol and Roy Lichtenstein are

unlikely descendants of arch-Romantic painter Caspar David Friedrich, the most important German artist of

the long 19th century. In Wanderer above the Sea of Fog, now emblematic of German Romanticism as a whole, Friedrich set man, represented by a single figure with Opening page: Wanderer Above the Sea of Fog, Caspar David Friedrich, c. 1818 bpk, Berlin / Kunsthalle Hamburg Elke Walford / Art Resource, NY 35

his back to (and therefore sharing a point of view with) the audience, against the backdrop of an inescapable

force in the form of the natural world. Pop Artists do the same, only their seas of fog part to reveal not the Elbe

Sandstone Mountains but the canned-goods

aisle—which is to say, an environment made of and inseparable from design. It is here, in the

replacement of an exalted Nature by a realm of

endless artificiality, that Pop revealed to us our future, if not the virtual form it would take.

There are, of course, alchemical designers,

and in the physical realm they will continue to exist. There are those whose vision is

transformative, who will mark the way in which we think about things and places—who will,

for example, redesign our public spaces to meet the needs of the hybrid public/privacy of our digital interactions, who will make us aware

of the ways in which those interactions affect

us. There are also those whose power is in their names, by which they give value to otherwise average goods. Where the “soft” replaces the

The construction of London’s St. Pancras station, J. Ward, 1868 Courtesy of the National Railway Museum

“hard,” however, the agency of both must change, even if we cannot yet know exactly how: the

OS can never become the Eames chair, or even the D&G t-shirt; we will not pass our apps

so we can have the sensory encounter designed

Will, simply because they are intangible—

the museum stop and the gift shop begin?

down to our children or offer them to the Good and yet it is the OS and the app that will,

increasingly, shape and define our existence. How does this alter our expectations for

design? In the virtual space, our experience

of design is immersive, as the primary forest would have been for Friedrich. There is an

assumption that nothing arrives by accident in a place where the designer has an almost

God-like power to create. Does this affect our

relationship to design in the tangible world? In the “experience economy”, where we seek out (and are charged for) not—or not only—the

concrete object, but the feeling our interaction with it gives us, the demands for ever-more

immersive design, abetted by new technologies, can only be expected to expand. Shops will be

entered not just so we can purchase goods, but

into the space. In such a future, where will

We must ask, is this different from simply

expecting a space to be beautiful, as a Victorian

might have a train station? Is the architecture of the “experience” space really so different from

what Barlow sought to create with St. Pancras? If so, it is surely in the anticipated personalization of the encounter. This is something we see

occurring in a thousand small ways, from the

frustration that your boyfriend’s phone, although the same as yours, might be a mystery because

of its customizations, to the fact that the world, once grasped most completely as the globe,

is now delivered by GPS one intersection at

a time, as centered on the individual. Where

Freidrich’s Wanderer could once stand in for

us all, “you are here” has becomes a statement that is constantly recontextualized.

Brillo Boxes, Andy Warhol ÂŠ 2014 The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc. / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

One of the things designers are hard at work creating

now—whether consciously or not—is their own role in

this future. As Paola Antonelli, MoMA’s Senior Curator of Architecture and Design, put it, “design is not only

problem solving, but also ‘problem making’ … focused

on finding possible solutions to problems that do not yet exist.” Will designers help us see past our segmentation, or will they cement it? As human interaction becomes more mediated—for many of us, our “second lives” on

social media are surely as present as our first—when the

user interface is also the face of your human interlocutor, design becomes the unchallenged constant; by virtue of its ubiquity, it is also almost certainly a medium

of control. How will designers face the challenge of

retaining individuality in the new spaces they create? What will be shared and what will be personal in this

new space? When personalization is the mainstream,

how will we step outside that to the counter-cultural?

To what extent can the “experience society” be separated from commerce? What will take the place of the public monument when the public is atomized?

These are, at least for now, questions without

answers. How designers, including those profiled here, choose to answer them (indeed, whether they choose consciously to answer or not), how we as consumers

guide that response, either knowingly or otherwise, will have effects that literally surround us. Remembering how far design reaches past our clothes or other

consumables might be more important than ever.

MAP MEN

LONGTIME COLLEAGUES JOHN GRIMWADE AND HAISAM HUSSEIN DISCUSS THEIR EVOLVING FIELD OF INFOGRAPHICS

By Naomi Krupitsky Wernham • Photographs by Natalie Holt

n today’s visually saturated world, infographics are everywhere. They illustrate recent voting

trends. They help us put together our new Ikea furniture. They track the mating patterns of rare birds. They

tell us about the weather this week. Yet infographics is still a tiny field. It occupies a unique space—somewhere between art, design, journalism, and science—but there are few infographics courses at universities, and a clear definition cannot easily be found online. (Indeed, the red squiggly line that Microsoft Word persists in showing

beneath the word “infographics” suggests that the discipline has not yet come to the attention of those linguistic powers-that-be.)

Figuring highly in the small but global world of infographics artists are John Grimwade and Haisam Hussein.

The two were brought together by their thirteen years as colleagues in the three-person Graphics Department

(first started by Grimwade in 1987) at Condé Nast Traveler magazine; collectively they have contributed work to virtually all of America’s leading publications, including National Geographic, The Atlantic, Esquire, New York, Rolling Stone, TIME, Vanity Fair, Popular Science, and Wired. Now out on their own as New York-based

freelancers, the two friends met with me in the backyard garden of Milk and Roses in CRETUS’s neighborhood of Greenpoint, Brooklyn. Our conversation was punctuated by Grimwade’s wry British humor and Hussein’s

frank observations as we discussed working from home, information distortion, the zeal for software, and the absence of “stuff” in a digital world.

Grimwade’s pencil sketches for Connect magazine, 2005

NKW: How did you guys meet?

know where we are. Always. Boringly so. I’m

HH: I was on track to get an illustration degree

“is that right?” But my wife says, on the other

from School of Visual Arts when I started doing production work at Modern Bride. Doing a full

time job and being in school is really hard, and

I realized that the track I was on requires more of a strong portfolio than a degree. But this

was before I even knew infographics existed.

I consider myself lucky, having then landed at

always looking at maps and Google and saying, hand, that I don’t see the big picture. She’ll say, “you didn’t see that crane over that building?”

And I’ll say, “It’s probably because I was thinking

about the proportions of the windows.” You know what I mean? I don’t see the bigger thing that’s going on.

Traveler. I couldn’t have planned it better.

NKW: What parts of your jobs are more

JG: Haisam had all the traits that I look for. I just

rather than working together at Traveler?

know it when I see it. He was interested in the

kinds of things you have to be interested in to do this job.

HH: John really took me under his wing. I owe

so much of my style and my way of approaching a graphic to him.

NKW: It seems very meticulous. JG: It requires a lot of patience. NKW: So do you feel like you see the world in

challenging now that you’re doing freelance,

HH: Working from home is great in many ways, but it can be too isolated. I’m realizing now as a

freelancer that it’s harder to know if I’m doing the right thing, because I’m working with one project and looking at it so often that I lose track of what it is and whether it’s working, whereas in the office we could show each other things. JG: Yeah, the objectivity thing is really

important. When you walk behind someone’s monitor, you spot the issues straight away.

infographics?

JG: I’ve driven my wife mad over the years

because I’m such a map person. And I always

A selection of monuments hand-drawn by Grimwade for English Heritage, the UK’s landmarks preservation commission

good motivation for me to set aside time to learn how to do that. Another client is interested in

3-D renderings, which is something I’ve done in

the past but not too extensively. That’s what I find satisfying in my work right now. HH: You need to come to my apartment and

walk behind my desk and look at my monitor! JG: I mean, we all need it—I need it. NKW: What parts of your jobs are more interesting now that you’re working as

NKW: I’m interested in how you start a project. When someone comes and says, I want a map

that represents X, you translate that into a visual – for me, that’s sort of unimaginable, so I’m

curious; does it happen instantaneously, do you sketch…?

freelancers?

JG: It depends so much on the project and on the

JG: I’ve liked some things I’ve done that are very

and really good sources it’s a totally different

simple. I remember I did a diagram of how a pipe organ works. And I just tried to make something that anyone could understand—I mean, hardly

material. If I have really good reference material project. If I don’t, I have to go out and find stuff in the world.

anyone knows how a pipe organ works, really.

NKW: So it’s your job to find the data also?

that may have enabled the ordinary person to

JG: Research is absolutely a part of the job. If you

Those are the ones I really like—the ones understand something.

HH: As a freelancer, there’s more hustle, more

energy and focus needed to keep the work coming in. But the projects are more varied, and there

don’t start off with fantastic research it’s quite a

struggle. Or quite often, they send you data, but it doesn’t actually make their intended point. That’s quite a shock.

are times when clients ask for a particular style or

HH: They want a graphic, so they set aside a

way of working, one that you wouldn’t necessarily

not anything to put in that space– there’s not

medium, and it’s a good push towards a different experience at a desk job. For example, one of my

clients is asking for interactive graphics, which is 43

space for something. But you realize there’s

a graphic in that story. Or you have to make something to fit a space.

Graphics designed by Grimwade in the late 1970s for the UKâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Sunday Times Magazine

wonder they dozed the rens: This 1954 tograph docunts Dresden’s es nine years r the air raids.

trucks

Traveler Condé Nast

DRESDEN REV3 SHIPPED 2-26

2006

SALVATION ON THE ELBE

rchaeological evidence and archival pictures are the keys to

Dresden’s 800th anniversary and the projected end of reconstruction. The church will be restored to its full height of 304 feet with the placement of the cross and orb— a reparative donation from England’s Dresden Trust.

the rebuilding of Dresden’s

Baroque center. Rubble was collected like puzzle pieces for reconstruction,

which began under East Germany but Grimwade designed this after reunificabecame more ambitious architectural rendering of in 1989.ofCurrent restoration efforts thetion rebuilding Dresden’s Lutheran Frauenkirche for are concentrated on the Lutheran Condé Nast Traveler in 2001 Frauenkirche (see detail, right). GRAPHICS BY

FRAUENKIRCHE The great Protestant church, built in 1743 and once the dominant feature of the skyline, is being rebuilt using sandstone from the original Saxon quarry and several thousand cut stones from the ruins. Surviving walls The two surviving sections of outer wall, which stood for 50 years as a symbol of what Dresden had lost, have been incorporated in the new building. THE RUIN

2003

Completion of the 205-foot-high dome.

John Grimwade

high with stone and sand

2002

an statue

ALBERTINUM

It suffered only minor damage during the war, and now houses Europe’s largest treasury in the Grünes Gewölbe (Green Vault).

B R Ü H L T E R R AC E

2001

TAG ACADEMY OF ARTS

Built in 1894 in Renaissance revival style. Reconstruction of the complex began in 1990.

ASSE

SURVIVING WALL

UM NEUMARKT

FRAUENKIRCHE

nce, yles. but il 6.

E74

RAMPISCHE STRASSE

Painters and photographers doted on this approach to the Frauenkirche. Restoration will concentrate on facades, to recreate the urban ensemble around the Neumarkt.

KREUZKIRCHE

Home of one of the oldest boys’ choirs in Germany. The exterior has been restored, but inside, only the massive columns suggest the original Baroque grandeur.

INNER GLORY

The intricately ornamented interior, built to accommodate more than 3,000 people, is being completely re-created. STORY EDITOR DESIGNER

1996

COPY EDITOR

Crypt completed.

PHOTO EDITOR

1993

Reconstruction begins.

0401-TR-WE75

JG: I hate that. I absolutely hate that. They’ll say,

telling a story, you want it to look appealing, but

square, and I’ll say, “wait a minute, it might be

sweet spot. You can’t do a guide to a museum that

we’re thinking of something that’s ten inches

a linear thing that needs to go across five little pages.” I think stage one is this sometimes-

you also want it to work. So you have to hit that doesn’t actually take you around the museum.

torturous planning process.

HH: I was just thinking, John – you showed

NKW: So after stage one, does it come sort of

and it was, I think, the number of people

naturally, what shape it will be?

JG: [That] springs out of the material, hopefully. That’s the best kind of infographic.

NKW: I was going to ask a question about

a graphic in your class…it was by Fox News,

who had signed up for ObamaCare. It totally

misrepresented the data by showing only the top part of the chart. It didn’t start at zero, so the

scale was all wrong. It looked like not many had signed up. The data was correct, but cropped.

whether you think design lives more on the

JG: The ethics of that is a huge issue. People do

like what you guys do is more between science

just shaving off the bottom of the data.

advertising side or the artistic side, but it seems and art.

JG: I think of it as where information and art

meet. I’ve described it to students as like a punchout between the two. It’s a conflict because you’re

that all the time. One of the worst problems is

NKW: But on the other hand, do you feel like

you have creative license to express things with a point of view?

JG: I think you just have to be very

careful not to mislead people. When it’s making ObamaCare look like a

huge disaster, and if you look at the

number it really isn’t a disaster at all. HH: I like the term ‘visual journalism.’ Because

what we do involves research and data-gathering just as traditional journalism does, and then you

to think it out first, because when you did it the

way to convey what’s often an overwhelming

had to really think it through first. Whereas now,

have to figure out the most honest and accurate amount of information.

NKW: John, you must have seen your fair share of technological changes in your industry.

JG: Yes, massive change. Incredible changes. From paintbrushes and designer colors, to computers…

NKW: How do you think that impacted the way you work?

JG: I’ve kept the same habits from back then to today. Like, I don’t just start something, I like 47

[old] way you couldn’t change it easily later so you like my students, they just go charging in. They don’t think about it at all! They just start!

NKW: That seems like a crucial difference in the mental process.

JG: Yeah, it’s a complete shift in the thinking. HH: And when you’re able to make things look

nice right away on the screen, you get caught up in how things look—

JG: Yeah, the look. Much too fast. Instead of planning. What happened to the planning?

From the Russian Mob to the Japanese Yakuza, this map of organized crime networks was designed by Hussein for the Crimes & Punishments issue of Lapham’s Quarterly, 2009

NKW: Do you feel like you were

resistant to computers being a part of your work, or were you excited? Did

you jump on the computer bandwagon We had to do the planning because you were

going to cut it out of film! You weren’t going to,

the way that people today are so excited about 3-D modeling, etc?

halfway through, rethink the whole thing, it was

JG: I worked at a newspaper where we first had

start off and they don’t know where they’re going,

were always fighting to get a graphic up on the

impossible honestly. But now of course people

they’re hoping that eventually they get to an end result.

NKW: And meanwhile you’ve lost quite a bit of time.

JG: Or you’ve gotten attached to the way it looks, so much that you won’t restructure it because it

looks great. That’s a common conversation I have

with my students. “What exactly is that?” “I don’t know, but it looks great…!”

no monitor, and then one shared monitor. So we screen. I liked it. It was great for typesetting…

suddenly, we were able to set type instantly. But

also, suddenly, it was silent. The print room used to be this noisy place where metal was being banged around.

NKW: That sounds sort of romantic to me, actually—to have physical stuff.

JG: I was so sad when I heard Pearl Paint was closing, because I was once always in there…

I mean, you had to have a massive stock of stuff—

JG: More, because we used to think about doing

years, I didn’t need the materials, but I used to go

I mean, everything was a nightmare. You had

film, paint, brushes, you needed stuff. In later in art stores and just look at things.

NKW: [To HH] This must be something that you sort of missed out on.

HH: I don’t even sketch by hand! And I feel a

little funny about that. I know John still does. JG: I do, but I’m doing it less and less. No one

really wants it. So I’m often doing it just for my own benefit, just to clear my thinking.

NKW: Do you feel like infographics is a growing field?

JG: Yes, because of the data. Think of the amount of data we have with—with GPS! I mean, the impact that’s had is incredible. Everyone is tracking everything.

NKW: So does all this make your job more or less exciting?

things, but we couldn’t get any data for them.

to manually track everything. But [the data] is

also a bit of a curse. It’s led to a mad rash of data visualizations. People are taking these massive

amounts of data and crunching them around and producing something that doesn’t really tell you anything.

HH: Lots of people are doing it, but they just

aren’t doing it properly. [To JG] It doesn’t seem like you’re opposed to any one software or technology, though.

JG: I’m not! If it works, everything is on the table: illustration, video, photography, 3-D, data visualization, or anything else! In the

early years of computer graphics, the standard of infographics fell through the floor. Badly

drawn vector graphics were everywhere. But the technology gradually improved, and so did the infographics.

NKW: Isn’t that the thing with any new tool?

Hussein’s travel icons for Variety magazine, 2013

JG: Yes, there’s the infatuation with it. Same with Photoshop; when it first came out people were doing crazy things. And 3-D. It reaches a peak and then it settles down. People figure out how to actually use the tool.

NKW: And Haisam, you seem to have kept pace with the growth of the software over the years. Rendering of a green home, designed by Hussein for Details magazine, 2014

HH: Between me and John, I think it’s fair to say I’m far more interested in learning the new programs. John’s strength is his ability to arrive at elegant

solutions to graphics challenges, he’s a very good ideas man. Right now, I’m

more focused on building out the tools I can use to solve a particular problem.

THE MODERN STATIONERY SHOP HIGH-DESIGN OFFICE OUTFITTERS CARVE OUT A NICHE IN LONDON AND NEW YORK

PHOTO: KRISTINA BUDELIS

By Andrew Gardner

The predicted demise of print—the printed

book, the magazine that you are now reading,

the Post-It—sure has been a long time coming.

Hasn’t it? After all, we still shop in independent bookstores (in fact, New York’s own McNally Jackson, opened in 2004, just announced

plans to open a second bookshop in Brooklyn). Niche publications printed on thick, uncoated

stock—everything from Gather and Kinfolk for the foodie set to Bullett and the Gentlewoman for the fashion crowd—have attained cult

status among their specialized audiences. And

new reality is energizing industries far beyond

books and magazines. Case in point: The modern stationery shop, the product of a generation all but married to the Internet, harkens back to a simpler time when writing and organizing

was an individualized experience, a product of the hand, not the machine. On recent travels I came across two such shops in London and returned home to explore their New York

counterparts; all are staking their particular

claim in the paper goods category, appealing to

notepads and printer paper are an ever-present reality for those of us too forgetful to set a

digital reminder. We may be beholden to our devices, but does the 21st century really spell the end of paper in all of its manifestations?

From London to New York, wood pulp seems

to be having more than a moment—and this 53

Opening page: at New York’s Top Hat, artfully arranged tables and shelves are filled with stationery finds from all over the world

the digitally savvy set who long to connect with

these hand-wrought experiences. These shops are revolutionizing the creative office environment, making a case for the finely crafted, expertly

honed objects—everything from staplers and

pens to notepads, journals and paperclips—not only as objects of high design but also objects of expert craftsmanship and integrity.

At Present & Correct, a small shop in

London’s Clerkenwell design neighborhood, owners Neal Whittington and Mark Smith understand the value of well-made desktop

accessories. Started as an online shop in 2008 by

the two graphic designer friends, the shop is now a go-to place for one-of-a-kind office supplies from all over the world—and their expert eye for design shone through on my recent visit to the store. Their approach seems based on an

equal attention to the design of an object as to its function. “As

the shop to feel like a sweet shop for stationery lovers. Lots of things to discover and enjoy.”

More recently, Neal has been working on a

Tumblr of thoughtful stationery compositions

(stationery-compositions.tumblr.com) that each respond to the inherent beauty of the objects in

his store. “I started doing these during stationery week, over on Instagram, just for a bit of fun

really,” he says. “I was putting an order together

and all of the items looked so nice layered up, so I took a photo. Then I decided to keep doing them, to see how long it can go for. I love arranging the items and playing with the

shapes and color ways.”

Over on Columbia Road in London’s east

end, home to the famed Sunday flower market, London’s Choosing Keeping emphasizes the strong bond between store owner Julia and the makers who supply to the store

objects they are attractive, before you take into consideration the fact that they are also useful,”

Neal says. “Most of the things we sell are still essential. Staplers, hole punches, tape, scissors. I

think most people will call on

one of these at least once a day.” In the little shop on Arlington

Way, customers can browse the unique selection of stationery and desktop tools while also

encountering the one-off vintage

PHOTO: LIZ SEABROOK

items the duo finds on trips

around Europe. “I think mixing

in vintage keeps everything fresh and also makes the line dynamic because when something old has gone, then that’s it. On to the

next thing,” Neal says. “I wanted 54

Choosing Keeping is defining what it means to

not source used or vintage objects. Instead, she

expert workmanship. “We do not select objects

the makers who are supplying the store. In fact,

source materials with a conscious eye towards for aesthetic reasons or design reasons. Our choices are driven only by people and the

integrity of their values — and by consequence,

their products,” says Julia, the store’s proprietor. Popping in on a busy Sunday morning one

day in May, I found a shop filled with objects that on first glance feel highly designed, yet

turn out to be the sort of treasures—whether

a stapler, pen or eraser—made for generations in small factories around the world. These

objects feel heavy and well-made, a fact that

belies their simple, yet beautiful, appearance. Julia, who opened the store in 2012, does 55

prefers to cultivate close personal bonds with

her relationship with some overseas companies

is so strong that she has even attended employee parties—in Italy. “Choosing Keeping is about

what life is about: pleasure, freedom and human interaction,” she says. “We want to show how

great and how different independent commerce can be and the value behind diversity and

integrity of product, even if it’s just a little eraser.” What sustains Julia and her shop is a powerful

statement about the importance of a simple

connection of pen to paper, of an antidote to

mass consumerism in the age of globalization and industrialization. “Simply I believe that

Present & Correct’s Neal Whittington started creating these Stationery Compositions, which he shares on the store’s Tumblr

the paperless office and, even more so, the

to feel we’re not just a step in the process of

and working people need to make a mess

York shop, located in Manhattan’s Lower

paperless studio, is a myth. Creative people and they need tools and bits to make stuff

happen,” she says. “And just as I don’t want to ingest tasteless engineered strawberries,

however cheap they might be, I don’t want

to use a supposedly American pencil which I know is made by exploited people in China.” PHOTO: PRESENT & CORRECT

A similar response to our highly disposable

society moves Nina Allen, owner of the New York-based Top Hat, to action. “I think our customers do sense what’s gone into the

products they buy from us, and I think it

makes it much more likely these things will

be kept and valued,” she says. “It’s important

everything being thrown away.” Her New

East Side, is filled with beautiful objects for

the home, widely sourced from Japan, Korea,

Germany, France, and the U.S. It’s the sort of place I want to return to again and again to uncover some of Allen’s latest discoveries. What bonds these tools as a cohesive

whole are the high production values—and

Allen’s discerning eye. “I do like most of all to find things that have a level of materials

and production, or thought and attention, far beyond what’s needed. It says so much about the commitment level of the company that

makes it or the designer who has designed it, 56

especially when the object is either very ordinary

seemed crazy. But in 2013, on the heels of

much obvious commercial potential,” she says.

into Brooklyn, the Goods for the Study store

and low-value, or when it’s something without For Allen, sourcing the unique collection of

the announced expansion of the bookstore

opened—further evidence that the modern

goods is done the old-fashioned way: “It’s always

stationery shop has recognized staying power.

a mediated experience,” she says. She spends

buyer of the new shop, explains the genesis of

around the country, scouting out products for

there were so many products that were not

on foot. Discovering things on the Internet is

much of her time traveling around the world and the store and also for her wholesale business. In a sense, the store, opened in 2010, is an archive

of the personal bonds Allen has cultivated with manufacturers all over the world, including in her beloved Japan. “It’s like its own planet for design—so developed and so sophisticated.” I found a similar emphasis on Japanese-

made stationery goods at the recently opened

Sandeep Salter, the partner and managing

the store: “Sarah McNally and I realized that

available, or not being given the right context, so we wanted to create a shop that would

center around that context, the study, and sell

objects specifically for the life of the mind.” The store reads like a series of vignettes, each area a

composed study space that features objects that are, as Salter suggests, truly one-of-a-kind.

And that’s precisely the point: that each of

McNally Jackson Goods for the Study, where

these shops, filled with beautiful, yet functional

Blocks are displayed alongside beautiful leather

render their space in their own vision. The

Craft Design Technology Pens and ITO Memo document cases from Israel and finely sanded modernist oak desks made in Portugal.

In many ways, this shop represents an

objects, allow each user to personalize, to

nameless, faceless masses in the digital era

can reach outside the keyboard and computer screen and touch and feel the objects around

appreciation for well-made stationery and desktop

them. “I think these objects are and will always

of Sarah McNally’s McNally Jackson Books,

formation ideas,” Salter says. “When you use

York’s Nolita neighborhood, the new stationery

write or to draw, you have total ownership over

products that’s come full-circle. An offshoot

be central to the act of writing and for the

a ten-year old independent bookstore in New

pen and paper as opposed to an interface to

store exemplifies the success of McNally’s vision.

the manifestation of your idea. It flows directly

To many, opening a bookstore in 2004,

at the beginnings of the digital revolution,

from the hand, through the tool, to the mark.”

PHOTO: JEREMY PATLEN

A range of beautiful desktop objects for the avid reader line oak tables at McNally Jackson Goods for the Study 58

PHOTO: JEREMY PATLEN

Shoppers peruse the study-like setups at McNally Jacksonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s new downtown shop

OBJECT PICKS WE ASKED THE BUYERS FOR THESE FOUR STORES TO NAME THEIR FAVORITE ITEM FOR SALE RIGHT NOW

PRESENT & CORRECT

“My favorite object in the store right now is the German stamp set from the 1970s. It’s a box of perfectly formed geometric rubber stamps, painted in solid colors—great for making patterns and pictures.” Geometry Rubber Stamp Set Vintage from 1970s Made in Germany, £ 22 presentandcorrect.com

TOP HAT

PHOTOS, FROM TOP: PRESENT & CORRECT; L’ATELIER D’EXERCICES; CHOOSING KEEPING; ITO BINDERY

“This notepad is useful to make a list on the table or to hang on the wall. The holes on the side help make a well-spaced list and also work as a centimeter ruler.” Endless Notes Designed by Sebastian Bergne Made in France, $52 tophatnyc.com CHOOSING KEEPING

“In 1924 two families, Balma and Capoduri, started manufacturing staplers as they still do today in their original town of Voghera, Italy. The company has retained the focus on quality of its product, with an irreproachable level of social engagement with their employees.” Zenith Desktop Stapler Balma, Capoduri & C. Made in Italy, £ 28 choosingkeeping.com

McNALLY JACKSON

“I am really into the ITO [micro-perforated] memo block—it’s such a clean and sculptural object, and very useful for list-makers like me.” Small Memo Blocks ITO Bindery Made in Japan, $18 mcnallyjacksonstore.com 60

PHOTO: JENNIFER TRAHAN

CRETUS CONTEST: DESIGNING FOR NEW YORK It is traditional for New Yorkers to complain about New York: its small apartments

and high rents, the shortcomings of the MTA, long lines, the heat, the cold… the list goes on. But New York is also home to some of the strongest universities for art and

design in the country, and many of the nation’s leading creative brains. Which suggests that, despite our long list of grievances, we surely have the resources to address them. We have design to thank for the quality-of-life improvements that New York has

seen over the past decade or so, whether as large-scale and concrete as the creation of

seven hundred miles of bike lines or the conversion of a former elevated freight system

into Manhattan’s beautiful High Line, or as simple and immediate as MTA’s BusTime mobile service.

Yet urban dwellers have been working to innovate their systems and mitigate the

hassles of everyday life as long as cities have existed. Longtime New Yorker and urban planner Jane Jacobs, in her famous tome The Death and Life of Great American Cities,

wrote: “Being human is itself difficult, and therefore all kinds of settlements (except dream cities) have problems. Big cities have difficulties in abundance, because they have people in abundance.”

We put this quotation to the entrants of CRETUS’s first contest, asking them to submit projects that addressed the question, “How can city life be made more

comfortable, efficient, pleasant, and safe through design?” We opened the contest up

to a range of disciplines, including architecture, product design, graphic design, even

fashion design… but perhaps unsurprisingly, our young winner and two runners-up all employed interactive design in tackling this challenge. With smartphones increasingly becoming our primary interface with the world, it’s no wonder that designers see apps as the most natural frontier for creative problem-solving.

The pages that follow showcase their proposals… see them here before they make it to the App Store.

ANDY OMEL is a freelance print and digital design director. He has been recognized by The Society of Publication Designers for his work at Condé Nast Traveler, where he served as Art Director, and Rolling Stone, where he was Assistant Art Director. Freelance magazine clients have included ESPN, Better Homes & Gardens, Vibe, and Condé Nast publications. Andy recently did a major overhaul of Well + Good’s website. He's also a travel junkie and guitar geek.

JOANNE (WEI CHING) CHEN is an independent curator, consultant, critic, and the founder of inCube Arts, a non-profit art organization in New York City with a focus on art from Asia and South Asia and a commitment to exhibition-led enquiry. She was the Director of Taiwan Art Gallery Association and Art Taipei from 2007 to 2010. Her writing has been featured in ARTCO, Art Investment, Art Collection + Design, ARTITUDE Magazine and Art Taipei Forum Media.

ADI GERSHONI is an architect who worked for a number of wellknown architectural firms in Israel and New York before starting his own practice. His international experience includes high-end private residences, hospitality projects, and residential and commercial buildings. Adi was the project manager on the Garden Tower in Tel-Aviv with Israeli architect Ilan Pivko, and the London NYC hotel and the New York Gordon Ramsay restaurant with New York architect Frank Williams.

Ask the Judges: “What Defines Good Design?” Andy: When I was a kid—long before I knew the names Massimo Vignelli,

Mies Van Der Rohe, and Alexey Brodovitch—I knew that my heart raced when I saw Boba Fett’s uniform in The Empire Strikes Back, Eddie Van Halen’s red and white striped guitar in the “Panama” video, and Christie Brinkley’s red

Ferrari in National Lampoon’s Vacation. I have no idea how to begin to define

design, but I’m certain that all of these things should be part of the discussion. Joanne: When presenting a successful art exhibition, there are some important elements to consider, besides a unique concept: the exhibition’s influence on

society and the exhibition’s ability to draw attention by surprising or challenging

its audience. If we can challenge the viewer’s preconceptions or show them another way to look at an image, then we know we have presented a thoughtful exhibition. This approach can be applied to design as well. Good design transcends time

and place. For me, personally, it’s always the idea that takes on the challenge to make this world a better place—that is what will always touch me the most. Adi: Good design inspires you… makes you smile… gets your attention…

catches you off-guard and surprises you… stays with you… educates you… makes you feel good and comfortable and can help you relax… makes you react to it in a subconscious way… is thoughtful and functional in a way

that helps you be efficient and focused… makes people say Wow! OMG!

and Amazing!... makes you feel at home… considers the environment and inspires you to be part of the cause… is original and uniquely yours.

PHOTO: DAEBOONG KIM

DESIGN CONTEST WINNER: DASEUL AN FOR HER NEW YORK GREENMARKET APP

By Andrew Gardner

After a stint at art school in her native

Korea, Daseul An came halfway across the

world to study interaction design at the School of Visual Arts (SVA) in New York’s Chelsea

neighborhood. That was three and a half years ago. Today, the recently graduated An is the

winner of CRETUS’s first-ever Design Contest. Her Greenmarket app, which also won her an alumni grant in her final semester at school,

represents, in many ways, the culmination of

years of hard work—and a complete departure from everything she learned at home.

“I had been studying fine art in Korea,”

An told CRETUS this past spring, “And

everyone in our school had amazing talents and

skill sets, but they were judged by academic

performance more than by their portfolio or

creativity… I wanted to study in an environment that had bigger opportunities and challenges so that I could keep growing and learning. And I’m so glad that I chose New York.”

An came to New York to pursue a creative

career, but it was not until she arrived at SVA that she sensed how the school—

and the city—would come to reshape her perception of the world. “I met a lot of

amazing professors at SVA,” she says. “They taught me how to think as a designer. It

wasn’t just about designing and creating

something, but about the thinking process.” 66

Daseul An

GRAPHIC DESIGNER

Her new school and new home challenged

her notions about creativity and about design— it was not just a set of rules and structures,

but an engaged and energetic application of critical thinking. Back home, consistency

and uniformity were prized; thinking outside the box was anathema to everything that

An had learned up until then. “All Koreans draw the same thing, beautiful drawings,” she says. “I did all the different styles of

drawing and scripting using all different

materials, but it wasn’t really right for me.” This new way of thinking completely 67

transformed An’s artistic approach. She

learned to observe, to watch and listen, to

understand people’s needs. Design, according

to An, is a way to help others. “The difference between design and art is that design is for people—you design for people,” she

says. “It’s not about keeping your style.” Design, she says, “can be functional

but at the same time it can be emotional.

So it can improve people’s lives but at the same time it can make people happy.”

That potential certainly feels present in her

latest project, the Greenmarket app. “I am a

lover of Union Square Greenmarket. I go there

every Wednesday,” she says of New York’s largest farmer’s market, in continuous year-round

operation since 1976. “I have met a lot of great

farmers, but sometimes they don’t come in, they change their schedules. And especially on a

rainy day, they leave pretty quickly. I wanted to get in touch with them to say, ‘Wait for me five

minutes!’ Some of them leave before six o’clock.” An set about developing an app that could

transform the market-going experience, one that would connect customers and farmers, deliver

real-time attendance updates, and supply other

information in an appealing way. She contacted farmers, interviewed them about social media use and got to know the ins and outs of their

market operation. (Did they have a website? How did customers communicate with them? How often?) “I wanted to design an app that made

communication between farmers and customers easier, and that also allowed visitors to browse through all the markets in the city,” she says. The final product offers would-be users

(customers, farmers, market employees) exactly that. Farmers can post discount deals through the app, update their attendance status and link their various social media accounts to

communicate directly with customers via one

platform. Customers can see updates of featured items at market and message farmers from

within the app; they can even preorder to be sure their favorite items don’t run out. There is also a

repository feature for unused greenmarket tokens, which some shoppers currently purchase with credit cards rather than having to bring cash.

Daydreaming at her fine arts school in Korea

four years ago, Daseul An could hardly have

imagined that today she would be improving

people’s lives through the process of interaction

design—let alone designing an app that revolves around some of her favorite things: jam,

bread, and cheese. In the urban realm and

beyond, from New York to Korea, apps are

addressing quotidian problems large and small. This young woman seems poised and ready to critically—and creatively—take them on.

NAME

Ji Yun Kim (with Shurong Diao) FIELD

Interactive Design PROJECT TITLE

Kensho

DESCRIPTION Kensho—the Japanese word for “seeing

nature”—is a combination mobile app and

multi-sensory device. It is meant to encourage users to access the benefits of nature from

their own urban environment. Two options

are provided.; first, the user can choose from

a variety of spectacular natural vistas around

the globe (webcams provide continual footage) and their Kensho device will simulate this

environment through light projections, vapor diffusion, and sound. Every five hours spent

on Kensho unlocks a new vista, to encourage regular use. Alternately, the app shares

updates about outdoor opportunities nearby,

including discounts exclusive to Kensho users.

IN HER WORDS Try to Google the word paradise you will be surprised at how most of the images are views of nature.

Some researchers say the city is negative

for health because it lacks green space. For

example, spending a few minutes on a crowded street impairs the brain it becomes less able to hold memories and suffers from reduced control. New Yorkers spend anaverage of forty-five minutes on the train [per day].

We dug deeper into this problem and asked, “What if you could enjoy a taste of nature

without leaving your apartment?” Through this

experience design, our goal is to connect people

in urban areas with paradise and use the healing power of nature to create health and well-being.

NAME

Charlie Sneath FIELD

Interactive Design PROJECT TITLE

Daily Commute

DESCRIPTION Daily Commute is a mobile app and web

experience that capitalizes on New Yorkers’

passion for (and pride in) local knowledge. In a daily email, it asks users to share their favorite way to chart a given course through the urban jungle of subways, sidewalks, buses, and bike lanes. Based on the aggregated responses, it

generates well-vetted directions for any given

trajectory. But unlike other way-finding apps, it factors in real-life considerations such as

proximity to a bagel store, most optimal scenery, convenience with a dog in tow, and other particularly “New York” criteria.

IN HIS WORDS Commutes have personalities of their own.

They are optimized patterns. They are ritualistic, oftentimes designed to reduce mental overhead and just get from here to there. But they are

subject to our moods. If we don’t feel rushed, maybe we walk through the park. If we’re

meeting a friend, we pick a place along the way. If it’s the weekend, we avoid the subway.

Navigating New York City is complicated…

Once we think we’ve figured it out, we wear the invisible badge of honor that says “I can deal

with New York City.” Everyone has an opinion,

and I always loved the idea of creating an outlet for that enthusiasm.

To: straphanger09@example.com

July 1, 2014 7:00AM

From: mail@dailycommute.co

Welcome to the Daily Commute! Every morning, we’ll send you two new locations in New York City and ask you to map the best commute between them. Here are today’s locations: START

END

Mulberry St. & Worth St.

16th St. & Broadway

Click here to build your Þrst route

www.dailycommute.co/today

Today’s Commute START

Done

Mulberry St. & Worth St.

What mode of transporation?

END

16th St. & Broadway