SURFACE - ANDRE BALAZS - JUNE/JULY 2015 by Surfacemag

ANDRE BAL AZS

ISSUE 119 JUNE / JULY 2015 POWER 100

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“STEREOSCOPIC” THROUGH THE EYES OF THE LEXUS LS AND PHOTOGRAPHER GILES REVELL.

Options shown. *Advanced Pre-Collision System is designed to help reduce the crash speed and damage in certain frontal collisions only. Driver Attention Monitor is designed to alert the driver if a potential hazard is detected ahead and the driver’s face appears to be turned away. The Active Pedestrian Detection System is designed to help reduce the impact speed and damage in certain frontal collisions only. They are not collision-avoidance systems and are not substitutes for safe and attentive driving. System effectiveness depends on many factors. See Owner’s Manual for details. ©2015 Lexus.

VISIONARIES SEE THE WORLD THEIR OWN WAY. THE VISIONARY LEXUS LS. Seeing beyond the obvious. Revealing the hidden. Anticipating the future. These are the qualities of a visionary, as evident in the extraordinary LS. A showcase of Lexus innovation, offering technologies designed to help keep you safe, informed and in command. Like Driver Attention Monitor*, millimeter-wave radar,* stereoscopic infrared cameras* and infrared projectors. Learn more about Lexus visionary technologies at lexus.com/LS.

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ALFI BY JASPER MORRISON Made in America of 100% reclaimed industrial waste and responsibly sourced local wood. Read more at emeco.net

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CREATING ENVIRONMENTS THAT AFFECT PEOPLE’S LIVES Luminaire Expands Its Soft Furnishings Collection with Kinnasand and Raf Simons’ Exclusive Designs for Kvadrat. During NeoCon® 2015, Luminaire announces its Soft Furnishings collection offering a wide variety of window treatments and floor coverings from Kinnasand, and Raf Simons collection of textiles for Kvadrat. With its subtle yet clear Nordic designs, Kinnasand draws on over 200 years of experience producing high-quality textiles characterized by impeccable attention to detail and splendid materials. Designed by award winning Creative Director Isa Glink, the designs stimulate the senses adding a new dimension to the experience of a space. In addition, Luminaire’s expanded Soft Furnishings collection also includes the exclusive representation of the renowned designer Raf Simons’ upholstery line for Kvadrat. Bringing an innovative blend of color and materials from his fashion background, the acclaimed designer brings his distinguished yet playful style to home interiors. Simultaneously on display will be a selection of new designs by Nendo that embody Oki Sato's quintessential philosophy that each product must capture the inexplicable "!" moments in life such as his new Offset-Frame collection from Osaka based Kokuyo. Moreover, a curated selection of lifestyle objects evoking meaning will be on display. Sourced from all corners of the globe, Luminaire’s accessories offer design driven and functional solutions to everyday life. RECEPTION / EXHIBIT Tuesday, June 16, 6pm Luminaire Chicago 301 West Superior

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CORAL GABLES SHOWROOM 2331 Ponce de Leon Blvd. Coral Gables, Florida 800.645.7250

CHICAGO SHOWROOM 301 West Superior Chicago, Illinois 800.494.4358

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SURFACE

NO. 120

CONTENTS

departments 50 On Time 52 Gear 54 Auction 56 Art 58 Books 62 Survey 208 Object

16 Masthead Editor’s Letter 18 20 Contributors 36 Know Now 38 Travel 40 Restaurant 42 Bar 44 Hotel 46 Retail 48 Transport ANDRE BAL ASZ

ISSUE 119 JUNE / JULY 2014

80 fashion

Men’s, and Women’s Photos: Standa Merhout Styling: Justin Min

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Since buying the Chateau Marmont hotel in Los Angeles in 1990, André Balazs has built a hospitality empire that includes the new Chiltern Firehouse in London and the Mercer in New York. The 58-year-old’s hotels are narrative-driven spaces that integrate design and storytelling in a refreshingly effortless way. Next on the horizon for Balazs is a Standard hotel in London, which will join Standards in New York, L.A., and Miami.

180 gallery In honor of the Coca-Cola bottle’s 100th

anniversary, we asked 12 U.S.-based designers to redesign the iconic piece in their own way. This is the result.

193 culture club

ideas in design

A photo portfolio of recent events, including a celebration at the New York Edition hotel for its opening and special happenings from New York Design Week.

rtist Tara Donovan discusses scale, A materials, media, and her slinky sculpture installation at the Parrish Art Museum. John McAslan & Partners designs a Quaker meeting house in London. French product designer Pauline Deltour takes cues from 19th century Paris to create Bluetooth speakers and more. SURFACE

PHOTOS: IDEAS IN DESIGN, ANDREW MUSSON. FASHION, STANDA MERHOUT. GALLERY, COURTESY AMINA HOROZIC. CULTURE CL UB, BFANYC.

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CONTENTS

106 power 100

146 fashion

Our second annual list of game-changing figures in architecture, art, design, fashion, and more.

118 h ospitality & real estate

ndré Balazs, Jorge Pérez, and other A industry-leading developers and hoteliers.

he sharp minds behinds the world’s T most highly regarded houses.

168 architecture Those at the top of the pack

reshaping the world around us.

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166 transport

122 a rt The artists, gallerists, and museum

140 m edia

154 design From Hella Jongerius to Marcel

visionaries shaping culture today.

I n print and online, the voices that keep us reading and watching.

162 tech F orward-thinking rule breakers pushing the boundaries of what’s ordinary.

Creativity and innovation drives brands like Tesla and Ferrari.

Wanders and everyone in between. c over: André Balazs photographed at his home in Manhattan photographer: Pascal Perich

SURFACE

PHOTOS: POWER 100, CHRIS MOSIER. HOSPITALITY, ART, PASCAL PERICH. MEDIA, ADRIAN GAUT. FASHION, FRANCK JUERY. ARCHITECTURE, ZACHARY BAKO. TRANSPORT, COURTESY FERRARI. DESIGN, COURTESY DANSKINA.

NO. 120

feltro due by paola lenti

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MASTHEAD

S U R FAC E brand development

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contributing editors David Basulto (ArchDaily), Marina Cashdan, Julia Cooke, Tomas Delos Reyes, Natasha Edwards, Ted Gushue (Supercompressor), Tiffany Jow, Seamus Mullen, Nonie Niesewand, Evan Orensten (Cool Hunting), Ben Pundole (A Hotel Life), David Rockwell, Josh Rubin (Cool Hunting), Jonathan Schultz, Valerie Steele, Ian Volner, Ethan Wolff-Mann (Supercompressor) contributing photographers Grant Cornett, Adrian Gaut, Dean Kaufman, Mark Mahaney, Ogata, David Schulze, Yoshiaki Sekine

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During an interview at this year’s Salone del Mobile design and furniture fair in Milan (see page 158), Dutch textile designer Hella Jongerius—one of 114 leaders included on Surface’s second annual Power 100 list (page 106)—told me, “The most important communication tool is the surface.” I smiled at this. As the editor-in-chief of Surface, I think about the word every day. The word is actually why, around five years ago, I came to work at this magazine: I thought it was an ideal title for encompassing the complicated, multilayered, refreshingly diverse world we live in. Yes, some could view a magazine called Surface as being, well, surface-level. But since taking the editorial reins at the publication two years ago, it has been my mission to show that the Surface world is anything but superficial. In fact, the magazine is a lot like how Jongerius sees an actual surface: a communication tool unlike any other. As with last year’s Power 100 list, this issue was not simple to put together. We kept the same categories, which reflect the fields the magazine’s editors focus on most: Architecture, Art, Design, Fashion, Hospitality & Real Estate, Media, Tech, and Transport. Also like last year, the list is unranked—why rank something that’s essentially a sophisticated listicle? (BuzzFeed, take note!) Last year’s list featured 105 people (to account for partners); this year, that number is up to 114. Those included hail from all over the United States—New York, Los Angeles, Miami, Chicago, San Francisco, Portland, and Washington, D.C.—and abroad, from Basel to Buenos Aires. Seventyfour of them are new to the 2015 list. The most obvious power shift this year was in art: Those in the Art category comprise 25 percent of the 2015 list, up from 19 percent last year. With a Picasso painting selling in May for a recordbreaking $179.3 million at Christie’s—whose new CEO, Patricia Barbizet, is featured on the Power 100 (page 131)—the money is certainly flowing in. But money’s not necessarily why art has gained such strong social currency as of late. It’s because groundbreaking contemporary artists like Pierre Huyghe (page 122), Robert Irwin (page 126), and Yoko Ono (page 125), as well as top curators, gallerists, and museum directors, continue to expand its enormous potential. This issue’s cover subject, hotelier and real estate developer André Balazs (page 108), understands the art of bringing all of these worlds together; his richly layered hotels are narratives unto themselves. Balazs and Jongerius have yet to collaborate, but I’d certainly like to see what the result would be if they tried. — Spencer Bailey

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PHOTO: COURTESY DANSKINA.

Editor’s Letter

EDITOR’S LETTER

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Contributors

ZACHARY BAKO Zachary Bako shot MAD architects founder Ma Yansong in his Beijing office for our Power 100 feature (page 171). “I was part of the Avant Guardian competition in 2009,” Bako says, “and I was excited to work with Surface again.” He says his favorite part of his job is the on-set creative process, and in this case, he was particularly happy about the subject, as he has been following MAD for years. Bako, who is American but is based in Beijing, is a photographer and filmmaker. He has shot for the likes of the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, Sotheby’s, and TIME. TOBY COULSON “This was my first commission from Surface, and it was exciting to get a call from America for a job,” English photographer Toby Coulson says of taking a portrait of Corin Swarn for Art (page 56). “I’m interested in Corin’s work so it was great to meet her.” Coulson, who lives in London, is currently working on a project about competitive pigeon showing and suburban hedges. His work has appeared in galleries including the AOP Gallery and the National Portrait Gallery, as part of the Taylor Wessing Photographic Portrait Prize. His photographs have been published in places like The Guardian, The Telegraph, and FT magazine. GRANT JOHNSON For this issue’s Auction column (page 54), Grant Johnson interviewed Brent Lewis of Wright and Lindsey Adelman about the auction house’s exhibition of new work by the latter’s studio (which includes a music video, a first for the designer). “It highlights the fact that summer is often taken as an opportunity to step out of the ordinary, to take a bit of vacation from the usual way of doing things,” Johnson says of the exhibition, adding that “talking to Lindsey made me excited to think more about the unique world of industrial design and what distinguishes it from the larger confluence of art and design.” Johnson, who is based in Los Angeles, is currently curating an exhibition of new work by artist Lita Albuquerque. His writing has appeared in publications like The Brooklyn Rail, Artforum, and Modern Painters. PASCAL PERICH French photographer Perich shot cover subject André Balazs and French artist Pierre Huyghe. “Everyone was very open creatively and very enthusiastic,” Perich says of working with Surface. Interestingly, this was the second time that Perich was commissioned to photograph Balazs. “Already knowing a subject usually influences the comfort level and plays a great role in the success of the portrait,” he says. “I was also very honored to photograph Pierre Huyghe, considering that his piece ‘Zoodram 5 (after ‘Sleeping Muse’ by Constantin Brancusi),’ with the hermit crab and the mask is one of the strongest pieces of art I have ever encountered.” New York–based Perich’s photographs have been featured in magazines like Vanity Fair, Vogue, GQ, and Le Monde. At the moment he is working on videos with varying subjects, including a Red Hook artist and an upstate craftsman. JONATHAN SCHULTZ Surface Transport columnist Schultz covered the new Bentley EXP 20 Speed 6 Concept (page 48) for this issue. He also contributed to our Power 100 feature package, writing about Elon Musk, Richard Branson, and Tokuo Fukuichi. “A lot of luxury brands flail about, trying to appeal to younger consumers who view traditional notions of luxury with skepticism and maybe a bit of fatigue,” Schultz says. “To see Bentley hit its mark so squarely its first time out is pretty remarkable” He adds that his conversation with Bentley design chief Luc Donckerwolke revealed the Speed 6’s fascinating origin story: “Basically, he disliked what a Ferrari owner had said about Bentleys, and took it on as a challenge.” Schultz is the deputy editor of Autos for BBC.

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Ideas in Design

IDEAS IN DESIGN

Tara Donovan

STUDIO VISIT

With a solo exhibition at New York’s Pace Gallery (through June 27) and a large-scale installation coming to the Parrish Art Museum in July, the artist opens up her studio in Long Island City, Queens to discuss her latest work.

INTERVIEW BY AILEEN KWUN PORTRAIT BY ANDREW MUSSON

I’m always trying to push a kind of perceptual shift into the foreground, shifting viewpoints, and so forth, and that becomes more important than labor. I’m not burdened by the labor in any way, shape, or form—it kind of just becomes a mechanized process—but if there were a machine that created it, perhaps I would. I also still believe in the handmade; there’s something to it. There are different workshop stations here for varying series, and also for the stages of production of each. How many staff members do you currently have at the studio?

About a dozen. Not everyone’s full-time. There’s something very meditative and communal about working with people in that way, and I’ve workedwith assistants for years—they become like family to me. Some

Your large-scale works must require a lot of planning and management.

The scale of the work itself is so important—that it be choreographed properly for each space. Often the scale of the work becomes what it is because of the space that it is in. The process of making, for me, comes after I’ve sort of figured out what I want the material to do, and what it is that the material is revealing in some kind of phenomenological or perceptual kind of way. There’s an element of phenomenon in your works.

That’s ultimately what I’m striving for. With my new prints, there’s parallax, almost like a lenticular lens … from the side, there’s a graphic underpinning that really reveals itself only from the angle. But when you look at it from straight on, it reads as a blur or as a fade. This is where the planning comes in: It’s all done by the density and the layering. It’s very mathematical. There’s one that we’re doing that’s very much based on the grayscale, and so we’ve planned and marked areas to place four pins, then three pins, and then two pins, and so forth, defining these things so that it’s actually extremely methodical. Tara Donovan in her studio. (OPPOSITE) Donovan’s “Untitled” (2015), made of Slinkys.

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PHOTO: KERRY RYAN MCFATE/COURTESY PACE GALLERY.

You’ve got a pretty orderly setup here, which makes sense, as your works are very meticulous and, indirectly, a reflection of the labor that goes into making each.

of my assistants have been around for 10 years; I don’t think anybody has been here less than three. We all work really closely, and it’s fun: We really get to know each other at intimate levels.

IDEAS IN DESIGN

Is staying organized very important to your process?

Yes, very. Also, just for my sanity. I don’t think most of my assistants would have it this organized. I’m very adamant about the organization, though, because I can’t stand the clutter! It’s interesting to hear you use the word “choreographed.” Previously, you’ve distinguished your sculptures as being “site-responsive,” as opposed to site-specific. How do you take a given venue or space into account when you’re conceiving of a piece?

It goes back and forth. Actually, the conception of a piece rarely relies on the space where it may wind up. [Laughs] Sometimes it does, but really, I always start with materials, and it’s always an investigation of some sort. I don’t have a set way of finding our sourcing materials, though: It’s usually just kind of happenstance—I’ll see something that might reveal some kind of quality that I find interesting, and then it becomes a question of figuring out what it is that the material can do. How do you then adjust a piece to fit its surroundings, once a venue is confirmed?

Things work more successfully in some spaces than others, and sometimes spaces are a real challenge. I had a traveling show that went from the ICA Boston to the Zaha Hadid–designed building in Cincinnati [at the Contemporary Arts Center’s Rosenthal Center], then to the Des Moines Art Center, and the Museum of Contemporary Art in San Diego, and all of those spaces were vastly different. I remember when I first saw that Zaha Hadid building, I was like, “Nooo wayyy!” You know? [Laughs] That must have been one of the more challenging ones.

It was incredibly challenging and a struggle, but was also amazingly

PHOTO: KERRY RYAN MCFATE/COURTESY PACE GALLERY.

rewarding because to make them work in that space, the pieces really took on a new life. I wouldn’t say it was the best scenario for the work, but I sort of liked what happened to the work. How does it feel to dismantle your large-scale installations? Do you have an emotional reaction when they’re removed and rebuilt?

No, I don’t have a sentimental part in my body. [Laughs] I don’t get attached to it in that way. Your works uncover and champion the beauty of everyday materials— plastic rods, nails, pencils, mylar, index cards, cups—all the while creating a delicate balance between order and chaos. There’s a wonderful sense of surprise in discovering the material; figuring out what it’s made of seems to be a central part of the sensorial experience.

Totally. There’s a beauty to these ordinary objects, elevated and shown and highlighting a texture that you may not have realized at first. As I said, it’s just happenstance. A lot of times, they start in really simple places, like Staples or the grocery store—places like that. Then I’ll reach out to the manufacturers directly, and go on from there. Do you feel the materials find you in a sense? Perhaps you’ll stumble upon something and will revisit it later?

When we start a project, we try and set ourselves up with these problems, and then try and figure out how to solve them. For years, I feel like I’ve constantly been trying to figure out how to make an outdoor sculpture, for example, and I’ve never really successfully been able to do it. And that’s sort of how the Slinky started working for us as a material—like, “Well, maybe if we start with something metal …” It’s a very organic process. I wish it weren’t, because then that would make my life easier. It’s an organic-but-difficult process. >

IDEAS IN DESIGN

You’ve been associated with schools of Minimalist, Conceptual, and Process Art for that method of working—of balancing intuitive explorations within a set of rational constraints. Do you identify with those movements at all?

Absolutely. My early inspirations were Eva Hesse, Richard Serra, Jackie Winsor—obviously for all different reasons, but also for common ideas that dealt with process. I also now align myself with artists of the Light and Space movement and feel like I fit somewhere in between. It’s a constellation of inspirations. There’s also an element of sculpture to your new “pin drawings” and printmaking series with the Pace Gallery.

My early work was primarily sculpture. And then I started doing prints as a way of making drawings with sculpture—printmaking, for me, is very much outside of the norms of the traditional sense of printmaking. One of the first print projects I did was aimed to the edges of adding machine paper, and then printed in a hydraulic printing press—I’ll show you our studio press in a minute—and I remember first being invited to do those prints and thinking, “No, I’m a sculptor, I don’t do that.” Then began discovering this new way of making drawings and that really opened up the process to include other mediums. It’s as if each piece is a reaction or an artifact—a result of sculpture, in a way.

Yeah. I feel like drawing and sculpture are very much the same practice. With sculpture, I’m essentially applying a line in three dimensions, and the way I approach drawings is very much the same process. In addition to the Pace show, you have a number of projects in the works, including an installation at the Parrish Art Museum, where you’ll show these new Slinky pieces.

(TOP TO BOTTOM) Slinkys in Donovan’s Queens studio. Another view of her studio.

PHOTOS: ANDREW MUSSON.

Terrie Sultan [the director of the Parrish] and I have known each other for a very long time—since she was a curator at the Corcoran, and I was a student when I was 18. I’ve known her for—you do the math; I’m now 45—a long time. So she invited me to do a project there over this summer. The prompt was basically, “Do what you want!”

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IDEAS IN DESIGN

ARCHITECTURE

Friends House

When British practice John McAslan & Partners—the firm responsible for the redevelopment of the King’s Cross Station in London—was commissioned to renovate the city’s Friends House for the Quakers, light shaped the formation of the project’s main spatial characteristics. The Quaker values of equality, respect for the environment, justice, simplicity, and peace became materialized in a newly conceived Meeting House. Dubbed “The Light,” the centerpiece skylight of the main space, located in a building dating to the 1920s, was created through the removal of a ceiling that had been added in the 1980s. The architects explain that “one of the key architectural decisions was to remove this and create a dramatic new ceiling void with a 3.3-by-3.3–meter glass ceiling light.” They also installed a flexible seating arrangement that increases the spaces capacity to 1,100. Influenced by the large-scale, phenomenological works of artist James Turrell, the result is a space that’s flooded with light, generating an atmosphere of calmness and unity at the same time, where all the members can unite or use the space for community activities. “We worked with James Turrell on the initial concept of the bringing light into the heart of the scheme and used his ideas and creativity as a starting point,” says James Dixon, project architect at the firm. “James is an internationally renowned lighting designer and artist, as well as a Quaker. He has worked on a number of Meeting Houses worldwide and some of his ideas—principally bringing light into the space—significantly influenced this scheme.” —David Basulto, founder and editor-in-chief of the website ArchDaily

Kneip

Jørgen Platou Willumsen and Stian Korntved Ruud are the young minds behind Kneip, a craft, design, and art studio based in Norway. Deeply inspired by nature, sustainability, and weather patterns, the duo often forms objects out of wood, steel, and copper, oxidized in concert with the natural elements. Both Willumsen and Ruud spent much of their childhoods outdoors, building tree houses and working with organic materials. Traces of such youthful passions exist in their present-day work, particularly in Weathered, a recent project that was exhibited at New York’s Collective Design Fair in May. For the series, the team constructed a collection of sculptures exploring nature’s force, drawing inspiration from elements such as humidity, degradation, and wind. While Kneip is excited to incorporate new materials and technology into their process, wood is still a core influence in their effortless, well-crafted objects. “Our ways of processing timber certainly belong to a Scandinavian tradition,” Ruud says. “Timber has so many different qualities—the variety in color, structure, smell, and texture is fascinating. In the last few years we’ve started collecting our own timber. We follow the tree all the way from the forest to gain a deep respect for the material.” Ultimately, Kneip aims to carry an actively multidisciplinary studio, engaging in gallery shows, public spaces, and shops, and constantly evolving to suit modern tastes and ecologically minded needs. “It’s time for a change,” Willumsen says. “Customers now have lively relationships with sustainable materials and objects. We believe that designers and producers have to make sustainable choices.” —Hannah Gottlieb-Graham

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UP AND COMING

IDEAS IN DESIGN

TECH

Lexon’s Fine Collection

Despite strong trends in contemporary gadgetry to really amp up the technology, French product designer Pauline Deltour’s new Fine collection for Lexon mutes the modern flair. Including a Bluetooth speaker, power bank, USB flash drive, and business card holder, Deltour’s line derives from classic 19th-century Parisian essentials, upgraded and designed to compliment modern handbags. According to Deltour, the signature of the collection is “the perfect contrast between the elegant feminine world and the industrial one,” and the choice of a stylish material palette—anodized aluminums colored in gunmetal, burgundy, dark blue, and soft gold—drives that point home. Small, trinket like, and portable, each of the items is tech-savvy without the geek factor: The USB flash drive doubles as a keychain ring, and the cardholder contains a round mirror as a swiveling partition—a play on the pocket compact. Unlike a substantial portion of gadgets in the marketplace today, the Fine collection should stay elegant and contemporary long after its electronic insides have become dated. —Ethan Wolff-Mann, editor at the website Supercompressor

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GRAPHICS

Pattern Foundry

As part of his final thesis project in 2005, Richard Rhys, then a printmaking student at London’s Central Saint Martins, imagined a concept for a pattern business modeled after a type foundry—in which designs are traditionally commissioned and distributed through licenses—with a key distinction: In place of letterforms and alphabets, the vocabulary would consist of patterns. “The name is loaded with meaning for me, and comes from a fascination with the idea of a foundry,” he says. “Many things have changed since that idea, but it’s sort of founded upon that principle.” The experiment quickly parlayed into a viable venture. Early collaborations with hard-hitters from the graphic-design world, including Karel Martens, Wim Crouwel, and collective Dexter Sinister, aroused interest and credibility. Now, 10 years since its conception, Pattern Foundry counts artists, mathematicians, scientists, writers, and musicians among its roster of partners. Practical applications range from tessellated building facades to ceramic tiles and public art projects; more conceptual designs have resulted in performative mediums such as exhibitions, talks, and publications. Rhys, who worked in patterns, colors, and textiles as a teenager at Alexander McQueen’s studio, says the number of textile and rug applications has grown in recent years, bringing the venture full circle. “I’ve always, in an artistic sense, worked with pattern for as long as I can remember,” he says. “My aim is to be able to offer tools to people to learn more about patterns.” —Aileen Kwun

IDEAS IN DESIGN

BOOK

“I Left My Noodle On Ramen Street”

Perhaps you didn’t know that psych-folk warbler Devendra Banhart made art. This reviewer sure didn’t, though Banhart has apparently shown work at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art and Art Basel Miami Beach. His drawings and paintings are quite good. Many are compiled in his new book, I Left My Noodle on Ramen Street (Prestel), and they resemble the runic scrawls of a methodical improviser who sets out to make a figure drawing and ends up with a geometric field (or vice versa). They’re meticulously crafted, but not without weird flourishes, somewhat like desk-doodle versions of Barry McGee, whose influence is invoked not once but twice in this book. The accompanying texts, however, aren’t so great. Jeffrey Deitch contributes an essay, which is memorable only because it’s hard to imagine him being a Banhart fan, digging the ululations of a genre the media likes to call “freak folk,” though Deitch seems to know the artist intimately. The obligatory monograph interview is composed entirely of insufferable stoner talk that lends an unfortunate throwaway quality to the art that follows it. And then there’s the poetry. “Polychromed gelatinous zooplankton skin is nothing new to me,” Banhart writes. “I’ve got plenty of it.” Maybe it looks better than it sounds. —Dave Kim

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PHOTOS: COURTESY DESIGN MEMORABILIA.

PHOTOS: COURTESY PRESTEL.

(CLOCKWISE FROM TOP RIGHT) Photos by Tommy Awalt Rouse, from Devendra Banhart’s first tour, in New Mexico, in 2002. Banhart’s “The Three Secrets of Fatima” (2003). “Rejoicing in the Hands” (2005).

IDEAS IN DESIGN

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Design Memorabilia Italy

For George Beylerian—venerable design industry veteran, and founder of the materials library Material Connexion—the news of this year’s Milan Expo incited an instant reaction: “This big celebration just suddenly inspired me with the many years I’ve spent in Milan and the designers and people that I’ve met and worked with,” he says. The result is a new collection of products based on the theme of the world’s fair and its location: Food and Italy. Collaborating with 32 Italian designers, each tasked with a simple brief—to design something related to food—Beylerian has launched a new collection of products, “Design Memorabilia Italy: De Gustibus.” It includes tabletop items ranging from salt-and-pepper shakers to dining sets and chopsticks, all created by leading design figures such as Andrea Branzi, Achille Castiglioni, Michele De Lucchi, and Paola Navone. The collection will be sold at Milan Expo (on view through Oct. 31); Milan’s La Triennale museum; the Italian department store La Rinascente; and come July, New York City’s MoMA Design Stores. Objects in the collection are priced from $12 to $100, with the goal of making quality design accessible to a wider public. One highlight is the Rodolfo Dordoni–designed Icicle ice bucket that allows melted water to slide into a bottom reservoir, “to keep the ice cubes from swimming in water,” Beylerian says. “[The collection], more or less, is about new concepts and for everyone to celebrate eating and serving.” —Julia Lu

PHOTOS: COURTESY DESIGN MEMORABILIA.

PHOTOS: COURTESY PRESTEL.

(CLOCKWISE FROM TOP RIGHT) Rodolfo Dordoni’s Icicle ice bucket. Paola Navone’s Fish bottle opener. Achille Castiglione’s Girachille.

The venerable Italian architect Renzo Piano’s new Whitney Museum in New York’s Meatpacking District heralds a new vibrancy for the city’s downtown cultural scene. In celebration of museum’s opening, Max Mara has collaborated with Renzo Piano Building Workshop on the design of a limited-edition handbag. At first glance, the soft leather of the bag and its characteristic ribbing recall the crystalline surfaces and jagged edges of the museum’s facade. Each of the raised lines

is constructed from brass plates that are then covered with leather, resulting in a look that’s reminiscent of Piano’s buildings (including the newly renovated and expanded Harvard Art Museums facilities). A vibrant red interior is the hidden surprise behind the rather unassuming bag’s exterior. The final piece is not unlike the Whitney: From the outside, it doesn’t necessarily “wow,” but inside, there’s a world wonder. Whitney bag, $1,750, maxmara.com —Justin Min

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PHOTO: VICTOR PRADO.

Museum Quality

SELECT

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Shiny metallic materials update classic staples, while embossed textures and embroidered details up their reflective qualities and lend a luxurious edge. (FROM LEFT) Diorama bag, Dior. Metal clutch with velvet and crystal embroidery, Chanel. Metal clutch, Stella McCartney. Embossed pump, Jimmy Choo. Velvet slipper with crystal detail, Casadei. Studded metallic flat, Christian Louboutin.

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With runway trends favoring black as the color du jour this fall, a solid black shoe is worth revisiting. This season, a heavier sole and perforated details refresh and modernize the classic option. (FROM LEFT) HermĂ¨s, Santoni, Churchâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s, Prada.

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Pairing artists with Afghan artisans, a museum project forges a cultural alliance. In this column, we ask our special projects editor, Bettina Korek, founder of the Los Angeles–based independent arts organization For Your Art, to select something in the world that she believes you should be aware of at this particular moment. BY BETTINA KOREK

A rug designed by Meg Cranston for the Hammer Museum’s “Afghan Carpet Project.”

In early 2014, Ali Subotnick, a curator at Los drawn from Moroccan rugs in the past, made Angeles’s Hammer Museum, undertook an an abstracted watercolor reminiscent of the unusual journey. Joining her were the artists shapes of Afghan women in light blue burkas. Lisa Anne Auerbach, Liz Craft, Meg Cranston, And Cranston—long interested in the sociolFrancesca Gabbiani, Jennifer Guidi, and Toba ogy of color—produced a collage inspired by Khedoori. Their trip, which was initiated by the a color chart hanging on the wall of an Afghan nonprofit Afghan Made and the carpet producer preschool (her rug is shown here). Then there’s Christopher Farr, took them to Afghanistan to Khedoori’s carpet, based on a painting she had learn about its carpet-weaving traditions, includ- previously made of the Hindu Kush mountain ing visits to weaving studios across Kabul and range, which the group flew over en route to Bamiyan. This summer, the Hammer will pres- Afghanistan. ent the result: “The Afghan Carpet Project,” an “The Afghan Carpet Project” embodies the exhibition of six carpets designed by the artists best type of creative collaboration: Not only and handmade by Afghan weavers. Traditionally, does it bridge a centuries-old tradition with Afghan carpets present repeated fields of tiled contemporary perspectives, it will also sell the or mosaic patterns, but here, the artists gave the limited-edition carpets (each available in a series carpet makers varied concepts, providing them of five and varying in price) and donate a portion an unusual challenge. of the proceeds to the Arzu Studio Hope, a nonSeveral of the artists considered the tradi- profit that provides stable living and working tion of carpet weaving in relation to their own conditions for women weavers in Afghanistan. practice. One example is Auerbach’s rug, which Made of handspun Afghan wool, the museumevokes ancient Greek and Roman mosaics that quality pieces provide a rare opportunity to buy portray the refuse from ornate banquets; hers a high-quality design collectible while making a depicts trash from around her own studio. tangible impact on the world. Others based their designs on sights they witnessed during the trip. Gabbiani, for example, was inspired by the images and colors of the region’s kites. Guidi, whose paintings have SURFACE

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PHOTO: COURTESY HAMMER MUSEUM.

Woven Worlds

KNOW NOW

Interiors From Spain at Wanted Design

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Interiors from Spain at Wanted Design On May 15 at Wanted Design, during New York Design Week, Surface hosted a conversation with five Spanish design studios: Alegre Design, Andreu Carulla, Mayice, Miguel Herranz, and Noviembre Estudio, moderated by senior editor Aileen Kwun. Discussion topics included the designers’s use of unconventional materials—like gummy bears, 3D-printed beads, and malleable laminated tin—and the impact of placemaking in their approaches. Special thanks to our partners at the Trade Commission of Spain, and to Anna de Codorniu and Wanted Design for their support of the event. (Photos: Fernando Alonso)

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Honed Base

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BY SPENCER BAILEY PORTRAIT BY MICHAEL RAVENEY When describing Miami, Nasir Kassamali turns around that time, there was this incredible hapto a food metaphor. “It’s a pasta fagioli,” he says, pening in Uganda where the president threw all referring to the hearty Italian dish that com- the Indians out.” The two decided to emigrate bines beans, pasta, and a spicy base—a recipe to Canada—but didn’t stay long. After a visit that typically makes use of what’s around. “We with a friend in Miami, they knew where they have an influx of other communities here,” adds wanted to live. “We’d been to Montreal, where Kassamali, who has lived and worked in the there were 47 centimeters of snow, and Toronto, Magic City for more than 40 years with his wife, where it was brutally cold,” he says. “Coming to Nargis. “We have Brazilians coming in, we have Miami in November, it was 78 degrees Fahrenheit, Venezuelans coming in, we have Columbians and it felt like home.” They also saw a business opportunity during coming in.” As the president of the design company the Florida visit: “I couldn’t find any showrooms Luminaire, which he and his wife started in or stores that sold good design,” Kassamali says. 1974, Kassamali is well positioned for Miami’s So they moved and opened a kiosk-sized showbooming international real-estate market full of room in North Miami Beach. They decided cash-rich investors jumping at the bit. In addi- to call the store Luminaire because initially it tion to selling Luminare’s wares to architects, sold Danish lighting. The transition wasn’t easy. designers, and those in the know, Kassamali has “Just at the time we said, ‘okay, we’re going to over the past decade or so also built a growing settle down,’ the war had broken out between consulting business. He was design director of Egypt and Israel,” he says, “and all of the oil the widely praised 1111 Lincoln Road parking- exports had been frozen, so there were hardly garage complex, which opened in 2011 and was any ships coming down. Even before we opened designed by Swiss firm Herzog & de Meuron, Luminaire, we were almost bankrupt.” and his current projects include the now-underThen a University of Miami architecture construction Grove at Grand Bay development— professor came into the shop. “Soon after,” Danish-born architect Bjarke Ingels is designing Kassamali says, “he started to talk to other archiit—and the 8701 Collins residences, still on the tects in town, saying that there is this guy who drawing board and being designed by Pritzker owns a unique lighting store. Clients with their Prize–winning architect Renzo Piano. plans started coming.” The business took off. By The path of Kassamali and his wife to Miami the early ’80s, Luminaire had expanded its reach was not straightforward. He is a third-generation and influence, and was selling many international Indian born in Kenya, she is from Tanzania; designers and brands in the United States for the the two met while at university in Nairobi. first time, including Cappellini. (Kassamali studied electrical engineering there.) In 1984, Luminaire moved to the Coral Gables “When I graduated—she was in her first year— neighborhood, and Kassamali hired Mateu Rizo we got married in London,” he says, “and just Associates to design the space. (Last year, the

Luminaire design team renovated the interiors of its flagship Coral Gables showroom, inspired by the designs of Piero Lissoni.) Five years later, the company expanded further, opening a location in Chicago, a city Kassamali had been visiting since the mid-1980s for the NeoCon trade fair. Growth continued. In 2000, Luminaire opened a 35,000-square-foot corporate headquarters and distribution center near Miami International Airport, and in 2007, it launched another space, Luminaire Lab, in the Miami Design District. For Kassamali, running the store continues to be much more about creating a cultural conversation than simply selling products. “We are not a furniture store, we are not a lighting store,” he says. “We are totally a design store. When we started, the consumer never had a bucket in their mind that said ‘design store.’ They had to create a new bucket in their mind.” Kassamali has helped create this bucket for decades. To educate buyers and the public, the shop launched a lecture series in 1979. Since then, architects and designers including Marcel Wanders, Ron Arad, and Massimo and Lella Vignelli have presented talks; during the first-ever Maison & Objet Americas fair this spring, Vancouver-based designer Omer Arbel gave a presentation. “The relationship I have with designers like Antonio Citterio, Piero Lissoni, and Patricia Urquiola is extremely special,” Kassamali says. “It has been cultivated out of respect. They love to hear my criticism because it’s always unbiased, and because they see me as an entrepreneur who’s more interested in propagating a design philosophy than selling labels.” Of Luminaire, he adds, “It’s all about making the client aware

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PHOTOS: 01, COURTESY FAIRCHILD TROPICAL BOTANICAL GARDENS. 02, COURTESY ARTIST AND PEREZ ART MUSEUM MIAMI. 03, MICHAEL STAVARIDIS. 04. COURTESY TASCHEN.

For more than 40 years, Nasir Kassamali has built an empire in Miami around quality design.

TRAVEL

INSIDE GUIDE TO MIAMI BY NASIR KASSAMALI 01 Located in the Coral Gables neighborhood, the Fairchild Tropical Botanical Garden includes a 16,500-square-foot conservatory with roughly 400 plants from the tropics, a 13-acre “palmetum” showcasing 1,000 palms, and a display of plants from Madagascar. “I go to Fairchild when we have friends visiting from Europe or Japan,” Kassamali says. “It’s one place where you’re able to take beautiful photographs. It’s not manicured. You have to discover things.” 10901 Old Cutler Road; 305-667-1651; fairchildgarden.org 02 Opened in 2013 and designed by Herzog & de Meuron, the Pérez Art Museum Miami (formerly the Miami Art Museum) is the city’s flagship venue of 20th- and 21st-century art. For Kassamali, both the exhibitions and the architecture are a draw. “[The space] is light and airy—appropriate for Miami—and takes advantage of the light conditions with its vertical gardens,” he says, adding, “It faces the bay. The internal galleries are well placed, with views of the bay, so that you’re always aware of the connection between inside and out.” Currently on display (through Oct. 18) is the show “Poetics of Relation,” which includes artist Tony Capellán’s “Mar Caribe” (1996), shown here. 1103 Biscayne Boulevard; 305-375-3000; pamm.org

01 PHOTOS: 01, COURTESY FAIRCHILD TROPICAL BOTANICAL GARDENS. 02, COURTESY ARTIST AND PEREZ ART MUSEUM MIAMI. 03, MICHAEL STAVARIDIS. 04. COURTESY TASCHEN.

03 One of Kassamali’s favorite Miami shops is Alchemist, designed by local architect Rene Gonzalez. The space features pieces from designer labels such as Martin Margiela, Dries Van Noten, and Ann Demeulemeester. Earlier this year, Alchemist opened a second location (shown here), also designed by Gonzalez and selling only jewelry, in the burgeoning Miami Design District. 140 NE 39th Street Suite 104; 305-640-5842; shopalchemist.com 04 Kassamali enjoys visiting the Taschen shop at the 1111 Lincoln Road parking garage. Among Kassamali’s favorite Taschen titles is Tadao Ando: Complete Works by Philip Jodidio. His most recent Taschen purchase was the book Man Meets Woman by Yang Liu. 1111 Lincoln Road; 305-538-6185; taschen.com

04 39

Privacy Please

RESTAURANT

BY ROXY KIRSHENBAUM

mementos from Mrs. Pound’s various quests. They include old photographs of local Hong Kong actresses in foreign locations, masks, compact mirrors, feathers, and butterflies. For Chow, the restaurant’s most captivating design element is its entrance. “The entrance sequence of the bar is the highlight of the project,” he says. “The special bottom-lit stamp button that activates a sliding display case door is a delightful and memorable surprise to all customers.” Contributing to the memorable dining experience are the graphic artworks, such as the front vestibule sign that reads, “This is not a stamp shop,” superimposed over the image of the stamp used to trigger the door. “The cheeky image hints at what lies beyond the facade,” Chow says. “The woman is supposed to be a youthful Mrs. Pound. Her eyes were omitted to add a sense of mystery, keeping the identity of Mrs. Pound unknown.”

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PHOTO: LESLEY UNRUH.

The hidden restaurant Mrs. Pound can be found on the corner of Tai Ping Lane in Sheung Wan, the antique district of Hong Kong. The small space has an unassuming door, tucked behind a storefront displaying traditional Chinese stamps. The vestibule opens into a bar on the left and a pink dining area on the right. The upper level has an additional dining room swathed in green. To create a single linear dining space, the kitchen and washrooms were placed in the back. “The simplicity of the layout is a result of the small properties typical of Hong Kong,” says Nelson Chow, director of Hong Kong–based design firm NC Design & Architecture Ltd. The concept of Mrs. Pound was developed by Chow’s office, while the restaurant’s owners wrote the fictitious star-crossed narrative of the eatery’s invented owners: Mrs. Pound and Mr. Ming. The story revolves around burlesque dancer Mrs. Pound, who mysteriously disappears with her rumored true love, Mr. Ming. “Our two ideas coalesced into a simple interior-exterior relation whereby the conservative identity of Mr. Ming was transposed onto the facade, while the glamorous and feminine qualities of Mrs.

Pound were focused within the interiors,” Chow says. Through exploratory research of the nearby neighborhoods of Sheung Wan, Chow and his team sought to use stamp shops as inspiration for the facade, and to infuse local materials throughout the restaurant. A nod to burlesque shows and circuses is evident in the pendant lights and props that allude to Mrs. Pound’s flamboyant and audacious past. The bar includes LED-lit bottle displays, green chalkboard menus, and a gold-trimmed countertop made of locally sourced tiles. The tiles follow a pink-to-green gradient to reflect the central contrast of pink and green colors throughout the interior. The floors are made of local Chinese titles specific to 1960s Hong Kong. A contractor designed bar stools with seats made of green leather and wood veneer with mirror and gold-finished bases. “The inspiration for both the bar counter and stools is a raw juxtaposition between luxurious refined materials like electroplated gold and local, everyday materials found through the streets of Sheung Wan,” Chow says. The lights above the banquettes take cues from vanity mirrors and acrobat swings. The ring acrobat lights, fashioned by the firm Ricardo Lighting, are made of an extruded ring of glass with a gold fixture that houses dimmable LEDs, along with a pink leather strap to conceal the electrical wiring. At the end of the restaurant is a large neon sign that adds atmosphere and a strong focal point to the interior. Props arranged on the walls represent

PHOTO: DENNIS LO.

A highly discreet, hidden restaurant in Hong Kong invites mystery to dinner.

RESTAURANT

Dish by Seamus Mullen INSPIRED BY MRS. POUND Chinese broccoli tempura There’s a time and a place for every restaurant. There are the perfectly pleasant restaurants you’ll take your in-laws, the ambitious hole-in-the-wall you’ll go to with industry friends, the tasting-menu restaurants you reserve for special occasions. And sometimes you just want a place where you know you’ll have a good time. I think Mrs. Pound in Hong Kong might just be one of those places. It’s clear that the owners of Mrs. Pound know how to have fun. You can’t open a restaurant with a faux facade, neon-covered walls, chopsticks and baubles, and gymnastic rings as light fixtures and not appreciate a good time. Outside, a seemingly benign and traditional stamp shop facade belies a loud, quirky, kitschy interior. The place is bursting with color—red and fuchsia banquettes, jade-green bar stools, and mirrors and shiny things everywhere. There’s a spirited playfulness at work here, encouraging you to order another drink, get loud, and just let loose. A fun space like this is begging for fun food. There’s no room for tweezer food here—just tasty, satisfying food that isn’t too precious and that pairs well with cocktails (lots of them). I decided to go in a bar-snacks direction, and in a nod to Mrs. Pound, I took a very familiar Cantonese ingredient, gai lan (Chinese broccoli), and gave it an unexpected twist by frying it like tempura. The humble gai lan is very common in Chinese cuisine, usually very simply prepared, sautéed with garlic and drizzled with some oyster sauce. Delicious, but not terribly interesting. For this dish, I wanted to make Chinese broccoli fun and playful. Rice batter gives the tempura just enough of a light crunch—bar snacks always need some crunch—and chilis bring the heat. A squeeze of lime adds just enough acidity to cut through all the textures into one super flavorful bite. You can use a fork or chopsticks if you want, but I’d just dig in with my hands—it’s more fun that way.

For this recipe you will need a food processor and a deep fryer or a deep saucepan. Serves 4 as an appetizer or bar snack

4 1 1 2 ⁄3 ≈ ≈

cups of oil for frying pound gai lan (Chinese broccoli), cut length- wise into long strips. (feel free to add other sea sonal vegetables; here we’ve added fiddlehead ferns and asparagus) cup rice flour cup soda water pinch of salt pinch of pimentón (Spanish paprika)

For the romesco: 1 ⁄2 bunch carrots 1 bell pepper 1 tomato ≈ Spanish onion ¼≈ bulb garlic ≈ salt and pepper ≈ sherry vinegar 1 tablespoon fermented Chinese chili paste

PHOTO: LESLEY UNRUH.

PHOTO: DENNIS LO.

To garnish: ≈ cilantro ≈ Thai red chile, thinly sliced 1 lime, cut in wedges

Process Preheat the oven to 400 degrees To make the batter: In a small mixing bowl, whisk the rice flour, salt, and pimentón. Add soda water, in two batches, until batter reaches a thick enough consistency to coat the back of a spoon. To make the romesco sauce: In a medium-size roasting pan, roast vegetables until they are charred and tender, about 40 minutes. Allow to cool, remove any charred or burnt skin, and process roughly in food processor. Adjust seasoning with salt, pepper, chili paste, and sherry vinegar. To make the tempura: Heat the oil in the deep fryer or deep saucepan until the temperature reaches 350 degrees (or when a drop of water sizzles). As the oil is heating, dip the gai lan in the rice flour batter until they are well coated. Carefully place the battered vegetables in the oil, gently frying for about two minutes. Set aside on a paper towel to soak up any excess oil. Spoon a generous dollop of the romesco sauce on each plate. Place the tempura gai lan on top, sprinkle with cilantro, red chilis, and a squeeze of lime. Serve immediately. Enjoy. Seamus Mullen is an award-winning New York–based chef; owner of Tertulia, El Colmado, and El Colmado Butchery; and culinary director of Sea Containers restaurant at Mondrian London. He is the author of the cookbook Hero Food.

BAR

Cocktail by Tomas Delos Reyes INSPIRED BY LOST LAKE What can I say? This is a great reincarnation of a good ol’ tiki bar. For this I had to go with one of my favorite rums: the Santa Teresa 1796. It has a lovely balance of spice, with a touch of vanilla, honey, and wood notes—all things that can be found in the texture of the space. The hibiscus syrup plays off of the bamboo lighting in the evening hours, but still holds up to the foliage of the art on the walls. The egg white and the lemon bring this cocktail to a full sour that I could imagine sipping at this rum-heavy depot, and the garnish captures the spirit of tiki in color and style. Santa Teresa 1796 rum hibiscus syrup lemon juice egg white Angostura bitters

Tomas Delos Reyes is a mixologist and partner of the gastropub Jeepney in New York’s East Village.

Chicago’s new Lost Lake rethinks the tiki tradition by ditching the kitsch.

Paradise Now

BY ZOË BODZAS The notion of a tiki bar in Chicago seems farfetched. But at the recently opened Lost Lake, the true magic of such a space—its blissful sense of escapism—becomes apparent. Designed (and partially owned) by local concept-and-development studio Land and Sea Dept., the bar presents a revitalizing take on what’s typically a tacky setup. Home to pet piranhas and wild cocktail recipes, Lost Lake sits on the northern edge of the city’s Logan Square neighborhood. Robert McAdams, a partner of Land and Sea Dept. and co-owner of Mode Carpentry, explains the bar’s vision this way: “We were inspired by the early wave of tiki bars in the U.S. As with all of our projects, we tried to give it our own spin and add some clear modern touches.” Here, the intent is passion, not irony, with a focus on the drinks rather than clutter and appropriated tiki-god artifacts. Upon entering, guests step through “Thank You,” Land and Sea Dept.’s sleek AmericanChinese takeout counter, then approach the main bar through Martinique fabric curtains. The bar winds into the next room with a distinct shift in texture and atmosphere, transitioning from a thatch ceiling and banana-leaf wallpaper to a black bamboo ceiling and woven walls. The space’s final room has the feel of a tropical grotto, decked out with mossy rock interiors.

To maintain simplicity, Land and Sea Dept. chose clear-finished sapele wood for the bar’s face, with a bold blue-turtle granite top. The back bar, made of mahogany, sits beneath a thatched hut roof and houses oodles of rum. Patrons may sit at larger sapele tables on rattan stools, at more intimate ebony tables on peacock-inspired wicker stools, or in simple horseshoe booths. Like the seemingly ramshackle décor, the flotsam-inspired light fixtures throughout were also “mostly made up,” McAdams says. Over the bar, the team strung Japanese fish traps together with rope and outfitted the rig with light bulbs. The main room’s glass window has been frosted to complete the escape from the city, and suspended Japanese fishing floats are aglow with spotlights. Especially evocative is the puffer-fish chandelier in the bar’s “cave” room. Land and Sea Dept.’s beverage director, the bartender Paul McGee, oversees the cocktail selections. While paying homage to original recipes, McGee explores escapist dreams associated with a tiki-style space. “If you’ve ever sat on a beach under a coconut tree and sipped a rum cocktail from a pineapple while looking at the sunset—that’s what we’re trying to recreate,” McGee says. Offerings include traditional picks, such as the Lost Lake (aged Jamaican rum, passion fruit, lime, pineapple, maraschino cherries, and Campari) or the more adventurous Hula Hips of Heaven (reposado tequila, mezcal, grapefruit, lime, falernum, cinnamon, Angostura bitters, and absinthe). What’s next for this Windy City getaway? McGee and Martin Cate of San Francisco’s tiki bar Smuggler’s Cove are preparing Lost Lake’s own rum club. SURFACE

PHOTOS: COCKTAIL, LESLEY UNRUH. BAR, CLAYTON HAUCK.

1.5 oz. 1 ⁄2 oz. 1 ⁄2 oz. 1 1 dash

COLLABORATION

Design Dialogues Soho House Edition I

Design Dialogues Soho House Edition I On May 6, Surface and Soho House presented the first in a series of Design Dialogues at the latterâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s New York City location. Surface editor-in-chief Spencer Bailey moderated the conversation between Israeli designers Dror Benshetrit and Yigal AzrouĂŤl. Benshetrit, principal of multidisciplinary firm Studio Dror, is closely linked creatively to the fashion designer, who is actually his uncle. The two discussed their influences, how design transcends categories, and why integrity drives their practices. Special thanks to Soho House and to the Schusterman Foundation, which empowers young people in the Jewish community and globally, for its support. (Photos: Michael Ryterband) 43

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A young designer adds a light, tasteful touch to the interiors of a 17th-century Roman building. In this column, we ask Ben Pundole, founder of the website A Hotel Life, to pick a new hotel that offers the best of hospitality design today. BY HALLY WOLHANDLER

When the owners of PalazzinaG, a Philippe Lobby, Bar, and Restaurant Starck–designed hotel in Venice, set out to open something similar in Rome, they knew Set up more like a private home than a hothey wanted to capture the city’s rich his- tel, G-Rough has no distinct lobby, nor a bar tory while creating something that felt con- and restaurant. At the entrance to the hotel temporary. They also wanted to turn out- is a combination of all three: an area to sit, of-towners into true Romans, if only for a drink, snack, and hang out that the owners limited time. The resulting hotel, G-Rough, and Cerulli call a “contemporary wine galis set in a narrow, five-story 17th-century lery.” “It was conceived as a lively, vibrating building in the center of Rome, and was de- place, constantly in contact with the intense signed by 35-year-old architect Giorgia Ce- life of this area of the city,” the architect says. In choosing furniture, Cerulli sought to rulli. “There are traces from the past in the walls, floors, and ceilings, but contemporary reflect the bars of Prohibition-era America, art also plays an integral role in the design,” which meant sourcing original midcentury she says. This meant mixing and match- leather furniture. For the floor, Cerulli ing pieces from the ’30s and the ’60s, while chose recycled, hexagonal red tiles, and for preserving patinas on the walls and carefully the walls, bronze mirrored tiles by Seletti. “They create reflections and bring a rarified integrating contemporary art. In keeping with the focus on creating a atmosphere,” she says. A custom brass bar truly Roman, anti-tourist experience, the and hanging Giò Ponti lamps—along with hotel offers a “lifestyle butler” who imparts Italian infinity light appliqués from the hyper-local knowledge to visiting guests. ’70s—add an Italian touch to the American “It’s a place to experience real Roman life, influence. Wallpaper with a leafy design, and to be accompanied on a very exclusive along with real plants, inserts a Parisian tour of hidden corners of the city,” Cerulli jardin d’hiver sensibility. Many works by says. The hotel has only 10 suites—all in- young artists are hung throughout the space, spired by Italian design legends and featur- compounding the contemporary excitement ing original furniture by them—adding to the designer sought to create. the homey, but self-consciously Italian, vibe.

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PHOTOS: CLAUDIO SABATINO.

Rough and Humble

HOTEL

PHOTOS: CLAUDIO SABATINO.

HOTEL

Guest Rooms

BEN PUNDOLE’S TAKE ON G-ROUGH:

The 10 guest rooms continue the theme of creating a home rather than a hotel, as well as a considered balance between the historical and the contemporary. Each suite is named after a great Italian designer of the 20th century, and the furniture Cerulli sourced for them include pieces by the likes of Ponti, Silvio Cavatorta, Ico Parisi, and Guglielmo Ulrich. At the same time, the designer emphasized the building’s existing materials. “We wanted to bring a new life to that history,” Cerulli says, which she did “by leaving old paint and materials on the wall exposed, and the floor that dates to the ’30s.” The vintage furniture, mostly from the ’30s and ’70s, “create an exclusive place, something unconventional but luxurious.” In the bathrooms, bronzed mirrored tiles, antique brass taps, and a mosaic marble on the floor create a ’50s atmosphere, and in the penthouse suite, an old double sink from France adds vintage glamour. Of course, as in the rest of hotel, Cerulli was careful not to focus too much on one period: the rooms also contain customized kitchenettes by the design firm Leftover.

Sometimes, people like it rough—even when it comes to hotels. This aptly named establishment celebrates the raw, the unadulterated, the unhewn. It also incorporates the whimsical. The architecture flaunts the building’s Roman bourgeois past but isn’t ostentatious. At a time when the word “vintage” has been totally bastardized, G-Rough suggests it can still have meaning and impact. Here, vintage is the antithesis of something found at Restoration Hardware: It is, instead, expressed through original midcentury pieces by the likes of Giò Ponti or Ico Parisi. The hotel is not made to look old—it is old. And tastefully so. It is pure poetry.

The Osvaldo suite at G-Rough, with an original Osvaldo Borsani table, Dessi chairs, and artwork by Guendalina Salini. (OPPOSITE) The Guglielmo suite, with an original Guglielmo Ulrich bed, linens by Society, and art by Nicola Pecoraro.

An established but expanding Italian brand hires a star designer for its first flagship in London. BY JULIA LU

home, dedicates single spaces for bedroom, living room, dining room, library, and others. The company’s range of furniture, designed by a list of star designers, shapes and characterizes the rooms. The Lema House is clad with bespoke oak flooring and is warmly lit by floor lamps and chandeliers. Large picture windows overlooking Kings Road flood the entrance with natural light. Technical lights on the ceiling offer lighting support throughout the space and exist alongside exposed pipes; in order to maintain an industrial feel, Lissoni decided against a false ceiling. The two levels are joined by a sculptural steel staircase that leads down to the Lema Contract atelier. Unlike the minimal yet sophisticated details throughout the showroom, the staircase stands out as an eyecatching piece that balances the industrial feel of the two levels. Lissoni compares the experience of moving through the showroom to that of eating dinner: “You feel immediately like an appetizer. And after that, you move again a few steps, and you are in the main course. When you go down in the Contract area, you jump to this special dessert. Dessert means different typologies of glasses, veneers, woods, fabrics, wallpapers, carpets.”

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PHOTO: BEPPE BRANCATO.

An intimate area in Lema’s London flagship hosts the Galerist display cabinet by Christophe Pillet and the Marble Arch sideboard by Matteo Nunziati; in the center are the Wow table by Toan Nguyen, and Tabby chairs by Gordon Guillaumier. (OPPOSITE) The stairwell in the shop.

For Italian architect and designer Piero Lissoni, designing for furniture manufacturer Lema is about creating something better in quality than the day before. When Lissoni, Lema’s creative director, was tapped to design the company’s new flagship store in London, “quality [was] the first issue, the first thought,” he says. Though this Italian company has been manufacturing furniture since the Meroni family founded it in 1970, the London location is their first company-owned flagship store. It also marks the brand’s expansion into international markets. The store, located in a restored building on Kings Road, with a Dutch facade, hosts the two segments of Lema on two levels: Lema Casa, the company’s home furniture line, and Lema Contract, a bespoke atelier that develops made-to-measure solutions for large-scale projects. “The discussion with Angelo Meroni, the owner of Lema, was to design something like an atelier,” Lissoni says. “‘Atelier’ means the idea to do something bespoke, the idea to design something super personalized around other people.” First, Lissoni considered the building and its surroundings—London. The showroom is designed like an industrial loft, a familiar space for London dwellers. It models the “Lema House,” which, like an actual

PHOTO: BEPPE BRANCATO.

Dual Purpose

RETAIL

PHOTO: BEPPE BRANCATO.

RETAIL

Bentley rises to a challenge to present a new model that’s anything but your grandparents’ car. BY JONATHAN SCHULTZ

The Bentley EXP 10 Speed 6. (OPPOSITE) The car’s interior, with 3-D quilting and straight-grain cherry wood. The headlights.

Royce, the company with which Bentley “But I’m too young for that car.” Having just spent an afternoon hustling once shared nearly everything but the hood a Bentley Continental GTC over Proven- ornament. (Rolls-Royce is now controlled by çal asphalt, the owner of a Ferrari 458 Italia BMW Group.) “But the real premise behind rendered this damning verdict. It nettled Luc this car was to show where Bentley could Donckerwolke, the extraordinarily trusting go,” Lee says. “It’s about you, the car, and the Bentley chief designer who had loaned the power.” The Speed 6 bears classic coupe proportions, Continental to the skeptical Ferrarista. “He came back so impressed, particularly with with a swept canopy and short front and rear the interior and the build quality,” Doncker- overhangs. Deep, aggressive, diagonal strakes wolke says. “He kept saying how his Ferrari score the sheet metal aft of the front wheels. felt cheaply made by comparison. But no, he Interlocking rings create a weblike headlight background. Inside, solid cherry door panels was ‘too young’ for a Bentley.” The assessment stuck in the Belgian design- are milled in a diamond-quilt pattern, with er’s craw. “It got me thinking: Why couldn’t copper inlays tapped by hand. The pattern is reprised on full-aniline seat leathers, and a Bentley be the poster in a kid’s bedroom?” His team’s response is the EXP 10 Speed 6 more copper gleams beneath knurled crystal Concept, Bentley’s first sports car in a century. dials. Custom Schedoni luggage rests behind It’s not a grand tourer like the Continental, the seat backs. “We’re stretching outside our but a driver-focused, two-seat, bedroom- comfort zone,” Lee says. Be that as it may, things are quite comfy in here. wall-worthy dream machine. The richness of the Speed 6’s materials Known for handcrafting heavyweight sedans and coupes possessed of locomotive- perhaps belie the progressiveness of the car. like power, Bentley is an unlikely author for Populating Bentley’s design studios in Crewe, the nimble Speed 6. The carmaker—under the England, were torn-out images of “fuselages, corporate stewardship of Volkswagen Group pieces of architecture—particularly from since 1998—trades in stout, emphatically Calatrava, from Zaha Hadid,” says DonckBritish notions of luxury: burl walnut, deep- erwolke. Look elsewhere for Christopher pile wool carpets, Connolly leather, chrome Wren. As with any design study, the Speed 6’s brightwork. But the Speed 6 also communes prospects for production hinge on customers’ with a grittier chapter in company lore. “Bentley Boys,” says Sang Yup Lee, head interest in the concept car, and the strength of exterior design, with a broad smile. Indeed, of a business case. But there is also the case the Speed 6 Concept is a heritage play, evok- for passion, the kind that puts a grand old ing the group of hell-bent, oil-stained gentle- marque on a bold new path. “A car is an emomen who etched Bentley’s name on trophies tion-charged product,” Lee says. “You have at Le Mans and Brooklands in the 1920s. “It to love this car, or it doesn’t work.” definitely connects to that era,” the designer says. The back-story also provides a ready differentiator between Bentley and RollsSURFACE

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PHOTO: COURTESY BENTLEY.

Young at Heart

TRANSPORT

PHOTO: COURTESY BENTLEY.

TRANSPORT

Power reserves are the mechanisms that keep time moving forward on your wrist. BY KEITH W. STRANDBERG

compromise between precision and power reserve.” Some companies choose to go with a bigger single barrel, with a larger mainspring, which would allow a longer power reserve. Other companies fit more than one barrel into the watch case, again lengthening the power reserve. New materials also have an impact on the mainspring and the capacity of the power reserve. Though each mainspring manufacturer staunchly guards its spring-production methods, they have all upgraded their processes and employ the latest materials. There are, of course, automatic, or self-winding, watches that run using the natural motions of the wearer’s arm. However, an automatic watch has to be worn continuously (and with enough movement) for 10 to 15 hours at a time to ensure a full wind. H. Moser has managed to provide three to four days of power reserve in its single-barrel manual watches and seven to nine days in its double-barrel ones. “The secret to the latter is an ingenious combination of two barrels arranged in a series, and a 2.5Hz frequency in the escapement,” says Edouard Meylan, president of H. Moser. “Having longer power reserve is very important, because it ensures convenient use and continuity. It is annoying to have to reset the time every time you don’t wear your watch for two days.” H. Moser isn’t the only manufacture to beef up performance. Panerai has several SURFACE

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PHOTOS: TOP, COURTESY HUBLOT. BOTTOM, COURTESY BREGUET.

The Jaeger-LeCoultre Master Eight Days QP Squelette. (OPPOSITE) The Hublot MP-05 LaFerrari 2. The Breguet Classique Ultra-Thin Tourbillon 53773.

A watch, at its most basic level, is all about power. It depends on energy to run the movement, and the movement manages that energy to power the hands that display the time and perform other functions. Without power, a watch is useless. With power, a watch can run virtually forever. The power reserve of a watch indicates how many hours it can operate, based on the state of wind of the mainspring, a tensed metal coil that transmits energy to the movement. In the past, 42 to 48 hours was the range of most watches, but this was not enough. The magic number was 62 hours, minimum, so that you could take your work watch off at five on Friday evening and put it back on at seven on Monday morning, and it would still be running. Until recently, there were ver y few watches that could offer that convenience. Then things changed. As watches got bigger, the potential for extending power reserve increased, since there was more space for larger mainsprings. “The first challenge to increased power reserve is the volume constraint,” explains Stéphane Belmont, creative and marketing director of Jaeger-LeCoultre. “In a watch movement, space is limited. In addition, a longer power reserve implies a smaller balance wheel and/or lower frequency, in order to reduce the consumption of energy. This can result in lower accuracy.” “At the end,” Belmont says, “it is always a

PHOTO: COURTESY JAEGER-LECOULTRE.

Strong Motion

ON TIME

PHOTOS: TOP, COURTESY HUBLOT. BOTTOM, COURTESY BREGUET.

PHOTO: COURTESY JAEGER-LECOULTRE.

eight-day power-reserve models, as do JaegerLeCoultre and IWC. Some watchmakers have increased their reserves to astonishing levels. A. Lange & Söhne has a model that offers 31 days, and Hublot takes the prize with its MP-05 Ferrari watch, which boasts a whopping 50 days. But these are the exceptions to the rule. Most companies, like Hamilton and Breguet, have focused on increasing power reserve into the 60- to 80-hour range, so that a wearer can get through the weekend without having to reset or rewind. The numbers can be misleading. When is 80 hours not really 80 hours? When it’s 80 hours of power reserve. When a watchmaker claims 80 hours, for example, it doesn’t really mean the watch can run for 80 hours without resetting. It’s kind of like your passport, which is valid for 10 years. No country lets you enter if your passport only has six months left on it, so the true length of its validity is nine years and six months. Similarly, the last 30 percent of the power in the mainspring isn’t reliably constant, and accuracy is not guaranteed. As a result, many watch manufactures have included a power-reserve indicator, also known as a réserve de marche, so wearers can keep an eye on their watches’ state of wind. It’s kind of like the gas gauge on a car; one should avoid letting it go all the way to empty before filling up again.

BY HANS ASCHIM

Danner Mountain Pass boots in cedar. (OPPOSITE, TOP TO BOTTOM) Jack II boots in black. Canoe Moc in cumin.

In 1932, the U.S. experienced its highest unemployment rate ever. Nearly a quarter of the working population was unemployed and the job prospects were grim—the Great Depression had reached its lowest extreme. In this economy, Charles Danner founded his boot company. Against the odds, Danner and his five employees set up shop in Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin, with a stubborn commitment to quality. Danner reasoned that no matter what the economy was doing, craftsmanship mattered. The west beckoned, and loggers sought boots that could handle the mud, rain, and cold of the Pacific Northwest. Never one to shy away from an opportunity, Danner packed up and set up shop in Portland, Oregon, in 1936. The brand’s boots quickly became a beloved staple for the working outdoors person. Over time, the brand has expanded from work boots to the outdoor recreation, military, law enforcement, and even fashion markets. Danner’s stitch-down construction—a procedure done by hand in which the boot-maker attaches the leather upper to the outsole—set a new standard in sturdiness and longevity. Danner was also the first to integrate Gore-Tex liners into its boots, ushering in a new era of waterproof

capabilities. Thanks in part to popularity in Japan, recent years have seen Danner become a growing force in the fashion world. The brand’s Stumptown collection sees the marriage of form and function with contemporary sensibilities meeting early design heritage. Stumptown is one of the Portland’s early nicknames. As the heavily wooded city developed quickly, trees were clear-cut to make way for rapid growth. At the time, there wasn’t enough manpower to remove all the stumps. In the early days, these stumps came in handy for crossing muddy unpaved roads. Though the stumps are now gone, the name has stuck around. Entirely made in the company’s Portland factory, the Stumptown collection pulls inspiration from the Pacific Northwest and Danner’s own history. “The Stumptown series is a Portland-made collection inspired by original Danner patterns, brought back to life with a modernized twist,” says Colleen Fennerty, the product-line manager of Stumptown. “We’ve been making more stylish boots for Japan for years now, and we’ve seen what a huge success it’s been, bringing that aesthetic to the States,” Fennerty adds. “We’re glad to see that more and more people are wearing SURFACE

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PHOTOS: COURTESY DANNER BOOTS.

Built to Last In this column, Josh Rubin, founder of the website Cool Hunting, highlights top-quality outdoor clothing, products, and equipment.

RUBRIC

JOSH RUBIN’S TAKE ON DANNER BOOTS:

PHOTOS: COURTESY DANNER BOOTS.

Like a rigid pair of raw denim jeans, a good pair of boots needs a little time to break in. But like those jeans, once the boots do soften up, they’re not only perfectly molded to your body, they’re also distinctively yours. Wear patterns take a longer time to achieve, but once they’re etched in you’ve achieved a warm look with an authentic history.

on making Danners that are just as welcome on the streets of New York as they are on the Pacific Crest Trail.” While the brand’s Stumptown collection appeals to more sartorially minded consumers, it’s still designed and built for use in the outdoors—especially the rain-soaked Pacific Northwest. The Mountain Pass silhouette draws on a classic backpacking boot design, but a closer look reveals it’s anything but a throwback. “The goal is to interlace key inspiration with functional applications to ultimately produce well-made, built-to-last boots,” Fennerty says of the collection. Fully waterproof and breathable thanks to a Gore-Tex liner, the Mountain Pass is equipped with a study and tech-driven Vibram outsole. The Kletterlift Thin provides a notably stable 53

and comfortable platform for the boot, and the lug pattern offers unrivalled traction. The boots are also exceptionally light. By integrating modern technologies, Danner reduced the weight of the Mountain Pass by 25 percent compared to the Mountain Light. Spanning heritage-styled backpacking boots, oxfords, chukkas, and military boots, the Stumptown collection represents a wide range in silhouettes and varying degrees of technical features. Each pair takes roughly three days to make, and no detail is too small for the Danner production team. Every piece of leather that comes into the factory is handgraded six times to ensure the final product meets the company’s high standards. Few brands can claim they not only weathered the Great Depression but also started

during it. Charles Danner’s unwavering belief that craftsmanship would always be valued continues to prove true. Though Gore-Tex, ergonomics, and color stories weren’t a priority of Danner’s when he started the company— Gore-Tex wasn’t even around; it was invented in 1969—there’s no doubt he would approve of how these materials have been integrated into the company’s products, because the goal remains the same: to make quality boots that are built to last.

A design studio and an auction house step outside their usual modes to create an unexpected exhibition. BY GRANT JOHNSON

Lindsey Adelman with her studio’s Clamp chandelier on set for the music video “Show Me.”

“Show Me,” an exhibition of new work by vision,” she adds. “The work looks different. designer Lindsey Adelman, promises a view into You can see it’s driven by different factors. It’s her studio’s process as well as an unbounded informed by different priorities. They have take on the practice of industrial design. From much more to do with a surreal fantasy.” June 25 through Aug. 1, Wright auction Citing the “threatening but totally beautiful” house’s Parke-Bernet building gallery in New photographs of Leonor Fini and the jewelry York will host not only seven one-of-a-kind and mirrors of Line Vautrin, Adelman mixed mirrors, assorted jewelry, candelabras, and biomorphic forms with a wild spirit that she lighting fixtures by Adelman, but also present describes as “almost punk” and “not necessarily the debut of her first music video, “Show Me.” quiet.” She imagines the work at home in the “As she explained the video to me—and showed Parisian and Moroccan abodes of Yves Saint me some still photographs from the shoot—I Laurent and Pierre Bergé—not unlike the immediately had a vision of it in the gallery eclectic spaces of her clients. “In my clients’ setting,” says Wright director Brent Lewis. homes on Central Park West, you walk in and Partnering with Adelman’s studio presented it feels like you’re stepping into another era, this an opportunity to unite Wright’s activity in beautiful mixture of vintage,” she says. “What historic design with contemporary practice, he I’m doing with my work, I’m hoping it fits into adds. “We wanted to use our New York space these settings that aren’t necessarily modern as a platform to work not only within our core at all.” For both Wright and Adelman’s studio, the business, which is auctions of 20th-century art and design, but also to explore creative exhibition pushes beyond the conventional— projects and find ways that we could do things and comfortable—to question the distinction differently.” we make between past and present. “I’m pretty Making the video included designing sure everything actually exists—that there is no choreography and costumes, as well as the gilded time,” Adelman says. “I like to design with this jewelry and fixtures ornamented with fungi, fur, intention of many eras coexisting, many styles and spikes on view at Wright. Adelman says coexisting. I try to let those lines be blurred it gave her studio an experience “very unlike in a really natural way and not separate styles traditional industrial design.” necessarily, but just let them exist in one piece.” “We started with a really imaginary, mythical SURFACE

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PHOTO: LAUREN COLEMAN.

Surreal Deal

AUCTION

COLLABORATION

On May 7, Surface co-hosted Design Dialogues No. 19 with RH Contemporary Art at its New York gallery in West Chelsea. Panelists Glenn Adamson, director of the Museum of Arts and Design, and Beatrice Galilee, associate curator of architecture and design at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, discussed the evolution of design as it relates to exhibitions, galleries, and museums. Special thanks to RH Contemporary Art for its support. (Photos: Patrick McMullan) 55

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Design Dialogues No. 19 at RH Contemporary Art

Italian Immersion

ART

With a major award under her belt, Corin Sworn embarks to Italy for research.

BY MARINA CASHDAN PORTRAIT BY TOBY COULSON

and in 28 years of the U.K.’s prestigious Turner Prize, there have been only six female winners. The Max Mara Art Prize attempts to redress the balance. We’re extremely proud that our past winners have gone on to be exhibited internationally to great acclaim.” And the historic London space has championed the careers of some of art’s most notable female artists, giving Barbara Hepworth, Frida Kahlo, Eva Hesse, Nan Goldin, Cindy Sherman, and Sarah Lucas their first major solo shows. This month, Sworn’s research will be realized as a multichannel sound piece with sculpture, costume, and video. “The work will be the culmination of months of research into the tales, costumes, and characters of the Commedia dell’Arte,” Blazwick says. “Corin’s working process is very fluid and organic but her attention to detail is meticulous.”

Corin Sworn outside South London Gallery. (OPPOSITE) Max Mara Art Prize for Women Installation views at Whitechapel Gallery.

SURFACE

PHOTOS: STEPHEN WHITE, COURTESY WHITECHAPEL GALLERY.

Last winter, London-born, Toronto-raised, be both a conscientious and overly imaginative Glasgow-based artist Corin Sworn won the researcher.” Sworn combines a hodgepodge of fifth Max Mara Art Prize for Women, an award found materials, suggesting “that the world that would send her on a six-month travel- people live in is malleable and there is scope ing residency around Italy—including time in for their agency in changing it.” The Venice trip set off her fascination with Rome, Naples, and Venice. Just a year earlier, in 2013, Sworn had installed a solo exhibition Italian culture and costume. Sworn’s proposal as part of a three-artist show at the Scottish for the Max Mara prize focused on the hiscollateral exhibition during the 55th Venice tory and costumes of the Italian Commedia Biennale. Her first time stepping foot in the dell’Arte, a 16th-century improvisational country was to prepare for that exhibition. “I comedy theater. “Corin is a vivid storyhad never been to Italy before my first trip teller,” says Iwona Blazwick, director of the to Venice,” Sworn says. “The longer I have Whitechapel Gallery, which has collaborated spent there, the more fascinating I find it. For with Max Mara on the prize since its incepsomeone interested in the layering of time, Italy tion in 2005. “We were fascinated by the way is a mindboggling place to be.” she weaves together memory, history, fact, Sworn’s work, which spans media including and fiction to create wonderfully immersive, film, installation, and drawing, is a combina- multilayered installations and films. The tion of research, anthropology, and psychol- [Commedia dell’Arte] idea was irresistible to ogy. Her early education in psychology as an us and we knew the experience would greatly undergraduate at the University of British benefit the development of this ambitious Columbia, in Vancouver, plays to her layer- work.” Blazwick was one of five female jurors, ing of present and past, time and space, and coming from different ends of the art world, to memory. “Much of my work since [school] decide on Sworn for the prize—one that turns has focused on mnemonic errors and mis- the attention to women making strides in their references to rehearse variation and slightly art practices. Blazwick notes that “women are eccentric engagements with the world,” Sworn still grossly underrepresented in the visual arts. says. “I like the freedom—that as an artist I can [They] command lower prices in the market,

ART

PHOTOS: STEPHEN WHITE, COURTESY WHITECHAPEL GALLERY.

Books Idea, Form, Resonance: 30 Years of Emerging Voices (Princeton Architectural Press) compiles nearly 250 individuals or firms who have won a spot in the Architectural League of New York’s Emerging Voices lecture series, one of

architecture’s most coveted before-you’refamous honors. The roster is extraordinary and eerily prescient—Steven Holl (who won in 1982), Toshiko Mori (1992), SHoP (2001), and Jeanne Gang (2006) are among those listed. This book is more of an index than a comprehensive survey; each winner is given just a single page of photos and minimal stats. But it’s enough to send one on obsessive Googling missions to see more work by Sam Mockbee (1990) or drawings by Wellington Reiter (1995). If there’s anything that will make you bite your fist while you take in the beauty of Sony’s Hit Bit 101, a 1984 computer that could’ve doubled as a Lamborghini prototype, it is Sony Design: Making Modern (Rizzoli). It’s not every day we use the term “design porn” here at Surface, but ladies and gentlemen, this 280-page book (with an introduction by Deyan Sudjic) is it. Full-page photographs of electronics from the past five

decades—each item shown alone, usually in a close-up, on a flat white background—make even the few clunkers look enticing. The details reveal design and graphics trends, from the severe grids of the 1970s to the biomorphic forms of the early aughts. You could be kicking around for 200 years and not live half the lives Ian Schrager has in his 68. Ian Schrager: Works (Rizzoli) is the rare monograph dedicated to a developer-hotelier who actually needs one, and it is in every way a fitting portrait of its subject: big, bold, cosmopolitan, and swarming with celebrities. Aside from the sheer spectacle of seeing Schrager’s larger-than-life spaces (and the parties they’ve hosted), the chapters reveal a startling range and a constantly evolving eye. We ogle, of course, at the gilded bombast of Studio 54, but later arrive at the austere, monochrome, achingly cool restraint of the Public Chicago. SURFACE

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PHOTO: MICHAEL RYTERBAND.

The Flow (Steidl) is the second book collaboration between photographer Juergen Teller and Nicolas Ghesquière, artistic director of Louis Vuitton’s women’s collections. The first was I Just Arrived in Paris, whose title may have better served its follow-up, since the 157 photographs in The Flow show off the French capital just as prominently as they do Ghesquière’s pieces. Snapshots of the churning Seine river and of Fondation Louis Vuitton, the new art museum designed by Frank Gehry, are juxtaposed with looks from the brand’s spring/summer 2015 collection, revealing the environments and textures that perhaps inspired Ghesquière’s designs—or simply make them look great.

PHOTO: MICHAEL RYTERBAND.

www.QuiTequila.com

Material

MATERIAL

In this column, we ask Material Connexion vice president Andrew Dent, Ph.D., to select one innovation that’s set to influence what designers will be using tomorrow. BY CAROLYN STANLEY PHOTO BY LESLEY UNRUH Cushioning materials face a unique dual challenge: they need to be soft—that is, they need to compress in order to absorb energy—but they also need to be firm enough to retain their shape over multiple impacts. If that sounds like a contradiction, that’s because, well, it is: Many energy-absorbing materials such as foams lose their effectiveness over time. Leave it to the world’s leading chemical company—BASF, headquartered in Ludwigshafen, Germany—to devise a novel solution with its material Infinergy. “Imagine a cushion on your couch,” says Vince Haas, North American consumer marketing manager for BASF’s Performance Materials division. “Each time you sit on it you deform the material. When

the cushion is new it returns to the original height, but over time the cushion no longer returns to its original form. Infinergy is unique in that it continues to perform over a significantly longer period of time than most competitive materials.” The innovation lies in Infinergy’s structure. Thermoplastic polyurethane (TPU), a type of plastic known for elasticity and abrasion resistance, is chopped into granulates that are then “expanded”—a process that introduces a blowing agent to the material and creates tiny pockets of gas. This puffs up the granulates to create a particle foam, which look like small, white, oval beads. At this stage, the beads already exhibit Infinergy’s characteristic properties: when squeezed, they spring back to their original shape. Once in particle-foam form, the material can be molded into the desired shape based on the needs of the application, using a pressurized steam chamber that bonds the individual pellets together. The resulting product resembles the pebbled foam often seen in disposable coolers and packing material, but with the pellets’ excellent

spring-back quality—also known as energy return—intact. As the first expanded-TPU (or E-TPU), Infinergy stands out among cushioning materials for its high elasticity, light weight, and durability, making it a natural match for applications that bear repeated impact. Most notably, Infinergy is used today in the midsoles of Adidas’s Boost line of athletic shoes. “What makes E-TPU unique is how it combines the usually conflicting performance benefits of soft and comfortable with firm and responsive cushioning,” Haas explains. “Applied in a shoe’s midsole, it provides a cushioning effect, while also maximizing energy return with every stride taken—providing the user with the same high performance on mile one and mile 100.” That combination of properties was once a paradox, but thanks to Infinergy it may become a rule.

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New York Design Week at B&B Itaila

New York Design Week at B&B Italia On May 16, during New York’s Design Week, Surface co-hosted the launch of Doshi Levien’s new Almora armchair at B&B Italia’s showroom on Greene Street in New York City’s Soho neighborhood. Guests included Patricia Urquiola, Niels Bendtsen, Brad Ascalon, and Stephen Burks. Special thanks to our event partner B&B Italia. (Photos: Jonathan Mittiga from onomonoMEDIA) 61

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Modular, flexible, and multifunctional, these new designs bring custom character to the workspace. BY AILEEN KWUN

Updated by firm Lievore Altherr Molina, Arperâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Duna chair comes with a new plastic shell in a range of colors. Its seat comes as a fixed front-face upholstered seat option, or paired with a removable accessory cushion. arper.com SURFACE

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capdell.com

cappellini.it

Capdellâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Mesana table comes in three sizes and can be ordered in special sizes upon request. It modulates into a conference table or long workstation, with slots in the surface ideal for power cords and outlets.

The latest addition to Piero Lissoniâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Lochness collection for Cappellini, this desk comprises a metal base and oak tabletop available in three finishes. A chest of drawers can be added on for extra storage.

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Designed by Samuel Wilkinson, Lexonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Babylon line of compact desk accessories is made from thick injection-molded ABS with a soft-touch matte finish. The faceted shapes of each piece were inspired by forms of rock strata. lexon-design.com

Part of Australian studio Daniel Emmaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s D.E. collection of desk accessories, the Cork Cone and Magnetic Tower are now available from Wrong for Hay. The platonic solids make for a handy ornament, or stash for paper clips and tacks. wrongforhay.com SURFACE

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Michele De Lucchi designed the 298 chair for Milanâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s soon-to-open UniCredit Pavilion. Produced by Cassina, itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s finished and assembled by hand, with a beech frame and steel mechanism that allows for easy folding and storage. cassina.com 65

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Stockholm-based studio Form Us With Love designed a series of acoustic panels for Baux. They come in five different patterns and a palette of 22 colors inspired by the natural beauty of the Scandinavian landscape. baux.se SURFACE

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A limited-edition, 11-piece collection designed by Jean Prouvé—newly brought back into production by Vitra and G-Star Raw—Prouvé Raw: Office Edition includes chairs, lamps, and tables in an industrial green palette. vitra.com

Named after the Spanish word for a covered carriage, Sancal’s Tartana acoustic dome is constructed with a rounded ash structure and three-layered felt overlay for optimal sound absorption and privacy. sancal.com

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usm.com

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USM’s Kitos Mechanical table flexibly adjusts to varying heights suitable for both standing and sitting, as preferred by its user. Its patented system is built to be super-stable, with interior spring-loading.

A sliding top that reveals storage space is a defining feature of Blu Dot’s Swish console desk. It’s made of a powder-coated steel base and two tabletop finishes: walnut veneer (shown here) and white-washed ash.

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Inspired by artist Alexander Calderâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s hanging mobiles, the Screen System designed by Gam Fratesi for Cappellini is multifunctional: The colorful panels can serve as a centerpiece, room partition, or acoustic panel. cappellini.it SURFACE

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An ergonomically refined, molded polypropylene shell and stained oak legs make up Wrong for Hayâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Neu 13 chair. The seat comes in a range of colors: black, white, gray, green (shown here), bordeaux, and orange. wrongforhay.com

Designed by Luca Nichetto, LAB by Emmegiâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Smarty collection includes a desk and modular cabinets that can be combined in varying configurations. Wood surfaces and pastel cabinet doors give it a playful, friendly character. lab.emmegiseating.com

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At Chicagoâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s NeoCon this month, Knoll will debut Antenna Designâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Horsepower, an adaptive office system comprising mobile units: seating, whiteboards, video displays and a sawhorse with plug-in USB power for a flexible work environment. knoll.com SURFACE

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poltronafrau.com

vitra.com

Designed by Lella and Massimo Vignelli in 1985, the Mesa table is now back in production by Poltrona Frau. Made of Ligurian slate and burnished steel, it’s shown here with another of their designs, the Intervista chair.

A nod to Thonet’s signature bentwood armrests, Vitra’s Allstar task chair by Konstantin Grcic comes with a plastic loop frame in an eye-popping palette. It’s fully adjustable, with settings for seat depth, height, and backrest.

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Interiors From Spain at Wanted Design

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With a swivel joint that allows it to be used as a small workspace or flipped up to reveal a slim shelving unit, Living Divaniâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s wallmounted Dju by Kasch Kasch makes for an ideal space-saving solution. livingdivani.it SURFACE

Leveraging design as a strategic platform, Culture + Commerce identifies and cultivates opportunities for global brands and international designers.

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hermanmiller.com

poliformusa.com

Designed by Naoto Fukasawa for Geiger, the Saiba chair is available as a fixed-height lounge chair with a four-star base and glides (shown here), or an adjustable-height executive chair with a five-star base and casters.

Made of a plastic shell seat, Poliformâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s classic Strip chair, designed by Carlo Colombo, can be paired with one of three options: a revolving base, one without wheels, or a chromed metal tubular structure.

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3,000+ international material manufacturers

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Access the most innovative materials in one place. MCX is the worldâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s largest materials library where designers can research and discover the newest trends. Become a member: info@materialconnexion.com or +1 212 842 2050

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Tailor Made Pre-fall womenswear is treated with excess layers and rich materials. Unconventional suiting is presented among the Hudson Yards development project.

CONNECTION

PHOTOGRAPHY BY STANDA MERHOUT STYLING BY DANIEL EDLEY

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Wool coat, Céline. Gray wool blazer, Etro. Red and black knit sweater, Marni. Gray wool trousers, Joseph. Black leather shoes, Hermès.

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(OPPOSITE, TOP TO BOTTOM) Black coat, Louis Vuitton. Graphic sweater, Christopher Kane. Floral motif sunglasses, Markus Lupfer for Linda Farrow. On Abiah (left): Camel coat, printed vest, white cotton shirt, striped trousers, Givenchy. Leather slip-on sneakers, Pierre Hardy. Watch, Hermès. On Luke (center): Black blazer and trousers, Yohji Yamamoto. White shirt, Louis Vuitton. Black leather lace-up shoes, Prada. Silver necklace, David Yurman. Silver rings, Chrome Hearts. On Danny (right): Black blazer, white shirt, black shorts, “tattoo” leggings, Comme des Garçons. Black slip-on shoes, Dries Van Noten. Silver necklace with charms, David Yurman. Silver rings, Chrome Hearts. (THIS PAGE) Blue blazer (worn inside out), Valentino. Black canvas backpack, Saint Laurent. Black embroidered bucket hat, Siki Im. Black and white stole, Philipp Plein. Watch, Tudor.

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(LEFT) Wool cropped sweater, Siki Im. Black blazer, Kenzo. Lace top, Gucci. Black trousers, McQ. Leather shoes, Ermenegildo Zegna. Open knit socks, Raf Simons. Gold purse, Lanvin. Black flask, Saint Laurent. Orange fox fur keychain, Adeam. (RIGHT) Gray patchwork blazer, Issey Miyake. Blue hoodie, Nike. Blue shirt, Paul Smith. Gray trousers, Joseph. Orange knit sweater, Marc by Marc Jacobs. Knit scarf, Kenzo. Boots, Jil Sander. Watch, Movado.

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(LEFT) Blazer, Fendi. Floral print trench, Simone Rocha. Wool knitted vest, Maison Margiela. White and gray cotton shirt, Joseph. Printed turtleneck, Marc by Marc Jacobs. Embellished hat, Lanvin. (RIGHT) Blue coat, Berluti. Embellished shirt, Lanvin. Silver dress (worn as skirt), Chanel. Leopard wool trousers, Sacai. Black and white wool scarf, Maison Margiela. Black leather strap watch, Movado. Fur backpack with charms, Fendi.

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Printed blazer and printed button up, Dries Van Noten. Black hat, Patricia Underwood. Watch, Tudor. (OPPOSITE, LEFT) Multicolor mirrored blazer, Burberry. Striped mohair sweater, Marc Jacobs. Striped trousers, Lanvin. Black perforated oxfords, Church’s. Printed scarf (worn around neck), Diesel. Watch, Hermès. Juste un Clou white gold bracelet, Cartier. Silver chain bracelet, Chrome Hearts. (OPPOSITE, RIGHT) Black and white wool graphic coat, Versace. Black and gray knit vest, Dior Homme. Wool vest, Raf Simons. Leather belt, Michael Kors. Black nylon trousers, Prada. Black leather shoes, watch, Hermès.

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Cape, Simone Rocha. Blazer, McQ. Yellow knit vest, Raf Simons. White shirt, Marni. Turtleneck, Alexander Wang. Trousers, Fendi. Hat, Patricia Underwood. Bottom Image: Gray wool blazer, Fendi. Floral print trench coat, Simone Rocha. Wool vest, Maison Margiela. Patterned cotton button up, Joseph. Printed turtleneck, Marc by Marc Jacobs. Black and gray wool herringbone trousers, Loewe. Embellished hat, Lanvin.

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Blazer, multicolor trousers, Missoni. Cable shirt, 3.1 Phillip Lim. Multicolor cotton button ups (tied around waist), Tommy Hilfiger. Necklace (worn on head), Chanel.

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Gray wool blazer, Fendi. Floral print trench coat, Simone Rocha. Wool vest, Maison Margiela. Patterned cotton button up, Joseph. Printed turtleneck, Marc by Marc Jacobs. Black and gray wool herringbone trousers, Loewe. Embellished hat, Lanvin. Photographer: Standa Merhout at Wilhelmina Artists. Makeup: Dillon at Wilhelmina Artists. Hair: Anthony Joseph Hernandez at Wilhelmina Artists. Abiah Hostvedt at Red Model Management. Luke Gernert at Red Model Management. Danny Allen at Red Model Management. Kyle Mobus at Re:Quest Model Management. Phillip Witts at Ford Models. Erlend at Wilhelmina Models. Jack Donovan at New York Models. Stylist Assistants: Efi Turkson, Jorge Lobos Vega.

CAPTION PHOTOGRAPHY BY STANDA MERHOUT STYLING BY DANIEL EDLEY

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Tweed blazer, black wool coat, black wool embroidered skirt, diamond and white-gold brooch, Chanel.

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Multicolor fur coat, black sweater, floral print bag, Fendi. Silk coat, Thom Browne. Silk turtleneck, silk shirt, Marni. Silk trousers, Mary Katrantzou.

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On Victoria (left): Black wool vest, Alexander Wang. Pearl-embroidered leather jacket, Philipp Plein. White wool turtleneck, HermĂ¨s. White cotton trousers, Christian Dior. Black suede boots, Stuart Weitzman. Fur stole, Michael Kors. Diamond and white-gold brooch, Chanel. On Ragnhild (right): Leather jacket, Christopher Kane. White wool blazer, Altuzarra. Pink sequin turtleneck, Christian Dior. Silk and wool skirt, Rochas. Leather boots, Stuart Weitzman.

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(LEFT) On Victoria (left): Black wool vest, Alexander Wang. Silk patterned coat, Thom Browne. White wool turtleneck, Jason Wu. Embroidered skirt, Chanel. Black wool trousers with side stripe, Michael Kors. Stole, Fendi. Suede boots, Stuart Weitzman. On Sojourner (right): Black wool embroidered jacket, Chanel. Wool patterned coat, Missoni. Tweed wool coat, black and white brogues, Thom Browne. White cotton shirt, The Row. Tuxedo trousers, Burberry. (RIGHT) Printed silk trench coat and black wool coat and skirt, Emanuel Ungaro. Printed shirt, Mary Katrantzou. Black lace shirt, Christopher Kane. Shoes, ChloĂŠ. Red leather clutch, Valextra.

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(LEFT) Embroidered silk and leather jacket, Gucci. White wool turtleneck, black wool trousers, black leather trench, HermĂ¨s. Wool and sequin skirt, Christopher Kane. Leather quilted bag, Chanel. (RIGHT) On Sojourner (left): Black and white textured dress and black knit sock boots, Balenciaga. Silver chain bracelet and rings, Chrome Hearts. On Victoria (right): Plaid wool coat, black suede boots, ostrich clutch, Balenciaga. Silver cross brooches, earrings, rings, Chrome Hearts.

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White fur coat, white wool trousers, Akris. Plaid wool blazer, Lanvin. Black leather clutch, HermĂ¨s. (OPPOSITE LEFT) Patent leather and black fur jacket, Christopher Kane. Navy wool coat with white trim, Thom Browne. Black wool turtleneck, Jason Wu. Black silk embroidered skirt, No. 21. Black wool trousers with side stripe, Michael Kors. Suede cut-out heels, Alexander Wang. Renaissance silver bracelets and multichain necklace, David Yurman. (OPPOSITE RIGHT) On Victoria (left): Black and white plaid wool blazer, Lanvin. White fur coat, Rochas. Silk patterned skirt, Thom Browne. Silver chain bracelets and rings, Chrome Hearts. On Sojourner: Black and white knit coat, Jason Wu. White fur coat, Burberry. White cotton button up, The Row. Black and white plaid wool trousers, Lanvin.

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Gray wool hooded cardigan, gray wool coat, Max Mara. Black wool and patent leather dress, Christopher Kane. Beige cashmere trousers, Jason Wu. Black leather boots, Stuart Weitzman. Diamond and white gold brooches, Van Cleef & Arpels.

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On Sojourner (Left): Wool camel coat, silk camel button up, Chloé. Wool camel trench, The Row. Cotton camel trousers, Céline. Leather flat boots, Lanvin. Leather clutch, Valextra. On Victoria (Right): Cotton camel coat, leather heels, Céline. Embroidered wool sweater, Rochas. Knit wool sweater (worn as skirt), Christian Dior. Knit wool trousers, The Row. Leather tote bag, Marni. Photographer: Standa Merhout at Wilhelmina Artists. Stylist: Daniel Edley. Makeup: Clelia using MAC Cosmetics at Utopia NYC. Hair: Vassilis Kokkinidis at Next Artists. Sojourner Morrell at Wilhelmina. Victoria Anderson at Wilhelmina NYC. Ragnhild Jevne at IMG. Stylist Assistant: Efi Turkson. Backdrop by Broderson Backdrops.

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STOCKISTS

adeam adeamonline.com Twitter: @adeamonline Instagram: @adeam

comme des garĂ§ons comme-des-garcons.com Twitter: @commegarcons Instagram: @commegarcons

jil sander jilsander.com Twitter: @jilsanderpr Instagram: @jilsanderpr

alexander wang alexanderwang.com Twitter: @alexanderwangny Instagram: @alexanderwangny

david yurman davidyurman.com Twitter: @davidyurman Instagram: @davidyurman

joseph joseph-fashion.com Twitter: @joseph_fashion Instagram: @josephfashion

belstaff belstaff.com Twitter: @belstaff Instagram: @belstaff

diesel diesel.com Twitter: @diesel Instagram: @diesel

kenzo kenzo.com Twitter: @kenzo Instagram @kenzo

berluti berluti.com Twitter: @berluti Instagram: @berluti

dior homme dior.com Twitter: @dior Instagram: @dior

lanvin lanvin.com Twitter: @lanvinofficial Instagram: @lanvinofficial

bottega veneta bottegaveneta.com Twitter: @bottegaveneta Instagram: @bottegaveneta

dries van noten driesvannoten.be Twitter: @driesvannoten Instagram: @driesvannoten

loewe loewe.com Twitter: @loeweofficial Instagram: @loewe

burberry us.burberry.com Twitter: @burberry Instagram: @burberry

etro etro.com Twitter: @etroofficial Instagram: @etro_official

louis vuitton louisvuitton.com Twitter: @louisvuitton Instagram: @louisvuitton

cartier cartier.com Twitter: @cartier Instagram: @cartier

fendi fendi.com Twitter: @fendi Instagram: @fendi

marc jacobs marcjacobs.com Twitter: @marcjacobs Instagram: @marcjacobs

celine celine.com

givenchy givenchy.com Twitter: @givenchy Instagram: @givenchyofficial

marc by marc jacobs marcjacobs.com Twitter: @marcjacobs Instagram: @marcjacobs

gucci gucci.com Twitter: @gucci Instagram: @gucci

maison margiela maisonmargiela.com Twitter: @margiela Instagram: @maisonmargiela

hermĂ¨s hermes.com Instagram: @hermes

markus lupfer by linda farrow markuslupfer.com Twitter: @markuslupfer Instagram: @markuslupfer

chanel chanel.com Twitter: @chanel Instagram: @chanelofficial christopher kane christopherkane.com Twitter: ckane_studio Instagram: @christopherkane chrome hearts chromehearts.com Instagram: @chromeheartsofficial church's church-footwear.com Instagram: @churchs

issey miyake isseymiyake.com Twitter: @isseymiyakenyc

marni marni.com Twitter: @marniofficial Instagram: @marni.official

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max mara world.maxmara.com Twitter: @maxmara Instagram: @maxmara

pierre hardy pierrehardy.com Twitter: @pierrehardynews Instagram: @pierrehardynews

versace versace.com Twitter: @versace Instagram: @versace_official

mcq mcq.com Twitter: @mcq Instagram: @mcq

prada prada.com Twitter: @prada Instagram: @prada

yohji yamamoto yohjiyamamoto.co Twitter: @yohjiyamamoto Instagram: @yohjiyamamotoonline

michael kors michaelkors.com Twitter: @michaelkors Instagram: @michaelkors

pringle of scotland pringlescotland.com Twitter: @pringlescotland Instagram: @pringlescotland

ermenegildo zegna zegna.com Twitter: @zegna Instagram: @zegnaofficial

missoni m-missoni.com Twitter: @missoni Instagram: @missoni

raf simons rafsimons.com Instagram: @rafsimonsofficial

miu miu miumiu.com Twitter: @miumiuofficial Instagram: @miumiu movado movado.com Twitter: @movado Instagram: @movado nike nike.com Twitter: @nike Instagram: @nike off-white off---white.com Twitter: @virgilabloh Instagram: @virgilabloh patricia underwood patriciaunderwood.com Twitter: @hatunderwood Instagram: @hatunderwood paul smith paulsmith.co Twitter: @paulsmithdesign Instagram: @paulsmithdesign philipp plein philipp-plein.com Instagram: phillip_plainq

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raf simons for adidas rafsimons.com Instagram: @rafsimonsofficial sacai sacai.jp Instagram: @sacaiofficial saint laurent ysl.com Twitter: @ysl Instagram: saintlaurentparis_official siki im sikiim.com Twitter: @sikiimstudio Instagram: @sikiim simone rocha simonerocha.com Twitter: @simone_rocha Instagram: @simonerocha_ tommy hilfiger tommy.com Twitter: @tommyhilfiger Instagram: @tommyhilfiger tudor tudorwatch.com Instagram: @tudorwatch Twitter: @tudorwatchusa valentino valentino.com Twitter: @maisonvalentino Instagram: @maisonvalentino

Power

100

Our second annual list of influential figures in art, architecture, fashion, real estate, design, and more.

POWER 100

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André Balazs PRESIDENT AND CEO, ANDRÉ BALAZS PROPERTIES INTERVIEW BY SPENCER BAILEY PORTRAIT BY PASCAL PERICH

You grew up in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and your parents’ house was filled with quite a bit of midcentury modern furniture. Did this upbringing get you thinking about design, architecture, and the urban experience at an early age?

Yeah. Because my parents lived in Sweden for 20 years, when they moved to Cambridge, they brought with them this complete immersion in what we now call midcentury modern. They moved to Sweden in 1941, so the ’40s and ’50s totally informed their life. My family’s house was, by far, among the most modern in Cambridge. My mom just moved out, but when I would take people there, they’d go, “Oh, this is the coolest thing!” That was the environment in which I grew up. I also had a wonderful, inspiring ceramics teacher in sixth grade. That led me to sculpture. We had a very unique program in high school; you’d spend the last half of your senior year doing a project, and I did some large-scale outdoor steel sculptures. Then I went to college at Cornell, and was in a very unusual program that allowed me to approach any professor in any of the multiple schools they had on campus. I then studied architecture, along with political science, literature, and economics and everything else. It was a really eclectic liberal-arts program. Most of my friends there were architects. Cornell’s architecture school was a five-year program. I spent a lot of time with the school’s students. That’s when I started getting into journalism. I started publications and became very involved in graphics. That’s why I ended up at Columbia [Journalism School], because I thought I was going to go into publishing and magazines.

In the middle of the living room of André Balazs’s stylish, immaculately conceived apartment in Manhattan’s Soho neighborhood there’s a custom-designed bright red ping-pong table. Not surprisingly, the spritely and fit Balazs has a pretty mean serve. The game, which requires finesse, attentiveness, and a light touch, makes a fitting metaphor for the 58-year-old’s business acumen and design sensibility. Born and raised in Cambridge, Massachusetts, Balazs later studied the humanities at Cornell University and journalism at Columbia. He may be known for his work as a hotelier and developer, but he is, at heart, a storyteller. In his real estate work, constructing the actual buildings is secondary; narratives come first. His company, André Balazs Properties, operates eight hotels in the U.S., including the Mercer in New York and Chateau Marmont in L.A., as well as the new Chiltern Firehouse hotel in London. He is the founder and chairman of the Standard hotel brand—an almost ironic name, considering the collection of properties is, well, anything but—with locations in Los Angeles, New York, and Miami Beach. (A Standard London is in the works.) This summer, from June 16–21, Balazs will showcase his storytelling skills and design know-how in an entirely different way: as the curator of the Design Miami/ Basel fair’s “Design at Large” program. With an architectural focus, the presentation will include So you were basically training to be a a Jean Prouvé prefabricated filling station, a bridge builder between architecture and Shigeru Ban paper teahouse, and an Atelier Van storytelling. Lieshout poolhouse. Earlier this year, Surface met with Balazs at the Top of the Standard bar in New York’s Meatpacking District to discuss Only later, looking back at all the things we everything from how Soho has transformed in currently do—whether it’s graphics or, when the 30-plus years he has lived there to why the I moved to New York, I wanted to be a fashword “sustainability” is B.S. ion designer for a while—does it make sense. When you’re doing it, you’re convinced you have no idea what you’re doing. Which may be the truth. Everything I did then relates to what we do now, including starting businesses. I always appreciated the excitement of creating something from nothing, which is what, at the end of the day, starting a business is all about. What led you to not become a sculptor or fashion designer?

André Balazs in the living room of his Manhattan apartment. 109

What was really frustrating about sculpture was exactly what I like about what we’re doing now. It was a very, very conscious abandoning of that pursuit. I felt very frustrated with the inability of most people to understand the vernacular of sculpture. Graphic design, painting—they’re much more readily graspable by most people, even today. The three-dimensional vocabulary of sculpture

is in many ways why it’s more sophisticated [than 2-D arts], but also why fewer people understand it. It’s sort of why even architecture, despite the big push given to it by various economic interests, is still poorly understood. That may be also because either architects don’t know how to describe their work to non-architects, or because the media generally struggles to make architecture more accessible.

Do you think so? Well, one problem seems to be architects not communicating the complexities of what they’re doing in a clear and understandable fashion.

Well, if you asked Renzo [Piano] what the fuck was going on over there [points to the new Whitney Museum building out of one of the bar’s south-facing windows], I don’t think he’d have trouble discussing it. I think people might have difficulty understanding what he’s saying. But it’s not that he’s not speaking articulately about it. It’s that he’s speaking a language that very few people understand. You can’t really be accused of being a bad poet if the people trying to read your poetry don’t have a command of the language. You may be a bad poet, but that’s not necessarily the conclusion. I wouldn’t blame architects for the lack of understanding of architecture. Part of it may be the media grabbing onto certain “trends” in architecture, but maybe ignoring some of the more substantive things about it.

That’s part of it, too—journalists trying to write about it. I wanted to be an art critic for a while. Clement Greenberg was my big hero. And Harold Rosenbloom. I wrote an art column in the Cornell Daily Sun. That was interesting, because the language of art criticism—I was a big fan of Baudelaire—to me was, “Oh, you use that language.” How you write about art is a whole separate thing from the art. Similarly, how you write about architecture is not the same as architecture. Whether an architect is articulate also depends on the writer and whether they’re articulate. It’s hard because a writer can get into the whole semiotics of it, and it can get really fucking boring. It can be dry. Which I think is the biggest complaint against architects in general. It’s a classic conundrum of architecture publishing: How do you make it exciting?

One of the biggest problems, I find, isn’t even the writing. I think the photography is what’s really disturbing to me right now. With the limits of 2-D photography, how do you convey what architecture is—or even interior design? I always read design magazines upside down. Because then you immediately see how fucked up the design is. It’s like, “My god,

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another fucking white floor with fucking holes in it.” [Laughs] Then there’s travel writing—I’m essentially in the travel business. You get some journalist writing that they went to the Ritz Carlton in Maui, and that it was really “hip” and “cool.” Then you go, “Now what?!” If “hip” and “cool” have been used to describe the Ritz in Maui, then— Next they’ll use “chic” and “unique.”

[Laughs] Yeah, those are already gone now, too, so what the fuck else is left? You’ve got this tremendous dilemma. It applies to the language of design reportage and criticism, architecture reportage and criticism, and travel writing. It’s becoming harder and harder to know what anything means. I think with design photography, meaningfulness is one of the really difficult things. You can kind of snazz up everything. In the end, it’s not even the design, but peoples’ reactions to the photos of the design that then becomes a part of the dialogue. It’s a really tricky area, which is one of the reasons I hate the Milan Furniture Fair, because it’s at the vortex of all of that. It’s not boring exactly, but more sad and depressing. You go through the pieces— one more, one more, one more—and none of it means anything out of context. Much of what you seem to be doing in your work is about storytelling, which you studied at Columbia.

Yes, there’s a connection. I’ve always loved storytelling. I think the greatest contribution to the work of a designer or an architect is providing the story—then the architect or designer becomes a collaborator in it, or the illustrator of it. It’s very hard for an architect or designer to create a narrative in the first place—other than if it’s a self-involved site. How do you design a house without knowing the way someone wants to live? An architect can only do a good work if they have a good client.

places that fall flat, I think, are because somebody along the way cut off the design process and presumed it was done when it was only 20 percent done. Developers do this kind of shit to designers and architects all the time: “Give me the plans. I want them on April 1.” Then whatever they get on April 1 they take and presume it’s a building. But it may or may not even be a tenth of the way there. Then there’s the whole “sustainability” kick developers are on these days.

What does that even mean? That the architect can sustain himself? To me, sustainability is more about building something that’s high quality and long lasting, not necessarily because it’s made of “green” materials.

That’s interesting. Think of how many things you can apply “sustainable” to. It’s sustaining the integrity of the concept; it is, as you say, a building that is of such high quality that it lasts a long time; it can be of high quality and have a light footprint on the environment; it could be made entirely out of materials that are “sustainable,” which is that the damage of making them expendable is less than other materials. I don’t even know what sustainable means. You must deal with buzzwords quite a bit.

Yeah, I try to ignore them. [Laughs] They mean nothing. I honestly don’t know what the fuck sustainable means. Do you? No.

Well, if you don’t—if the editor of Surface doesn’t—then who the fuck does?

A bungalow at the Chateau Marmont hotel in Los Angeles.

When you give a brief, do you give them a story?

PHOTO: NIKOLAS KOENIG.

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PHOTO: TIM CLINCH.

It always starts with a story, but it’s iterative. Good design is always an iterative process and is never fully formed. I was in the offices of an architectural firm, and they gave me a 400-page book that Taschen had just published, and we were flipping through it. I was like, “Jesus Christ, they’ve built hundreds of buildings around the world.” Then I went through it again and realized there wasn’t a single building that had been built. They were all renderings, but they were so realistic. Then you look at “old-school” architects— like Frank Gehry—and they build maquettes. Even with a maquette, you have no idea what it will be like, which is why design is iterative, because so many times you build a volume and it’s not until the volume exists and you’re in it that you can go to the next level. Most

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Let’s dig into the substance of your business: What is it that you look for in an architect? How do you build, create, and—I won’t use the word “sustain” here—maintain or keep the substance?

I think it’s very unfair to architects—and it’s bullshit by developers—to do competitions. If you don’t know which architect to hire, then you don’t even know what you’re trying to build in the first place. Hiring an architect isn’t a fishing expedition, yet so many people treat it that way. A lot of the projects that do it like that are committee projects, like a new museum or a new town hall. It covers everyone’s ass to do this. It’s like an RFP. By the end of the day, they’re still going to hire someone that makes sense for a bunch of reasons. A young Shigeru Ban, a young Jean Nouvel—all these people bust their ass, do drawings for nothing, then a bunch of committee people sit around together and steal the ideas they like. It’s so unfair to the designers. When private developers do competitions, it’s especially unfair. In Europe, the reason young architects could get great commissions, at least in the past, is because everyone could submit. So there is that oddball chance that a 30-year-old architect can get a museum in Europe. In the U.S., private developers go through the same bullshit process, but then they only invite the Frank Gehrys of the world, about whom there’s no question of their competence or greatness. Then they still ask them to do a competition, which I think is so patently unfair to the architect. It means the person who’s doing the commissioning has no idea what they want anyway. For example, when I built 40 Mercer here in Soho there was, to me, only one possible architect: Jean Nouvel. This was way before he won the Pritzker Prize and before he did anything in America. Soho had this industrial feel, and it was historic. We were building a new building, and it couldn’t be a faux castiron building. It had to be something new. To me, it was obvious that Jean Nouvel would be the best architect for that mission. There was no competition. He was the only one.

PHOTO: TIM CLINCH.

PHOTO: NIKOLAS KOENIG.

Could you have imagined Nouvel designing the tower he’s now creating next to MoMA?

A bathroom at the Chiltern Firehouse hotel in London. 111

He’s doing that because Goldman Sachs, which was my partner at 40 Mercer, got to know him on that project. But did Goldman Sachs and Hines, the developer, make an original choice? I don’t know. They did what they knew. I don’t know that I would’ve asked Jean to do that particular building. I honestly haven’t studied it. But I know he’s the architect because both of those firms—Hines and Goldman Sachs—were my partners in 40 Mercer, and both of them got to know him in that process. It was not an inspired or risky choice; it was a safe choice. I really hate the building Jean did here on the West Side Highway in Chelsea. >

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You seem to have really strong opinions on architecture. You must spend a lot of time researching. Is that why you felt qualified to curate “Design at Large” at Design Miami/Basel this June?

One of the reasons I was interested in curating “Design at Large”—after Rodman [Primack, the executive director of Design Miami] asked me—is that I’ve been very, very interested in prefabricated and modular units for a long time. It’s one of the reasons I bought the Maison Tropicale [at a Christie’s auction in 2008; the unit is a prefabricated housing system that was developed by Jean Prouvé in the 1950s]. If one were to use the word “sustainable” for something like that, it was sustainable because the means of production was controllable, therefore the pricing was sustainable and there was climate control. The Maison was amazing because of the innovations relating to airflow, the handling of ultraviolet light, the material choices for its use in a jungle atmosphere. Everything about it was very innovative considering it was done in the ’50s. This was 65 years ago! It looks so modern. It’s nuts. I’m very interested in this prefab idea of making affordable, very well-designed buildings for various uses. I’ve been looking at architects working in that vernacular. Who are some of those architects?

I shouldn’t say because we get knocked off so fast anyway. Within a week of opening someplace, an executive from every major hotel company is camped out there. I also don’t like talking about projects we haven’t completed. Where we’re sitting is a pretty good example of your influence on the hospitality industry. It seems like Roman & Williams’s career skyrocketed after this place opened.

The exterior of the Mercer hotel in Manhattan’s Soho neighborhood.

PHOTO: THOMAS LOOF.

Can we set the record straight? Shawn Hausman is the designer of this hotel. Todd Schliemann, who’s now at Ennead—which was called Polshek Partnership Architects— is an old college friend of mine; he was 100 percent responsible for the building. We went through hundreds of iterations until the exterior resembled what the Standard brand was supposed to represent. I had worked with Shawn for many years. He’s worked on every Standard, and he’s working now on the Standard in London. He was a production set designer. I needed a firm in New York that had the manpower and was close enough to execute the plans he was producing. I met Roman & Williams through an actor friend of mine. Roman & Williams had also been set designers and had done a kitchen or two for some actor friends. They said, “You should meet this guy [Stephen Alesch], who draws like old-time Hollywood set designers could.” Very few architects or designers today can draw like him. So I met with them. In order to facilitate the production of Shawn’s interiors, I hired Roman & Williams and introduced SURFACE

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them to Shawn so that they could execute the concepts Shawn was developing. Subsequent to the opening of this place, Roman & Williams really took a lot of credit that belongs to Sean. This room [the Top of the Standard] is an ode to Warren Platner, and that was an idea that Shawn and I came up with. This is not to take anything away from Roman & Williams’s subsequent work, which stands on its own. What’s your working relationship like with Shawn?

I’m working with him daily in London. He moved to London, and we’re doing a Standard there in King’s Cross. There’s a purposeassembled design office that’s functioning for the sole purpose of building that one hotel. That’s the way we typically do it: with our internal people and selected outside professionals who help build the narrative. When and how did you start working with Shawn?

We did the Bar Marmont with him. I knew him from the days of Area. He was in L.A. doing production design. This was 20 or so years ago. We expanded the Chateau to include Bar Marmont, and he did the design for that. It’s interesting, this connection between set design and hospitality design.

PHOTO: THOMAS LOOF.

It ties right back to narrative. If you have a narrative, like you have a movie, you put together what a production designer does, which is to create the physical environment in which certain moods and stories unfold. If you want someone to enter a dining room and it’s supposed to be menacing, you adjust the dining room’s décor to help convey that. If it’s supposed to be sunny, bright, shiny, and friendly, then you adjust the décor to support that narrative. Production designers are used to adjusting their design to be at the service of the story. Because of the economics of the way the design industry works, designers are largely beaten down and forced to abandon that all the time because some potential client will come to them and say something stupid like, “I really liked what you did for David Geffen, can you do that for me?” What’s the designer supposed to do? You can’t say to a client, “Fuck you, David wanted this, that was that site, and he’s this kind of person. Why would you want me to do the same?” I don’t mean to beat up David Geffen. He’s an example of a really informed, really sophisticated client. I can’t imagine he would go to a designer and say, “Build me something like …” But I can see other clients saying, “Give me something like what he has.” Where does that leave the designer? People develop styles. How can you create something original if you hire someone with a signature style? It takes a lot of work to convince someone to give up a style. Or you harness it—but it takes a lot of work. That’s where we are right now in the design world. 113

In your work, there’s not necessarily a Balazs style. Your spaces are each layered and complex in their own way. How do you continue creating these new stories?

You have to invent it. It just requires more work. I think it’s a little embarrassing to do things twice. Let’s talk about Chateau Marmont, which was a turning point in your career. In 1990, you bought the hotel, which had a sort of tired reputation, and revitalized it. What was going through your mind as you were doing this?

The good thing is we’re still doing it. We’re about to step it up. We’re redoing all the bathrooms. This year marks 25 years [since I took it over], and the fact is, it’s always been under renovation during this time. There hasn’t been a month that something’s not being done. The magic is, if you were to be in there for the first time, you’d go, “Oh, this is amazing, no one’s ever touched it.” There aren’t that many people around who knew the hotel 25 years ago anymore. Most people have experienced it in the last 25 years. To put it into context: Let’s say you’re a 50-year-old director; you showed up there when you were 25. I think it wasn’t that different from any other place in L.A. Chateau had a history, but it needed to be interpreted. You could look at its history in two ways: Either you didn’t want to continue it—you wanted to reject it and say it was terrible, because it was so rundown and fucked up—or you could say it was history that belonged. You could argue that the Beverly Hills Hotel had the same history. Actually, that’s the only other hotel you could argue that about. The Sultan of Brunei bought the Beverly Hills Hotel the same year I bought the Chateau, and he shut it down for what he thought would be five years but ended up being seven. At the same time, we kept the Chateau open and kept making incremental changes to it. The changes were meant to be so incremental that even people who were smart and had a great eye couldn’t see it. I’m now fine-tuning the bathrooms so that they’ll seem pitch perfect for what that building is: for the time period people associate with it, but with all the modernity that people expect and want. It may look like a 1920s bathroom, but the level of lighting has to be what people expect of lighting today. The scale is a little hard to change in that building because it’s so historic. The bathrooms here at the Standard, which is a different category of hotel, are different from the bathrooms at the Chateau. But that’s a function of the original building. If you gutted it, I’m afraid you’d lose that quirkiness. At the Chateau, we have kitchens, right? Nobody—well, a few people; some stay there a long time—cooks in their kitchen. Yet we have full-on stoves. Is that important to maintain? I think so. Just the idea that you have a kitchen adds qualitatively to the experience. >

tect’s rendering, or if you’re on top of the fire turret looking down. It was built from the outside in; it was meant to convey safety, public power, the symbol of the government protecting its people. Inside, it was a mess. It was built for a bunch of firemen who actually lived in it with the horses, carriages, and equipment. The rooms were at odd angles not because it made sense from the inside, but because the architect thought from outside it would look elegant. It’s a classic example of bad architecture. It was more like a sculpture of civic strength against fire. We had to add a building in between to conform. There was no way to do this unless we

former factory building in a very un-fancy neighborhood. There was no Balenciaga next door. There was no retail at all. There were no restaurants at all, other than Raoul’s and this place called Food. Dean & DeLuca opened a few years later on Prince Street. It was: How do you find a language that’s simple? How do you use art in a building where a lot of your clients are going to be art dealers and artists? The whole language there was a function of the story and needs. Which is the opposite of the Chiltern. There, it was a different issue: How do you make it cozy? How do you make it not English? The restaurant itself, a lot of people go there and say, “It feels so downtown

The narrative of what to keep is all woven into: What’s the story of the Chateau? What’s the narrative behind your new Chiltern Firehouse hotel in London?

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PHOTOS: TOP, COURTESY DZEK. MIDDLE, FRANK HULSBOMER. BOTTOM, THOMAS LOOF.

It’s perhaps the most complex of all the buildings I’ve ever dealt with. It was so constrained in its parameters. This is how I approached it: Here’s this building that looks like, to an American, a cathedral. It’s high Victorian. It’s ambitious public architecture. It’s so beautiful from the outside. It has architectural details on the roof that you can’t see from any place, except for when you’re looking at an archi-

took a radically modern approach with some politically powerful architect like Richard Rogers to achieve it. We couldn’t have done an I.M. Pei–like glass pyramid there. It just wouldn’t have flown. So we built another building to mimic it. It was all restoration. Then we had to define a language for the inside, which was completely concrete. The narrative and the challenge was: How do you make a luxury hotel that sits inside a building with this past? It had to work within the constrained spaces, yet still be a luxury hotel and seem real. It was a very complicated thing. It was not dissimilar to the challenge with the Mercer. Christian Liaigre was just starting out on the look he’s now famous for. That was developed for the Mercer. It was a

Perhaps it’s the notion of being at home.

PHOTO: COURTESY GALERIE PATRICK SEGUIN.

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New York.” That was a conscious decision. I wouldn’t try to go in and out-British the British. You have to go with what the building was, which is a little bit more grit. You mentioned your clients. Who are they exactly?

I find that what we do appeals to people who are very sophisticated. They’re conversant with this dialogue because they face it themselves in their own work, whether they’re writers, actors, directors, artists, or designers. They’re people who are very, very self-confident. They ask themselves questions about how they dress. They really appreciate what we do, and they likewise don’t look to us to validate who they are. They know who they are. They just deeply appreciate this other layer. They’re thinking people. So they appreciate an attention to detail as much as you do.

On every level, not just design. It could just be fabulous attention to being friendly and real. You can’t design your way into meaningfulness. It’s got to resonate. You have to find meaningfulness on many levels. It’s not about who the decorator is. Each of your hotels has a special energy. How do you create and maintain it?

I think it’s the enthusiasm of the people. There’s no substitute for the people, meaning the team that keeps it alive. The team very much involves the guests, too. It’s a symbiotic community.

I’m a surrogate for the guests in the design process, absolutely, because in the end they’re going to be the client. It’s not going to be me. I’m just sort of channeling it to get it into shape for them. And because I’ve done it for a while, I can anticipate the issues hopefully better than anybody else.

PHOTOS: TOP, COURTESY DZEK. MIDDLE, FRANK HULSBOMER. BOTTOM, THOMAS LOOF.

PHOTO: COURTESY GALERIE PATRICK SEGUIN.

Do you see yourself as a guest?

Your career really took off in Soho, where you moved in 1984. During this time, the neighborhood has completely transformed. I also feel there’s been a transformation of the hotel industry at large since then—at least when it comes to the idea of a “design hotel.” What’s your take on these two seemingly parallel developments?

(TOP AND MIDDLE) Max Lamb’s Marmoreal for Dzek, part of the “Design at Large” exhibition Balazs is curating at Design Miami/Basel this June. (BOTTOM) The Standard East Village hotel’s penthouse terrace. (OPPOSITE) A 1969 Jean Prouvé filling station, part of this summer’s “Design at Large.” 115

I would separate them. What happened in Soho has happened every single time we’ve opened something anywhere, whether it’s downtown L.A., Marylebone in London, or Shelter Island. Even in the Meatpacking District—I don’t think the Gansevoort Hotel set this area on fire, and when we opened [the Standard], the High Line wasn’t even a political reality. I think a really good hotel becomes a center of a community. We’ve been able to—and I think a good hotel can do this—transform a neighborhood into something else. >

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I’m not sure if this is a good thing or a bad thing, but it’s a fact that when we started the Mercer there was no retail in Soho, and today the most expensive retail space per square foot in Manhattan is on the corner of Prince and Mercer Street. It spread from the [Prada] Epicenter across the rest of Soho. It’s more expensive now to rent retail in Soho than it is on Madison or Fifth Avenue. Again, I’m not sure if it’s good or bad, but that’s what’s happened. And it’s what has happened in the last 18 months in Marylebone in London. The street was selling size 15 women’s shoes and

in the hotel business, I’m not exactly sure if anything has changed or is new. You can’t even attribute the social factor to it. César Ritz—my personal hero—is actually the one who stimulated wealthy people to move out of private-home entertainment and into public spaces. That was in 1890. You know Design Hotels? It’s run and founded by a dear friend of mine. I always say to him, “What the fuck is a ‘design hotel?’ What hotel is not designed?” We both laugh about it because it’s such a meaningless phrase. Who has ever built anything that wasn’t

woodwind instruments, and now it’s considered the “hot” street. I don’t know how to feel about it exactly. I’m ambivalent. But I know it’s a fact. The question about hotels changing—it’s funny, I remember Steve Rubell showing me through the Royalton when it was about to open. He was the first one who told me it was a “boutique hotel.” I remember thinking it was clever, because he was appropriating a retail term to a hotel of a certain size. But if you look in Europe—except for the “grand” hotels—they have always had what we call a boutique hotel. And today, in America, Starwood and Marriott are in the boutiquehotel business, which is a complete misuse of the word. How in the world can a 300-room hotel be a boutique hotel? It’s just a Sheraton by another name. It’s kind of bullshit. When we talk about what has happened

designed? When you mention a change in hotels, what is it you’re referring to?

The bar at Narcissa, the restaurant at the Standard East Village hotel.

I suppose mostly to the fact that hotels are more and more being marketed as “design” properties.

PHOTO: CHRIS MOSIER.

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PHOTO: CHRIS MOSIER.

Claus [Sendlinger, the founder of Design Hotels] is the first to say, “You can’t build a hotel without designing it.” So what’s it mean? I don’t know what it means. Design Hotels will represent basically any hotel that wants to pay the fee to be represented, as long as it’s not a complete piece of shit. What’s the difference between Leading Hotels of the World, Small Leading Hotels of the World, and Design Hotels? There are so many representation agencies. I don’t know what has happened. There are still big hotels, little hotels, good hotels, bad hotels. They’re all designed.

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I think people now think it’s cool to go into the hotel business. Which they didn’t before. Hotels haven’t always been so central to a neighborhood, though.

Except when César Ritz did them. How far back are you going to go to make exceptions? If you want to go back, where was the coolest place to hang out in Ohio in 1820? It was the saloon. And the few rooms above the saloon, which was the hotel. I don’t see it as any distinction between now and then. I see it as one continuum of rich life. Some people know how to do it and some don’t, some people care and some don’t. The people who care less do shitty shit, and the people who care more do good things.

PHOTO: CHRIS MOSIER.

I think what truly makes a hotel good is, as you said, the quality of its narrative. Not that many people think about it that way, but you seem to.

Very few people do. A hotel with a boring story becomes mundane. That’s probably what makes something cool or not cool: if there’s a story behind it that resonates in an intellectual and emotional way.

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The exterior of the Sunset Beach hotel on Shelter Island in New York.

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HOSPITALIT Y & RE AL ESTATE

Joshua Abram, Alan Murray, & James O’Reilly CO-FOUNDERS, NEUEHOUSE BY TIFFANY JOW PORTRAIT BY WILL ADLER Despite 15 years of starting sizable companies, veteran tech entrepreneurs Alan Murray and Joshua Abram kept encountering the same problem. “There’s always a collision between the entrepreneurial moment and big-city real estate,” Abram says. “The ambition and sophistication of great small companies are often ill-matched with the spaces they find themselves in, especially in creative capitals like New York.” They joined forces with James O’Reilly, who helped develop the curated retail experience behind New York’s Ace Hotel and brought an outsider perspective to their conundrum. All three were acutely aware of how rapid economic change was affecting talented, artistic people: No longer working for the man, they were intrigued by the notion of achieving ambitious feats by themselves or with a small team. Traditional office environments were hardly conducive to these inspired individuals. “We saw an opportunity to do something radical: to rethink how entrepreneurs in creative industries connect,” Abram says. The trio began to flesh out a model that reflected an ideal working environment for curious minds. They determined that contemporary creatives are nomadic and collaborative, and happily blur the boundaries between work and play. The three decided to create an environment that facilitated frequent serendipitous encounters with practitioners of contrasting industries—a highly curated pool for content-producing collaborations. The result was Neuehouse, a members-only workspace that opened near Madison Square Park in May 2013 and will soon expand to Los Angeles,

Craig Robins CEO AND PRESIDENT, DACRA

London, and beyond. [Editor’s note: Surface Media was headquartered in New York’s Neuehouse from June 2013 to Jan. 2015.] Neuehouse is a multifaceted experience for the global creative class. Located in a renovated five-floor industrial complex, the New York building’s thoughtfully integrated work and social spaces encourage spontaneity and movement. Designed by David Rockwell, a partner in the operation, and Cristina Azario, the principal of Neuehouse’s in-house design firm, its interior utilizes the raw setting to create non-corporate environments that look more boutique hotel than start-up central. Celebrated chef Chris Bradley, a veteran of the Danny Meyer empire who ran the kitchen at the Whitney’s Untitled, oversees its restaurant, The Canteen. Cultural programming, filled with boldfaced names like Nico Muhly, Milton Glaser, and Paul Smith, offers further opportunities for members to interface. The workspace’s carefully cultivated membership includes individual members (“solopreneurs”) and teams of up to 12; 40 percent hold passports from another country and half of its resident companies are owned by women. Founding members include Island Records founder Chris Blackwell, Dazed & Confused publisher Jefferson Hack, and SpaceX regional director Nathalie Streng. “A filmmaker will be in conversation with a fashion leader, or will intersect with someone who’s writing a novel,” Abram says. “It’s the diversity that makes it so interesting.” Neuehouse is not a co-working business, Murray insists. Ninety-five percent of its members come from traditional landlordto-tenant relationships (not a café or their parents’ home). They understand that maintaining a balanced diversity within their community is key to brokering cross-pollination. Last year, Neuehouse was approached by the owner of the historic CBS radio building in L.A.’s Columbia Square, the former site of CBS Radio Network’s pioneering West Coast facilities. Neuehouse will officially open there later this summer, catering to the area’s burgeoning creative industries and its many existing members who have another business or office on the West Coast. Built in 1938 by Swiss architect William Lescaze, the structure’s state-of-the-art

More than 20 boutiques—including shops for Loewe, Miu Miu, and Harry Winston—have opened so far this year in Robins’s Miami Design District development, and according to the Miami Herald, 60 more stores and restaurants are set to to open by mid-2017. Celebrating architects for talent, not necessarily name recognition—starchitects aren’t the name of the game here—the growing neighborhood recently welcomed a garage designed

recording studios helped solidify the city as an entertainment capital. Within its walls, Orson Welles defined a new standard for the then-new medium of radio, Lucille Ball filmed I Love Lucy, and Bob Dylan and Johnny Cash recorded albums. “We always thought the revolutionary work done by Neuehouse members would be broadcast to a larger audience,” Abram says. “Lo and behold, we were presented with this building—the first in the world to be built for broadcasting. It was love at first sight.” Located in Hollywood near the Silver Lake and Echo Park neighborhoods, the structure is a beacon of International Style. Lescaze’s conviction that clean lines and pure geometric shapes produce beautiful efficiency is apparent inside and outside the building, and in the tiniest details: He even designed housings for microphones. Neuehouse will occupy six floors, which include a 100-seat theater, a flower shop, outdoor cabanas, a barber shop, and a roof garden to grow produce for its full-service restaurant. The L.A. outpost will have its own art collection and roster of cultural programming. Its interiors have been redesigned by Rockwell and the Neuehouse Design Studio, and they’ve been given a curious, colorful twist. “Despite the austerity of their work, architects like Le Corbusier tended to live in environments enriched by ethnic textiles with a domesticated sensibility,” Murray says, noting that North African motifs and artifacts will feature heavily in the L.A. space’s interiors. Neuehouse hopes to have 20 locations by 2020: its London outpost will open in early 2016 in the Adelphi Building, near the Victoria Embankment Gardens and the River Thames. Plans for spaces in Seattle, San Francisco, Miami, and Hong Kong are on the horizon. “We will always be focusing on work,” O’Reilly says. “Creating a quality work experience is a big agenda, and that will keep us busy for many years to come.” (OPPOSITE) Alan Murray (left), Joshua Abram (middle), and James O’Reilly at Neuehouse’s soon-to-open L.A. location in the historic CBS Columbia Square building.

by firms Leong Leong and Iwamoto Scott; a building by firm Aranda/Lasch is nearing completion; and a plaza by Johnston Marklee is planned. In April, Robins announced leasing on Phase III of the project. At this rate, a Phase IV wouldn’t be farfetched sometime soon.

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Alan Faena FOUNDER AND PRESIDENT, FAENA GROUP

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The Argentine hotelier and real estate developer is readying for his big unveil: the Faena District in Miami Beach. Opening in November after years of work, the project will include a hotel, as well as residential, retail, and arts spaces. The designers and architects involved include Norman Foster, OMA, and Studio Job, and even filmmaker Baz Luhrmann is a part of the project. Influential in the Miami real estate world, Faenaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s also now

looking to make an impact on media: Former Departures fashion and style director Horacio Silva recently left to become editor-in-chief of a soon-to-launch, yet-to-be-named quarterly print magazine run by Faena Group.

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HOSPITALIT Y & RE AL ESTATE brand. But I think our guests would self-select, and they’d say something about themselves by coming to 1 Hotels. I took a lot of heat on the name. But I stuck FOUNDER, CHAIRMAN, AND CEO, STARWOOD CAPITAL GROUP with it because of the message that we’re trying to portray and the simplicity of it. I think too I think yesterday was 10 years since I left often everything we do is too much. Nature is Starwood Hotels, and ever since I left, I was about the right balance and that’s what we’re trying to think if I was going to do another trying to strike in our design. hotel brand after I started with W Hotels. It From the start, the design aesthetic [of 1 had to have more than just an economic prop- Hotel in Miami] was to make it light, make osition; it had to be meaningful and interesting. it bright, and make it clean. Celebrate nature, There are a lot of issues with hotels, one of use as many reclaimed materials as you can, which has to do with the Internet age. Guests work with what was really not a very attractive are not as loyal as they used to be. They can building. It’s like a butterfly, right? It’s sort of shop around so much more easily, and also ugly, and then it comes out of its cocoon and there’s the turnover of employees. Turnover is beautiful. We actually had butterflies in the of employees is something like 60, 70 percent lobby. They were in cocoons, they’d hatch, in hotels. So how do I build something interesting? A brand that has meaning, a brand with a purpose? I had been on a panel with Snoop Dogg and Blake Mycoskie from Toms Shoes about entrepreneurship, and I was intrigued with this social responsibility model that Blake had come up with, giving away pairs of shoes with each shoe you buy. And I thought, “Well, why don’t we do something for the environment?” Because my kids were doing environmental-science classes, and I really think it’s our responsibility to protect the earth for future generations, I came up with 1 Hotels. And I named it “1” because it’s one world; we’re all responsible for each other. I had to figure out how we were going to reflect that in the hotels. Obviously we’d try to do stuff that was as natural as possible, and our employees would now be part of a cause and not just a

FOUNDER, MACKLOWE PROPERTIES

For Macklowe, the sky is, or at least the clouds are, not the limit, as his soon-to-finish, 1,398foot 432 Park Avenue building makes clear. It turns out, at least in Macklowe’s hands, a tower—even one that’s 84 floors—can still be developed in a thoughtful, elegant way.

(LEFT TO RIGHT) A room in the new 1 Hotel in Miami, designed by Meyer Davis. The lobby of the hotel.

Designed by Rafael Viñoly Architects and featuring interiors by Deborah Berke, the development will provide unimaginable-thus-far views of New York City and beyond. Upon completion, it will be the tallest residential building in the Western Hemisphere. SURFACE

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PHOTO: SPENCER BAILEY.

Harry Macklowe

and we’d let them go. And that’s kind of what the building was. It closed its doors, cocooned itself for about a year and half, two years, and then we opened up. People love this design aesthetic. I think that we have a mission, and if everybody copies us, I’d be really happy about that. —As told to Roxy Kirshenbaum

PHOTOS: ERIC LAIGNEL.

Barry Sternlicht

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Jorge Pérez

CHAIRMAN AND CEO, RELATED GROUP OF FLORIDA Loud power moves are Pérez’s thing, whether through transforming neighborhoods via his company’s mindboggling development projects or having structures named after him. In 2011, the Miami Art Museum was renamed the Jorge M. Pérez Art Museum of Miami-Dade County, to recognize his $35 million gift in cash and art. In Miami’s Edgewater neighborhood, the Argentine-born executive’s panache is becoming especially pronounced: Related’s Arquitectonica-designed Icon Bay tower is about to finish construction, and Paraiso Bay, a megaproject that involves the designers Karim Rashid and Piero Lissoni, is now getting underway. Related Group of Florida’s new Icon Bay complex in Miami.

Aby Rosen CO-FOUNDER AND PRINCIPAL, RFR HOLDING

to rankle preservationists for his proposed alterations to the Four Seasons restaurant in Manhattan—a renovation for which he has enlisted architect Annabelle Selldorf—and in May the city’s Landmarks Commission rejected his plans. No matter. Regardless of what happens, Rosen will, as he nearly always does, still get his “I told you so” moment.

Nathan Blecharczyk, Brian Chesky, & Joe Gebbia

Since launching Airbnb in 2008, Blecharczyk “alternative accommodations” sponsor of the and RISD grads Chesky and Gebbia have 2016 Olympic games in Rio de Janeiro. The become a focal point of today’s “sharing company now has roughly 750 San Francisco economy.” (The company’s slogan, after employees, and it was recently valued at $20 all, is “belong anywhere.”) Though many billion. view Airbnb as a tech company, it’s actually a hospitality juggernaut disguised as an Internet start-up. The company has become so globally influential that in March it was announced Airbnb will be the official

Stephen Ross

The head of the real estate firm developing Manhattan’s 28-acre Hudson Yards project sits on an impressively cash-infused empire— so much so that he recently donated a gift of $100,000,000 to the University of Michigan for the naming of a campus athletic center. His

influence goes beyond just buildings: He is the owner of the Miami Dolphins football team and a part owner of Motivate, a consortium that owns Citi Bike. Also in the works is an 11-story residential tower designed by Zaha Hadid and located alongside the High Line.

Since last December, Schrager has unveiled two new Edition hotels in collaboration with Marriott International—one in Miami, the other in New York—and released a 407-page Rizzoli tome, Ian Schrager: Works (see page 58). Projects currently under construction

include 215 Chrystie and 160 Leroy, both in New York and done in collaboration with Herzog & de Meuron and John Pawson (the latter of whom is designing the interiors), as well as nine more Editions, three of them in China (Sanya, Shanghai, and Wuhan).

CO-FOUNDERS, AIRBNB

CHAIRMAN, RELATED COMPANIES

PHOTO: SPENCER BAILEY.

PHOTOS: ERIC LAIGNEL.

To understand the ambitions of Rosen—the owner of both the Seagram Building and Lever House—100 East 53rd Street makes a good case study. If Rosen were a building, this currently-under-construction, Norman Foster–designed skyscraper would be him: forward-looking, strong, and brash, but also stately and sophisticated. He continues

Ian Schrager HOTELIER AND REAL ESTATE DEVELOPER

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Pierre Huyghe ARTIST

INTERVIEW BY AILEEN KWUN PORTRAIT BY PASCAL PERICH

Pierre Huyghe with his “Rite Passage” (2015) installation on the rooftop of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

For his latest high-profile commission, French the floors of silent seas” vividly depicted in conceptual artist Pierre Huyghe dug into New T.S. Eliot’s poem “The Love Song of J. Alfred York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art, quite lit- Prufrock”—mindlessly move and dig into the erally. To create the work—this year’s installa- ground, existing somewhere between cognition tion for the museum’s Iris and B. Gerald Cantor and an extension of nature’s preordained proRoof Garden (through Nov. 1)—Huyghe took gram for evolution. “The daily actions of sura number of the museum’s granite floor tiles vival will be the same,” Huyghe says. “Knowing and pulled them up from the ground, stacking that, it’s as if programming a machine—you set them aside to reveal earthen sediments; trickles it to a BPM, doop-doop-doop, a framework; of of water from an aquarium on a plinth appear course, there’s a bit of uncertainty, where things to slowly pool into the crevices, spawning signs are undetermined. We evolve and there’s an of life and entering the circulatory system of entropy, but on the other hand, there’s a recurthe site. The result, a sort of archaeological dig rence—a constancy—that will perpetrate.” Over the course of the summer, that entropy overlooking Central Park, is, as Huyghe’s work is sure to involve a few wild cards in the form tends to be, otherworldly. “You’re on top of layers of history,” the artist of rain showers and thunderstorms, and while says of the work. “If you go even deeper under the installation will be monitored periodically the building, you go into Central Park and con- by Huyghe’s studio staff, he anticipates an elefront all these resources, natural and controlled, ment of change that can’t be fully planned for. yet you’re in the present, on the roof, walking in “It might overflow; the top is open. I really see the present time.” He adds, “Once you remove it as a preserving machine,” he says, in reference the floor tiles, you’re ready to dig through the to a short story by sci-fi fiction writer Philip K. museum.” Dick in which the protagonist, aiming to preOf the installation’s unofficial title, “Rite serve an arts institution’s high culture holdings Passage,” Huyghe stresses it’s really just a signi- in the event of apocalypse, creates a machine fier, noting that rite de passage had been written that transforms classical music masterpieces on one of his many notes for the project. He’s into various animals. When he releases them nonplussed by the detail, perhaps because he into the wild and later recovers them, he finds views an exhibition as a form that’s maleable. each has undergone evolution, making their “I’m very interested in the notion of exhibition, musical scores distorted and cacophonous as a and for years I’ve worked with that format: the result—a fitting parable of man’s grapple with question of how things appear, and at which nature. Adding to Huyghe’s experiment is an rhythm, which condition,” he says. “More and automated program that causes the smart-glass more, I became interested in this notion of ritual. walls of the vitrine to pulsate intermittently I consider the exhibition a ritual, and I consider from opaque to transparent, causing “a certain this ritual to be an evolving organism.” economy of visibility,” Huyghe says. An exploration of things as living organisms Downstairs, inside the museum’s galleries, has been central to Huyghe’s practice for years, another of Huyghe’s works makes its New and the fantastical array of mediums used in his York premiere. Called “Untitled (Human artworks—living animals, ecological environ- Mask),” the 19-minute film depicts a macaque ments, digital programs, and manmade struc- monkey as it carries out its duties as a trained tures, in addition to drawing, photography, wait staff in a sake restaurant outside of Tokyo. music, and film—are aptly reflective of that. At Dressed in a uniform, a white mask, and a long, his recent retrospective, which traveled from brunette wig as it wavers between boredom, the Centre Pompidou in Paris to the Museum anxiety, and a repetition of its learned action in Ludwig in Cologne, Germany, and then to the solitude, the scene is at once macabre, haunting, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, works and humanizing. exhibited included a beehive-headed sculpture, Despite the multilayered juxtapositions a ceiling installation of the video game Pong, presented in his complex works—between and an Ibizan hound named Human that trot- artifice and nature, animal and plant, chaos and ted around freely with a magenta-painted leg. order—Huyghe resists any readings that pit any Inside the Met’s rooftop aquarium installa- one force against another. “I don’t try to put a tion are a large floating rock, mirrored in sym- moral on the way that humans are impacting metry by a mound of sand and pebbles, and two nature, because I just think we are nature,” he primordial freshwater species (American brook says. “Technology is an extension of man, so in lamprey and tadpole shrimps). “They’ve been a sense, a nuclear power plant is man, is nature. chosen in a very specific way,” says Huyghe He is the energy of the hive. When you look at of the creatures. “They’re both what I call the birds-of-paradise and see how they make ‘living fossils’: animals that existed hundreds their nest, then see an artist do a rooftop instalof millions of years ago, and which you find lation,” he says, in good humor, “it’s a different as fossils, but still remain unchanged, not only expression of different species, I’m assuming.” in the formal aspect—which is less what I am interested in—but also in instinct and behavior.” The tadpole shrimps—alarmingly reminiscent of the arcane “ragged claws scuttling across SURFACE

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Adeline Ooi DIRECTOR, ART BASEL ASIA

Before her promotion to director of Art Basel Asia, Ooi was Art Basel VIP relations manager for Southeast Asia; in her new role, she’ll be helming the rapidly growing Art Basel Hong Kong. The Malaysian-born curator also founded an art-advisory firm in 2009 with several partners.

Eli & Edythe Broad FOUNDERS, THE BROAD

Sheikha al Mayassa bint Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani CHAIRPERSON OF QATAR MUSEUMS

Dasha Zhukova FOUNDER, GARAGE MUSEUM OF CONTEMPORARY ART

Qatari royalty Sheikha al Mayassa has spent billions bringing contemporary art to the country’s museums, and has installed sculptures by the likes of Damien Hirst, Louise Bourgeois, and Richard Serra throughout Doha. Also the head of the Doha Film Institute and the foundation Reach Out to Asia, the 32-year-old is leading an initiative to turn the oil-rich nation—home to Al Jazeera, the media company founded by her

father—into a major center of culture and giving. In honor of her work, the Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo recently awarded her its StellaRE Prize, given to women who work to better the world.

The art collector and philanthropist, who is married to Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich, was also a onetime fashion designer and magazine editor. Zhukova founded the Garage Center for Contemporary Culture in Moscow in 2011, which became the Garage Museum of Contemporary Art last year. Now she’s moving the museum— currently housed in a Shigeru Ban–designed prefab pavilion—to a new location in the

Vremena Goda, a Soviet-era landmark. The project, designed by Rem Koolhaas and his firm, OMA, opens this June. Koolhaas and Zhukova appeared on the cover of WSJ. magazine earlier this year for a cover story about the museum (see pages 142 and 143).

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PHOTO: COURTESY ILLY CAFE.

(TOP TO BOTTOM) The Broad’s lobby during construction of the museum. A model of the OMA-designed Garage Museum in Russia.

PHOTOS: TOP, HUFTON + CROW. BOTTOM, COURTESY OMA.

With two Fortune 500 companies to their name, the Broads, who have been married for nearly 60 years, have been patrons of the arts since the 1960s, and established the Broad Art Foundation in the ’80s. Having put more than $800 million into Los Angeles art institutions, the Broads are now founding one of their own: The Broad, a contemporary art museum in downtown Los Angeles, designed by Diller Scofidio + Renfro. The museum is set to open in September.

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Yoko Ono

The artist who in 1971 gave herself her own solo exhibition at MoMA (which involved releasing flies doused with perfume into the museum’s sculpture garden) now has an actual MoMA solo exhibition, “Yoko Ono: One Woman Show, 1960–1971” (through Sept. 7). The show displays around 125 of Ono’s early works, spanning objects, installations, recordings, performances, and more. The show is giving Ono’s work, which has always been overshadowed by her famous husband and his band, its rightful attention.

Philippe Parreno PHOTO: COURTESY ILLY CAFFE.

PHOTOS: TOP, HUFTON + CROW. BOTTOM, COURTESY OMA.

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The artist who rose to fame in the ’90s for his experiential exhibitions opens his largest installation in the U.S. yet at the vast Park Avenue Armory on June 11. “H{N)YPN(Y} OSIS” (through Aug. 2) was co-curated by Hans Ulrich Obrist and Culture Shed artistic director and chief executive Alex Poots; Tom Eccles, the executive director at the Center for Curatorial Studies at Bard, is a consulting curator. Adding to the already-interesting collaborative mix is Randall Peacock, who contributed set design.

Yoko Ono’s Mended cups for Illy Caffè’s Illy Art Collection, now available at the MoMA Design Store.

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Robert Irwin ARTIST INTERVIEW BY AILEEN KWUN PORTRAIT BY KEIRNAN MONAGHAN In 1970, Robert Irwin, artist and pioneer of the Light and Space movement—which counts James Turrell, Doug Wheeler, and John McCracken among its progenitors—abandoned his studio altogether as an ideological rejection of the construct as a site of creative practice. Despite this, he continued to produce work. Beginning with painting, then creating light sculptures, large-scale installation, and landscape projects, Irwin has worked across a progressively expansive range of mediums in his six-decade career exploring abstraction and the phenomenology of light, color, and space. This year and the next mark milestone moments for the 86-year-old legend, who’s set to open a string of solo shows throughout the U.S. Last month, Pace Gallery—which has now represented Irwin for 50 years—showed “Cacophonous,” a collection of his new light works; this month, he’ll unveil a reinstallation of a site-specific work he presented at the Dia Center for the Arts 15 years ago, this time at Dia:Beacon (for which he also consulted on the museum’s master plan and landscaping). Next April, he will install a series of outdoor scrim installations around the iconic Gordon Bunshaft–designed building of the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden in Washington, D.C. And finally, now in the works for 13 years, Irwin’s magnum opus—a 10,000 square foot, permanent installation housed in a former army barracks’ hospital—promises to debut in 2016 at the Chinati Foundation in Marfa, Texas, following a monumental groundbreaking for the $5-million campaign for the site’s renovation earlier this year. The born-and-bred Californian met with Surface in New York recently to speak about maintaining a studio, the act of wandering, and what’s in store for the next several months.

Robert Irwin at the Pace Gallery in New York. 127

You famously abandoned your studio practice altogether in 1970, and this year you have a number of big installations and projects in the works.

Philosophically, I had taken the whole thing apart and realized one day that I was doing certain things that were very simple—and I realized that’s not how we see the world. We don’t see the world in a frame. And pretty much my understanding of the history of modern art is that it took itself apart, dismantled the whole idea of a pictorial reality. I realized that if I stayed in the studio I would do something like studio work, or make something. A studio is not an accident. It has a long, hard tradition. I thought, “If I stay in studio, I’m not going to be able to pursue this.” So I got rid of everything, sold everything, sold the studio, and kind of went out into the desert for a while, because the desert is not made of objects; it’s more expansive. I sort of hung out around Four Corners and said, “I got all the time for anybody, for anything.” Except nobody asked for a long time. How has traveling and wandering impacted your explorative practice?

In the early years, for some reason, I started being a question addict; in fact, I still am. I mean, questions are more profound than answers because when you finally get an answer, they immediately ask another question. So all the energy is really moved by the question, the quality of the question. If you have a really good question, and if you seek some kind of resolution to it, you usually have something pretty interesting on your hands rather than the way we normally perceive, looking for answers. I knew that if I stayed in the studio, I would do something akin to what everybody else was doing. But all my questions led me into another direction. You also spent some time in New York and North Africa.

I spent a lot of time wandering. At one point, I sort of lived on Ibiza when it was an abandoned island, before it became a hotspot. In fact, it was very much not a hotspot: It was just local fisherman and local farmers. It was a nice experience. A lot of the stuff I produced then, I didn’t do well, and can’t say that I conceived to do it. I sort of fell into it backwards, because my questions sort of led me in that way. I didn’t talk—I hadn’t talked to anybody for 10 months. I didn’t speak the language, so basically I just walked every day. If you do it long enough, there’s a point where you start to examine your own mind. I did that for a brief period of time. There was a little theater that used to show films about once a month. I had never gone. I was

there for seven months, and one day, I went by and they were playing Singing in the Rain. So I went in, and—poof!—the spell was broken! Since it was all sets, I knew it was shot in L.A., where I’m from. And when I saw it, I thought, “L.A., wow!” I’m as “L.A.” as you can get. You were born in Long Beach, studied and taught at numerous schools in Southern California, and have lived in San Diego for a number of years now. As a pioneering figure of the Light and Space movement, which began in Southern California, how has the region informed your work?

You know, one of the things that pisses people off in New York is that you had a happy childhood. They think it’s gotta come from pain and suffering or something—and it does, to a degree. But in California, man, you just have a different quality of life, a quality of being in the world. People would always ask me about the light. I mean, what do you mean about the light? It’d be hard to try and describe it. But when I did the project at [Dia:Beacon]—I was the architect and transformed the space, stayed here for a few months working on it—I looked up across the river and found a little town called Cornwall-on-Hudson. I was there for well over a year. It’s very nice, and my wife thought it was terrific. I thought it was, but I was kinda busy: I was going back and forth to New York and working around Dia. It has a fabled beauty, the Hudson River School and all that. By the end of the year, I was really depressed and realized that it was the light: It’s very melancholy. It’s an interesting thing to have this melancholy. But I much preferred and realized that L.A. is not melancholy—very far from it. Living there and growing up there was a very different kind of experience. I had no sense that I was going to be an artist when I was young. I had a happy childhood. Every summer, I’d lifeguard. The world was my oyster, and once I got a car, I’d spend time on Saturday night riding around. The feeling of freedom, just driving—it’s the best. The natural beauty and leisure of California you’re describing seems intrinsic to a lot of your works, which interact with and respond directly to nature.

It starts with the light, and teasing it, because what happens with real light is—it’s not artificial. It changes. A cloud goes by and— whoosh!—all of a sudden, the sun comes back. It’s full of life, full of energy, full of incrediblequality things that were so much more than any kind of artificial light you can make. It’s interesting that the spectrum of your your work—and the varying scales it has extended into—will be encapsulated in your four major projects this year, starting

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with the reinstallation at Dia:Beacon, to your shows at the Pace Gallery and the Hirshhorn Museum, to the huge permanent installation currently underway at the Marfa’s Chinati Foundation, which has been in the works for more than 13 years.

I’ll give you the whole story. Years ago, I decided to, just for the fun of it, follow the coast, just drive down. I was in L.A., down to San Diego, stayed as close to the Mexican border as possible, and went all the way around the United States, which was a very exciting trip. You circled the entire country? How long did that take you, and did you have companions?

The entire country. Three and a half months. All alone. I do my best when I’m alone. When somebody’s there, you have to tend to them,

so you’re not paying attention. At one point, I went through Marfa, because when you leave El Paso, the road goes away from the border, the border kind of curves away like that, and so I had to get back to the border. At Van Horn, you turn right, go down and swing around to Marfa, and then at Marfa, that stop sign, you turn right and go right down to Big Bend. And then you’re back on the border and then down to the Gulf [of Mexico]. So you went around the edge of Texas?

Not around the edge of Texas—the end of Texas. The end of Texas, Mexico, and then along the coast all the way down to the Florida Keys, and then all the way up the East Coast to Maine, and then across and along the Canadian-American border. It was incredible. When you stop and think about it, in a way, that kind of trip is always interesting, because more stuff is going on at that point of

the border than any other place. But anyway, let’s get back to it: I went through Marfa. I was actually sitting on a bench, getting a gallon of gas and a Coke in Marfa—and Donald Judd came walking by. Just by chance?

Yeah, by chance. He used to vacation in northern Mexico, way out in the middle of nowhere. But apparently, he was out there looking at that town. We had this funny conversation: He told me what he was doing, and I told him what I was doing, and then we left—and I hadn’t been back there for a long time. They asked me to come back for different reasons, which I did, and they considered the idea that they wanted to do something. Basically, I started with the idea of being outside. In fact, for the first eight years or so, I refused to be inside, because there’s really something quite magical about Marfa. I think it’s probably the quality of the sky.

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PHOTO: PHILIPP SCHOLZ RITTERMANN/COURTESY ARTISTS RIGHTS SOCIETY.

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PHOTO: PHILIPP SCHOLZ RITTERMANN/COURTESY ARTISTS RIGHTS SOCIETY.

AR T The site-specific aspect of your work involves intensive architectural considerations. How does a work change both for you and the viewers when you present it in other venues? You’re showing an earlier work from 1998, “Excursus: Homage to the Square,” at the Dia:Beacon this summer, for example.

Most often you can’t. You have to start over again. In this particular case, the room that [“Excursus”] is going to be in, it’s made for it. It’s going to be the same, but it’s going to be different. I was the architect on that project—I did the master plan [for the Dia]. I was there and detailed everything along the way, working with Michael Govan as a team. I realized that the whole process of entering was very important. For most people, you don’t want them to know they’re being led to this thing, but in my mind they start at Grand Central Station. I’m

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thinking in the sense of New Yorkers, who on the whole, most don’t go out of New York except in the summertime to Kamp Kippy. So you get on the train and you’re going along, right along the Hudson River, it couldn’t be better. Slowly the city is fading away and it starts becoming rough on the edges and then it starts becoming the country. And it gets richer and richer, all the way up. So you’re going through, being like, Whoosh! Do you know what I mean? It’s like a detox of sorts.

Yes, exactly. The moment of arrival in anything is one of the pivotal experiences you’re going to have, so it’s an opportunity, and you really don’t want to blow it, don’t want to throw it away. You don’t want to clever it up. But anyway, I’m very proud of it. This year is a milestone moment for you in

several capacities: In addition to the opening of the installation in Marfa, next year will mark 50 years with the Pace Gallery, and you just exhibited your 18th solo show there. With that perspective, how has your practice evolved? Will you continue to keep a studio?

We’re in the studio right now, going through this editing process, and we’re finally getting to the end of it. I’ve got 80 pieces or something. Now we’re reviewing every one of them and we’re making them, then we’re gonna put it in a box and close the studio down, because I don’t need it anymore.

(THIS SPREAD) Irwin’s “Zephyr” (20142015), left, and “Agave” (2014-2015).

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Maja Hoffmann FOUNDER, LUMA FOUNDATION

Hoffmann, founder of the Luma Foundation, is one of the art world’s most prolific and versatile impresarios: In addition to heading up the nonprofit, she’s a Tate trustee, a major collector, the president of Kunsthalle Zürich, and she sits on the boards of the Palais de Tokyo, the New Museum, and CSS Bard. This year, she was a sponsor, through Luma, of “What Could Happen,” a project by architect François Roche and artist Pierre Huyghe that took a select crowd to a lake on a vintage train, as well as this summer’s Philippe Parreno installation at the Park Avenue Armory. She’s also releasing a book in July, This is the House That Jack Built (Steidl), featuring photos of her contemporary art collection.

Iwan & Manuela Wirth CO-PRESIDENTS AND OWNERS, HAUSER & WIRTH

DIRECTOR, ART BASEL

Michael Govan DIRECTOR, LOS ANGELES COUNTY MUSEUM OF ART

surprising, as the Wirths are known to create a market for what they are selling, rather than the other way around. This year, the work they’re presenting includes solo shows by Ida Applebroog and Lee Lozano (through July 31) at their New York location, and in the countryside, an exhibition of architectural drawings by Pierre-Francois-Léonard Fontaine, Álvaro Siza, and others (through June 21).

As the man in charge of the behemoth Art Basel fair, now in three cities, Spiegler oversees the growth of this global presence. The former journalist has been in charge of the 40-year-old operation since 2007, and led the fair’s expansion to Asia (Art Basel Hong Kong opened its doors for the third time in March). This

June, in Basel, large-scale works by Ai Weiwei, Kenneth Anger, and Martin Creed, among others, will be included in the Unlimited section. The Basel fair runs from June 18–21.

With Govan at the helm, the largest museum on the West Coast released designs last summer for a 160,000-square-foot addition designed by Peter Zumthor. This year, LACMA celebrates its 50th anniversary with an exhibition

showcasing 50 new gifts to the museum’s collection (on view through Sept. 7), the latest in a marathon of 19,000 acquisitions over the past seven years.

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PHOTO: LUO XIANGLIN AND CHEN SHENGMING.

Marc Spiegler

The Swiss couple started the first iteration of their gallery in Zürich in 1992, with the backing of Mrs. Wirth’s mother, the art collector Ursula Hauser. Now their empire comprises five galleries—in New York, Zürich, London, and Somerset—and represents the likes of Louise Bourgeois and Paul McCarthy. The Somerset operation, which opened last year, puts a contemporary gallery in an unlikely place: an 18th-century farm in the English countryside. The location is unlikely but not

PHOTO: COURTESY STEIDL.

A photograph of Arles, as seen in Hoffman’s new book, This is the House That Jack Built (Steidl).

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Nicholas Serota DIRECTOR, TATE

Michael R. Bloomberg PHILANTHROPIST

Okwui Enwezor DIRECTOR, HAUS DER KUNST

The director of the Tate art museums and galleries has held the position for nearly 30 years. Serota gets major credit for the Tate Modern’s standing (it’s the most-visited museum in the

world) and London’s current status as an art world power city. In October, he was ranked at the very top of Art Review’s list of art-world influencers.

New York’s former mayor has become a major patron of the arts through the arts-and-culture arm of his giving organization, Bloomberg Philanthropies (which allocated $462 million among six areas of interest in 2014). Last October, the foundation announced its Public Arts Challenge, which will give at least three

American cities up to $1 million over a period of two years to sponsor public art displays. Two hundred and thirty seven cities applied; 12 finalists were announced in February (Albuquerque, Atlanta, and Chicago were among them).

When the Nigerian-born director of the Haus der Kunst in Munich was appointed curator of the 2015 Venice Biennale, he became the exhibition’s first African-born curator in its 120-year history. The Biennale (on view through Nov. 22), titled “All the World’s Futures,” aims to mirror the contemporary reality of constantly changing fields, practices, and roles. Enwezor uses an unrelenting global perspective to connect art and artists to the current state of things.

Olafur Eliasson ARTIST

PHOTO: LUO XIANGLIN AND CHEN SHENGMING.

PHOTO: COURTESY STEIDL.

One of the first exhibitions at Fondation Louis Vuitton, the new art museum in Paris, was Eliasson’s “Contact,” comprising immersive sensory environments that left visitors in awe. The Danish-Icelandic artist’s perpetual curiosity and intent to change the world has sparked projects such as 12Ethiopia, which works to improve life in Ethiopian orphanages, and Little Sun, which distributes cheerful LED lamps to areas in Africa with little access to electricity.

A view of Eliasson’s “We Have Never Been Disembodied” exhibition (through June 12) at Mirrored Gardens in the Chinese city of Guangzhou.

Patricia Barbizet CEO AND CHAIRMAN, CHRISTIE’S

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After a 25-year role as CFO of the Pinault Group, Barbizet last year became the head of the world’s largest auction house and the company’s first female CEO. In 2007, she was included in Fortune magazine’s list of the 50 most powerful women. Barbizet will lead an organization that has set a number of records in recent sales, including a blockbuster $852.9 million auction last November.

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DIRECTOR, THE WHITNEY MUSEUM OF AMERICAN ART

Joan Jonas ARTIST

ART DEALER

first show in the new building is the widely praised “America is Hard to See” (through Sept. 1). The exhibition features more than 600 permanent-collection works, some of which haven’t been exhibited in decades. A view of the “America is Hard to See” exhibition at the Whitney Museum.

The 78-year-old multimedia artist was chosen to represent the United States at the Venice Art Biennale this year, and she did not disappoint. Each of the five rooms of the pavilion was given a different theme, such as “bees” and “mirrors,” and treats viewers to rich, sometimes autobiographical narratives. The show, titled “They Come to Us Without a Word,” includes

videos, installations, drawings, and sculptures, as well as live performances (occurring on three days in July).

We learned this year that even King Gogo can be turned away from a Cannes premiere for wearing sneakers (though Harvey Weinstein snuck him in soon after). Still, after nearly four decades in the business, Gagosian is the art world’s undisputed powerhouse, whose

14 galleries across seven countries boast revenues estimated at $925 million. In June, the gallery’s Britannia Street location, in London, will mount “Sprayed” (through Aug. 1), a survey of painted works from 1929 to the present day.

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PHOTO: COURTESY MAHARAM.

Larry Gagosian

This is the year of the Whitney, which opened its bigger and shinier new location—designed by Renzo Piano—in Lower Manhattan this spring. Visitors mourning the museum’s move from Marcel Breuer’s beloved Brutalist monument were treated to light-filled interiors, expansive views of the Hudson River, and open decks overlooking the cobblestone streets of the Meatpacking District. Weinberg’s

PHOTO: TIMOTHY SCHENCK.

Adam Weinberg

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Thomas P. Campbell DIRECTOR, THE METROPOLITAN MUSEUM OF ART

The Met has made some big announcements this year related to its newly aggressive commitment to modern and postmodern art, including plans to turn the former site of the Whitney museum, which the Met purchased, into galleries for contemporary works. Campbell also revealed that architect David Chipperfield will design an expansion that will replace its existing modern and contemporary wing. The event of the year, though, was of course the Met Gala,

which has become a moneymaking (and celebrity-drawing) institution in its own right.

The new director of the Brooklyn Museum has never worked for a museum, but few are questioning Anne Pasternak’s appointment to the second largest art institution in New York City. The 50-year-old curator has spent more than two decades running arts nonprofits, and was the longtime president and artistic director of Creative Time, known for organizing public art shows in New York. Creative Time has put

on some blockbusters in recent years, including Kara Walker’s “A Subtlety,” last year, and Nick Cave’s “Heard NY,” in 2013. Pasternak begins her post at Brooklyn Museum in September.

Hans Ulrich Obrist & Julia Peyton-Jones CO-DIRECTORS, SERPENTINE GALLERIES From household names like Marina Abramovic to emerging talents enjoying their first solo shows, the artists who have shown at the Serpentine’s two galleries in Kensington Gardens, in London, come from all types of backgrounds and disciplines. For this year’s Frieze art fair in New York, Obrist and PeytonJones teamed with textile brand Maharam to produce a series of artist-designed wallpapers, with the likes of John Baldessari, Rosemarie Trockel, and Ai Weiwei lending their talents.

Maharam’s “(Nose/Popcorn - Yellow/ Green)” wallpaper by John Baldessari, done in collaboration with London’s Serpentine Galleries.

Anne Pasternak

PHOTO: COURTESY MAHARAM.

PHOTO: TIMOTHY SCHENCK.

DIRECTOR, BROOKLYN MUSEUM

David Zwirner ART DEALER

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He hasn’t yet toppled Gagosian in terms of revenue, but Zwirner is responsible for some of the most-talked-about art shows in recent history. Yayoi Kusama, Oscar Murillo, and Kerry James Marshall have drawn crowds to the gallerist’s three locations, but one shouldn’t overlook exceptional works by Alice Neel and Jan Shoonhoven, both of whom had shows this year.

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Astrid Welter

Run me through the Fondazione Prada’s new campus.

It’s the regeneration and transformation of an existing industrial area. It was built from the early 20th century on as a distillery. Over the course of the decades, a number of buildings INTERVIEW BY SPENCER BAILEY were added. When Mrs. Prada and Mr. Bertelli proposed to Rem Koolhaas to do a permanent PORTRAIT BY DELFINO SISTO LEGNANI headquarters for the Fondazione, they offered him the area to rebuild it new if he wanted. But Since its founding 20 years ago, the Fondazione he took the challenge to integrate it into the Prada has become one of the strongest, most existing architecture. He decided that he would groundbreaking private art institutions in the keep all these typologies of spaces, a variety of world. For 18 of those years, Welter— its project different environments, to which he’s adding director for the past five years—has shepherded three new buildings: No. 1, a podium, which the program, working with artists including is going to host mainly temporary exhibitions; Laurie Anderson, Steve McQueen, and John it’s a very sophisticated building in terms of Baldessari. In 2011, she helped organize the technology. The second is an existing building opening of the Fondazione’s Venice location, he reengineered and rebuilt in the form it was and over the past few years has overseen the before; it’s becoming a cinema. The third new planning of its new Milan venue, designed by building is this nine-story, 60-meter-tall tower, Rem Koolhaas and his Rotterdam-based firm, which will finish later this year; it will host a OMA. The just-opened Fondazione campus, restaurant and gallery spaces. on the site of a 1910 distillery, features roughly 120,000 square feet of exhibition space, including What was your involvement in all of this? a theater, a Wes Anderson–designed bar, and a library. Here, Welter discusses the Fondazione’s This project has been in the knowing hands new spaces, her multidisciplinary approach, and of OMA. It was announced in 2008, so there why fashion won’t likely be a part of the institu- has been a dialogue in terms of our necessition’s programming anytime soon. ties, which do not always correspond to the PROJECT DIRECTOR, FONDAZIONE PRADA

PHOTO: ATTILIO MARANZANO/COURTESY FONDAZIONE PRADA.

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architects’ desires. I say this in terms of really practical aspects. The creative side was really this dialogue between Mr. Koolhaas, Mrs. Prada, and Mr. Bertelli. From our perspective, it was really accompanying the process and making sure the future uses were reflected in the decisions. How did you initially get involved in the Fondazione?

The Fondazione was very young. It had existed for four years, and for two years as the foundation, which was founded in 1995. I was working in the exhibition office of the city of Milan after graduating from university. I happened to meet Mr. Bertelli while I was operating as a freelance cultural manager, and he invited me to work at the Fondazione in exactly the year that I knew the Fondazione was going to do something extremely interesting: the Dan Flavin project at Chiesa Rossa. I came in exactly when the Fondazione had been approached by the Dia Foundation in New York and the Flavin estate—because Flavin had conceived this project for a church in Milan and died days after finishing it. Dia, the estate, and Giuseppe Panza di Biumo, a collector who was very close to Flavin, thought the Fondazione had manifested an interest in sculpture and American art—the shows we’d

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You’ve worked with so many artists while at the Fondazione, including Tom Sachs, Francesco Vezzoli, Nathalie Djurberg, and Carsten Höller.

Let’s talk about Carsten Höller’s “Double Club” in London. We’re proud of this. We literally set up this nightclub in London with

him. This is a typical Fondazione situation: so immensely popular. It came down to Mrs. Carsten Höller had done an exhibition with Prada and our team sitting down and asking, us in 2001, “Upside Down Mushroom Room.” “How much should a pint of beer cost in this He stayed on friendly terms with Mrs. Prada. place?” We didn’t charge entrance, and people With many of the artists we feature, there are came in masses. long meetings and discussions about how to do some of these crazy projects. Some have been So how much did a pint of beer cost? very challenging. Carsten said to Mrs. Prada at a certain point while they were together in I think £3.50. Paris, “I imagine I would like to do a collaboration that’s half-Congolese, half-Western.” She It seems like your team overcomes a lot of just said immediately, “Let’s do it.” This is a creative hurdles. Tell me about the 1999 quality in Mrs. Prada’s awareness and attitude. Laurie Anderson project, “Dal Vivo,” which She says, “Okay, you want to do it? We’ll do it.” looked at a prison detainee. There’s a very encouraging aspect in Mrs. Prada, being the president of the Fondazione, toward She couldn’t do it in New York. She wanted encouraging artists to dare to think something to do it with Sing Sing—no permission. She that seems too complicated can be done. The was on her way to do it in Austria, and then project was quite an adventure: finding a loca- in Austria it couldn’t happen because it turned tion where we were able to open something out that it’s forbidden by law for the image of for a short period of time—it was meant to be a prisoner to be seen outside prison, because six months, but became nine because it was this project was the virtual escape of a prisoner sitting inside of a prison and being beamed virtually, three times a day, to the Fondazione. It was really tricky. [Editor’s note: Anderson ended up documenting Santino Stefanini, a detainee of Milan’s San Vittore prison.] Another time, Mrs. Prada and our team discussed how, without having major engineering problems, to fill 25,000 liters of liquid silicone of minus-20 degrees into an aquarium. And if the flowers should go in before our after. There’s a quality of a very open-minded approach. We give artists the freedom they need. There was a 2001 exhibition, “Works in Progress,” on projects for Prada by OMA and Herzog & de Mueron. What’s the relationship between architecture and the foundation? And where does Prada the brand come in?

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PHOTO: ATTILIO MARANZANO/COURTESY FONDAZIONE PRADA.

This was exactly the moment when Mr. Bertelli and Mrs. Prada had commissioned Herzog & de Mueron and OMA for Epicenters. This was when the Epicenter idea came up. Herzog & de Mueron was doing the Aoyama building in Tokyo, and OMA was doing the first Epicenter in the U.S., on Broadway in New York. We just happened to understand the materials and process for this was really fascinating. While the projects were already agreed upon, the Fondazione organized a presentation. International architects still remember this show because it was absolutely minddazzling. We had this 1,500-square-meter exhibition space that was divided between the two studios. There were these two worlds. The Fondazione later contributed to Prada Aoyama, on the top floor, an exhibition we arranged with the Teatro alla Scala in Milan. It was the beginning of the Fondazione looking at these Prada spaces. We started in New York to work with the store on cultural programming, which led to the fact that we started to work with the Tribeca Film Festival—which

PHOTO: BAS PRINCEN/COURTESY FONDAZIONE PRADA.

done were David Smith, Anish Kapoor, Michael Heizer. They thought the Fondazione would be the new institution that could take this project up. We realized it, donated it to the church, and it was installed by his estate. Michael Govan, who was then the director of Dia, was curating this operation and the exhibition in our spaces, which opened at the same time. The next year, Laurie Anderson came in with a crazy project. Then Walter de Maria. It went on and on. It’s now been a long-term collaboration for me, and it’s always been very worthwhile. It was irresistible.

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PHOTO: ATTILIO MARANZANO/COURTESY FONDAZIONE PRADA.

PHOTO: BAS PRINCEN/COURTESY FONDAZIONE PRADA.

I’ve noticed that in galleries and museums we’re starting to see fashion presented as art a lot more. Is fashion something you’d consider showing?

No, Mrs. Prada and Mr. Bertelli definitely do not want to have fashion come into here. Prada is very capable of looking after itself—look at the Pradasphere; there’s already a sophisticated representation of the fashion world around Prada, and the Fondazione should not have that. If in three years we should do something linked to fabric—we shouldn’t say, “Astrid said we would never do anything fashion-related”— there might by cultural or necessary urgencies to look at. There’s no desire to use our platform to showcase something that’s linked to fashion. If you take fashion as a broader discourse, there are many artists involved with contemporary attitudes, but the Fondazione should operate as it always has operated: with a very different purpose, with a really sincere intention that this is an instrument of research. When they set this up in 1993, there was no discourse about art and fashion. But this link is clearly understandable because the fashion industry has very much to do with the formal aesthetic and philosophical concerns of art in society. This is why it seems so clear now that these are two businesses that are close to each other. The Fondazione team knows our colleagues at Prada, but we’re separated as experts in art. The Fondazione is made possible by Mrs. Prada and Mr. Bertelli, but it stems more out of their curiosity and wish 20 years ago to kick off with something they weren’t even yet aware of. It was becoming quickly relevant in Milan to have a private foundation. There wasn’t a private foundation here yet. There was not yet Fondazione Nicola Trussardi. There was not yet Hangar Bicocca. Mrs. Prada and Mr. Bertelli set out in this very idealistic way for the sake of art, for the sake of research, right from the beginning, with in-depth publications, strongly independent and wishing to leave this territory for research, art, and experimentation. The seriousness of this intention is now more 137

evident than before. The Fondazione is really establishing a center for art and culture. What’s your working relationship with Mrs. Prada and Mr. Bertelli? How do you decide which art or artists you want to show?

Mrs. Prada and Mr. Bertelli are both very knowledgeable about art. Everything has always kind of been possible with the total participation of them. They are the decision makers, but on the other hand, there have been, in the past, occasions—because of research the Fondazione was going into, like video art, for instance, around 2004 and 2005—that it became more evident that as an institution it was proper to look at one artist rather than another. It has not been a totally arbitrary strategy. The Fondazione is going to operate, especially now, as a structure that has a core team in Milan, and with other guest curators. Mrs. Prada and Mr. Bertelli will be absolutely willing to have this plurality of voices for autonomous developments of content that are good for the space. Film is so central to what the foundation is doing. One of the opening exhibitions is “Roman Polanski: My Inspirations” [through July 25], and Wes Anderson is designing the Fondazione’s bar. How do you see the connection between film and architecture manifesting itself here?

I could not necessarily say that there’s a link between cinema and architecture. This is a space that comes out of a long dialogue with architecture and design. It happens to be designed by a very important architect with strong conceptual views. I would say that architecture and the Fondazione goes more to the question of what the spaces designed by OMA will mean for the art, and where they will overlap. Tell me more about how OMA’s vision fits the needs of the Fondazione.

We’ve been working with Thomas Demand and Robert Gober, and both artists had dialogues with the architect about the spaces hosting their installations. But at a certain point, we might want to show an artist, and they and the curator of the show will have to live with how the architecture is done. Another artist we’re working with, I’m really curious to know, when he has come back to Milan and seen the finished project, which space he will pick, because the typologies are very wide. The generosity of this project from the architectural side is that it has generated this situation, and now the users—artists, the Fondazione, curators, Roman Polanski—will see what good use to make out of it. There will continue to be dialogues in the future with OMA. I foresee a long, interesting, inspirational collaboration with the firm to make things possible here.

The Wes Anderson–designed Bar Luce at the new Milan venue of the Fondazione Prada. (OPPOSITE) Inside the Fondazione’s courtyard. (PREVIOUS SPREAD, LEFT TO RIGHT) Astrid Welter in an exhibition space at the Fondazione earlier this year. A view of the Fondazione’s “Serial Classic” exhibition (through Aug. 24).

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Melissa Chiu DIRECTOR, HIRSHHORN MUSEUM AND SCULPTURE GARDEN PORTRAIT BY JEFF ELKINS Chiu, the former director of the Asia Society in New York, discusses her new role at the Hirshhorn Museum in Washington, D.C. I started in October, just over six months ago. I think there are some wonderful opportunities to be able to build on [the museum’s] extraordinary collection, iconic building, and great reputation for groundbreaking exhibitions, as well as its existing 40-year history. A couple of things I’m looking at: to really build out the collection to be truly international and global, and looking at how we can really see the Hirshhorn as a creative hub for the intersection between art and technology. I think museums have a real opportunity globally to give visitors access to greater information about artwork, but also the virtual community. Thinking about how we can commission artists to really think about the architecture of the Hirshhorn itself is an important piece of the strategy, as well as to include the sculpture garden. In the 1990s, there was a fantastic Krzysztof Wodiczko slide projection commission, and then even more recently a Doug Aitken video projection right onto the rounded exterior of the building [designed by Gordon Bunshaft]. Part of my work so far has been to assemble the right team, so I’ve brought on a chief curator, Stéphane Aquin, and a curator-at-large, Janni Jetzer. Now I think we have the right group to complement the talent and expertise of the five curators who were already on staff. We’ve begun mapping out our five-year plan for our exhibitions and programs, and one of the things that we’re focusing on is how to actually build connections between public and educational programs and exhibitions with our collections, all with the overarching view to make the Hirshhorn a 21st-century museum. It does certainly bear the responsibility of being the national museum of contemporary art, but I don’t think we take that as necessarily one that is limited. Our new international brief for the Hirshhorn is more about how to look at contemporary art in terms of new ideas, new scholarship around new art, as well as how to connect the 20th century to the 21st. We’re at this transitional moment between the 20th and 21st centuries, and feeling that in a very palpable way, and there are artists who are able to provide insight into that transition, which I think is very important. If you look at museums and the way that they’ve developed over the last 20 years, it’d be true to say that they’re much more interested

in connecting with visitors and audiences than ever before. Most museums are very attuned to attendance and how exhibitions can build greater engagement and connection with individuals. One of the real issues that many museums have been dealing with is how to engage Millennials, which is the next biggest demographic group after Baby Boomers. Most museums are interested in showing and knowing that their survival depends on the importance that this new generation places on museums. Today, there are much greater demands on curators in museums to be familiar with world history—not just American and European history—and world art. That’s a very positive thing, which will cause us to be much more open to learning about the world. Artists today are also looking at cross-disciplines. No one thinks of themselves as a painter or a sculptor anymore; that kind of experimentation of cross-genre work is one that’s revealing for us—to bear witness to how a new generation is really articulating their vision to the world. There are much fewer hierarchies of values in place today than there were previously. Your personal experience will always inform the kind of decisions you make professionally, and I consider myself a great beneficiary of witnessing a great cultural change in the perception of Asia. It’s a really momentous change; when we talk about transitional moments, again, it comes back to that. So in some ways I think of my own background as maybe allowing a greater sensitivity to some of those changes, when the world is opening up in a different way. —As told to Aileen Kwun

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Kristina O’Neill EDITOR-IN-CHIEF, WSJ.

INTERVIEW BY CHARLES CURKIN PORTRAIT BY ADRIAN GAUT

You don’t give many interviews. Tell us a little about your background.

I grew up in Woodbridge, Virginia. I currently live in Brooklyn Heights. I moved to New York more than 20 years ago to attend NYU and never left. You started out as Candace Bushnell’s assistant in the mid-’90s. How did you meet her?

A little more than two and a half years ago, it was announced that the revered Deborah When I was at NYU, I was taking journalNeedleman had resigned from her post as ism classes, and one of the assignments was editor-in-chief of the Wall Street Journal’s to interview someone you admired. Candace lifestyle magazine, WSJ. She had taken an at that time had a column in the New York offer to take over T: The New York Times Observer, “Sex and the City.” When it came Style Magazine after Sally Singer’s abrupt out on Wednesdays, my girlfriends and I departure. Needleman had become a bit of loved to read it and dissect it. So I called 411, legend during her tenure at WSJ., and she left got her phone number, rang her up, and said, some mighty big shoes to fill. Enter Kristina “Can I interview you for a school paper?” O’Neill, the affable Virginia-born, NYU- Well, it turns out Candace had also gone to educated former executive editor of Harper’s NYU, so I think she just felt sorry for me, and Bazaar, who has quietly made WSJ. into an thought it was charming that I was calling her advertising juggernaut. The September 2014 from a payphone at Dean & DeLuca. I think women’s fashion issue was up 24 percent in she thought it was gutsy. She agreed. So we ad pages from the previous year, while the met, I did my interview, and she said, “I don’t September 2014 men’s style issue was up 30 think you’ve asked all the right questions.” percent—setting new benchmarks, which Our one-hour interview turned into two and according to O’Neill, are on track to be sur- a half hours. We got along really well. She passed again this year. The 39-year-old editor needed an assistant, and she liked my story sat down with Surface to discuss her successes [about her] when it was finally published, and and those to come. we’d kept in touch, and she offered me a gig as her assistant, so I did that while I was still in school. Come summer, it became a full-time job. At that point, she’d met with Darren Star [producer of Sex and the City on HBO], and the treatment had been worked on. I remember her asking me, “What do you think of Sarah Jessica Parker?” And you were the reason she was ultimately hired?

No. I take no credit for that. [Laughs] But it was so exciting to be there in those early days in the first season they were shooting. It was a wild time to witness the potential of a newspaper column. Do you feel the same way about WSJ.? Is it a wild time?

It’s really exciting to be at the ground level of something. WSJ. is six years old; I’m its third editor. But I definitely think in the last two and a half years we’ve transformed it into this exciting platform. People have said it’s gone from a newspaper supplement to an essential monthly magazine. What do you think made that happen? What’s the special sauce?

If I tell you that … [Laughs]

Mayonnaise and ketchup?

No, there are a couple of ingredients in there that are very special and specific to WSJ. I think the entire magazine industry is going through a lot of change right now. For the real institutional brands like the Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, and The New Yorker—these trusted resources—I think you go big or go home. Or it’s an opportunity for smaller players to do really interesting, creative things, but scale doesn’t have to be as important for them. I think everything else in between feels like it’s trying to scale up when it shouldn’t be, or trying to diversify while getting away from its core values. When you’re a brand like the Wall Street Journal, it’s a very exciting platform to be a part of. There’s a trust and obviously a legacy, an authenticity to the product. It’s surprised me so much how the integrity of the overall institution really trickles down into everything we do, and informs every decision we make. “Integrity” is a key word that keeps coming up when I think about what sets us apart. We don’t do features because we have to; we do them because we want to. You’ve had cover subjects as diverse as the Knicks’s star forward Carmelo Anthony to supermodel Daria Werbowy. Tell us about how you make these decisions.

It’s not a science. We’re able to put [on the cover] who we’re feeling at that moment. Doesn’t it get a little scientific sometimes? Like today Carey Mulligan on the cover of this month’s Vogue. She was also be on the cover of your May issue.

It’s Carey Mulligan’s moment now. It was Carmelo’s moment then. Woody Allen had Blue Jasmine out when we did him. Wes Anderson was doing The Grand Budapest Hotel. What I feel very lucky about is having that intuition about who’s right for WSJ., but also right for the time. Are there any subjects you’d kill to have?

I would die for Meryl Streep. [Laughs] We’re working on it. Does exclusivity make or break a story sometimes?

Exclusivity is really important. And sometimes it’s nice going in and knowing. Obviously, we knew Carey was on Vogue. And Vogue knew when we approached Carey that we wanted her for WSJ. So there’s a transparency in those negotiations. Sometimes we decide that we want to be the only ones. >

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One of the things I’m really conscious of is to look back at a 12-month run and say, “Did we tick all the boxes of the things that we stand for? Did we cover art, architecture, design, interiors, food, fashion?” We try to get the mix right in every issue, but sometimes one of those features rises to the top. In that case, what was so exciting about the Garage Museum was that not only did it tick the architecture box—Rem’s collaboration with Dasha on the space—but it’s a major art institution that’s about to open in Russia at a time when people aren’t taking those kinds of leaps. It was a really interesting project to learn about, and I’ve been following its progress. Dasha is someone I’m wildly impressed by. And it was great to do the two of them together. I love that it signaled a different side of WSJ. We’re able to do risky, out-of-thebox things because people don’t expect things from us in the same way that you know a celebrity is going to be on the cover of most magazines every single month. Who we put on our cover can change. In April, we had a stairwell on the cover. What role does design play at the magazine?

Do you keep tabs on your competitive set?

Is your WSJ. way different from that of your predecessors, Deborah Needleman and

I think it’s a new WSJ. way. I don’t want to compare my WSJ. to her WSJ. or to T. I certainly think the way we approach things photographically, stylistically—I think my fashion point of view is honed from working 12 years at Harper’s Bazaar.

The cover of WSJ.’s February 2015 issue, photographed by David Bailey, featuring Rem Koolhaas and Dasha Zhukova.

Tell us about the design of the magazine

I’m very proud of how it looks. We’ve come up with a visual system that feels very different from the way other magazines look. We’re not afraid, when a story’s a little quiet, to let it be quiet. We’re very conscious of the package. For the overall design, we tweaked the entire thing from top to bottom. I wasn’t a big fan of the prior logo. It felt disconnected to me. I wanted to own the fact that we’re an extension of this amazing 125-year-old newspaper. It’s very easy to go in and say, “I want to shake this, and put my thumbprint on it.” I wanted to put the Wall Street Journal’s thumbprint on it. I think of us as a sixth or seventh section. SURFACE

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IMAGE: COURTESY WSJ.

When we want to feature René Redzepi, suddenly our competition is Bon Appétit and other food magazines. It could be Vanity Fair. It could be that Jeffrey Steingarten [Vogue’s food critic] is doing something. If we’re going with celebrity, then we’re paying attention to what the competitive set is doing there. The goalposts are always moving. For each story, it’s very individualized. It’s not just a broad stroke. It’s more organic to what the feature itself is, and we might choose, like we did with Carey, to go ahead and say, “You know what, it’s actually kind of great she’s on Vogue.” We feel like we can do something different, do her in a different way. We’re gonna do it the WSJ. way.

Tina Gaudoin?

IMAGE: COURTESY WSJ.

Personally, I think design is another area that our reader is enormously fascinated by. Whether it’s interior design, garden design, public spaces, building design. We’re able to marry things. We had a portfolio in the June issue. It’s a museum space, and the design of the museum is as important as what’s inside it. We’re paying attention, we’re competitive in the space.

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MEDIA How would you describe the office environment at the magazine?

It’s a very familial place. I’m a pretty laidback editor in terms of open-door policy. I’m very approachable. I’m always on my Blackberry. [Pauses] Blackberry? What am I saying? I’m always on my iPhone. Your Razr?

through before we hit Send. Before we commission anything, my team and I debate the merits. It’s important to workshop those things up front. September issues are most important for a lot of magazines. Yours is “Innovators,” and it’s published in November, coinciding with an awards ceremony. Tell us a little about that.

IMAGE: COURTESY WSJ.

Yeah, my StarTAC. [Laughs] I’m very acces- “Innovators” is the biggest event we do. It’s sible. I like that people pick up the phone and the one night a year that we basically bring feel that they can call me directly. I like having the magazine to life. Not only is it about the lunch and dinner. 2-D version: writer plus subject plus photographer. That translates into this event. Do you seek out writers based on their Everything has to holistically fit together. It’s name recognition? one of the issues we work the longest and hardest on. Literally, after last year’s, the next Not at all. It’s the right writer for the gig. For morning we woke and made offers for this me, what’s so important is that subject feels year’s. It’s very competitive. It’s all about the at ease. I’m not a square-peg, round-hole overall fit—does it make sense? kind of person. I don’t like to work uphill. If something doesn’t feel right, we’ll walk away Which editors have inspired you? from it. Katharine Graham from the Washington Post You kill stories then? was a childhood hero. In terms of contemporary editors, I think Adam Moss does a really No. I don’t think we’ve killed a single story cool job at New York. I’m admiring from afar since I started. [Laughs] But I’m very clear what Janice Min is doing with the Hollywood about how I want the interview. How I want Reporter. I learned a lot from working for the pictures to look. All that planning is done Glenda Bailey [at Harper’s Bazaar]. Anna well ahead of time. We really talk things [Wintour] is obviously someone whose

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tenure and trajectory have been amazing. Does print media have a strong future?

One hundred percent. Not only ad sales. The overall circulation of the Wall Street Journal is going up. You just got back from the White House Correspondents Dinner in Washington, D.C. I saw you Instagrammed President Obama while he wasn’t looking. You going after him for the a cover? Pegged to his exit from office perhaps?

The one area we don’t really touch is politics. I’ll leave that to the newspaper.

The opening spread of writer Tony Perrottet’s WSJ. feature story on Dasha Zhukova and Rem Koolhaas’s Garage Museum collaboration.

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Deborah Needleman

Over the last year, the covers of T: The New York Times Style Magazine have included Beyoncé, the 82-year-old novelist Philip Roth, the 11-year-old film actress Quvenzhané Wallis, Björk, Memphis furniture, and Kanye West. This eccentric grouping reflects the mind of Needleman, the magazine’s decorous yet forward-thinking editor. She has found a balance of various fields, including literature and art (the publication includes a column called A Picture and a Poem), design, fashion, food, and more. T isn’t necessarily known for its groundbreaking features, but some, like Lisa Cohen’s recent profile of artist Joan Jonas, have been standouts.

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF, T: THE NEW YORK TIMES STYLE MAGAZINE

Anna Wintour EDITOR-IN-CHIEF, VOGUE

Imran Ahmed EDITOR-IN-CHIEF, BUSINESS OF FASHION Eight years ago, as the world began to grapple with the sweeping digital era, a then-31-yearold Amed envisioned its decisive impact on the fashion industry. Now an authoritative critic and influential businessman, the founder of Business of Fashion has joined the ranks of the heavyweight luxury executives he profiles. Here, the man who once tackled the fashion industry as an outsider reflects on technology, business, and creativity.

Costume Center after her—Michelle Obama cut the ribbon to mark its opening—and Wintour has been the chair of the museum’s annual Gala for the past 20 years. The Gala has brought in a reported $145 million thus far, and according to The New York Times, last year it netted almost $12 million alone.

It was quite static. All of those things have now changed. Fashion shows are now available on social media, and people can feel that they’re participating. Social media has opened up a conversation with consumers that brands have to participate in, and engage in conversation about everything from customer service to marketing to recruiting. Some brands are also experimenting with technology, and there’s much more openness to it. It’s much more integrated to the way we create products— for example, the Apple watch, but also other wearable technology. When I started, none of my professional training or education was in fashion, so that equipped me with a completely naïve, outsider perspective. My views weren’t constrained with old ideas of what the fashion industry was. I was educating myself, but I still had an openness about possibilities. My perspective was: What is this thing called social media? Let’s think about it. I started as a consultant to LVMH, but I don’t do any consulting work anymore. My consulting work was my original way of making a living, but when BoF became my business, it seemed important to me to build it as a business 100 percent. But in a broader context there are no finite, clear answers on the boundaries between journalism, consulting, and advertising or commerce. Clearly, some of the traditional business models don’t translate online. People are really rethinking how media companies can be monetized. Advertising, subscriptions, and now commerce—selling things, using media as a generator of desire—these are the three tools for

media companies. I don’t see it as problematic as long as companies are transparent about what they’re doing. If you look at old media, the relationship between advertising and editorial was always very porous. I think the very honest and clear solution to address that challenge is to be transparent. If content is being created about a company, the media company is responsible for being clear about how the content is created. My objective and mission is to continue informing the global fashion industry. It was always about helping those within and those outside the industry understand that fashion is a business. If we can help creative people understand the business side of fashion and business people understand the creative side, then we’re doing our job. —As told to Shirine Saad

IMAGE: COURTESY NEW YORK MAGAZINE.

The world has really changed in the last eight years, since I first started writing Business of Fashion. At the time, social media wasn’t really as prominent. The most prominent socialmedia network was MySpace, which was for the music community. Today, of course, social media is such a pervasive part of the way we live. I think it’s clear that we’re living a digital revolution where technology is transforming the way we live. At first, the fashion industry was hesitant to use these tools. Technology was seen as nerdy and external to fashion, but technology has been like a tidal wave. Even for the people who were reticent at first, it’s clear that it’s shifted the way we all live. The most significant change for the industry is that technology has opened fashion up. Previously, fashion was a closed business. It was a small group of elite people who communicated in a very one-way, top-down formula.

Not only at the helm since 1988 of what is without question the most influential fashion magazine in the world, Wintour, for more than two years, has also been serving as the artistic director of its parent company, Condé Nast. Her influence extends beyond media and fashion, and into the art world: Last year, the Metropolitan Museum of Art named its

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Jerry Saltz ART CRITIC, NEW YORK

IMAGE: COURTESY NEW YORK MAGAZINE.

The cover of New York magazine’s April 20–May 3, 2015, issue, photographed by Adrian Gaut, featuring Jerry Saltz’s review of the new Whitney Museum. 145

Often cantankerous in the best way, Saltz is the rare cultural critic to bridge the printdigital divide. On his @jerrysaltz Instagram feed, which has around 108,000 followers, he pulls no punches, poking fun at everyone from MoMA’s Klaus Biesenbach (who, it should be noted, he has also posted a selfie with) to Fox News. Earlier this year, he won the National Magazine Award in the Columns and Commentary category—a first for an art critic. In April, New York published as a cover story his review of the new Whitney Museum and its inaugural show, “America is Hard to See.” Weaving his personal experiences with museums throughout, the must-read begins, “I’ve spent much of my life in and in love with museums.” Not just cantankerous, Saltz has an energy that is contagious.

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Nicolas Bos CEO AND PRESIDENT, VAN CLEEF & ARPELS BY NATASHA EDWARDS PORTRAIT BY FRANCK JUERY

As CEO and president of Van Cleef & Arpels, summer 2014, inspired by the Peau d’Ane faiNicolas Bos is quietly carrying the venerable rytale; to the simple iconic Alhambra motif, Parisian jewelry house, founded in 1906, into launched in 1968. The company’s clientele, as the future. He’s also giving it a new public aura. such, is extremely varied and international. The Bos’s background has prepared him well for house has been present in the United States the job: He came to Van Cleef and its classical since the ’30s, Japan since the ’70s, and over the golden-stone headquarters on prestigious Place past decade has seen a growing number of cliVendôme in 2000 from the Cartier Foundation ents in China, Russia, and the Middle East. for Contemporary Art, where he began his “The haute joaillerie is a bit different,” says career in 1992 after ESSEC business school. “It Bos, who believes in the “renewal of the art was an institution quite unique, and a precur- of jewelry as a category of the decorative arts. sor in the sponsorship of contemporary art,” he There are clients who regard it a bit like a colsays of the Cartier Foundation. “I met lots of lection, in the domain of an art object. It can be artists, painters, and sculptors, also designers worn, but also be seen as an artistic expression. and architects, people from fashion and per- In the Art Deco period, jewelry used to be conforming arts. I had a role to make sure that proj- sidered one of the decorative arts, along with ects worked, like the building with Jean Nouvel, architecture and furniture. I want to remove it to be an interface between Cartier and the cura- from its isolation.” “When I began,” he adds, “the style perhaps tors of the foundation, and between Cartier and the people from the world of art and the world wasn’t really in the air du temps; the taste was of luxury.” for more abstract, more masculine style.” But One skill that Bos brought with him from today he believes there is a new public fascinathe Cartier Fondation was collaborating with tion with “slow design” or “applied creation.” different teams. He also brought a strong belief If haute joaillerie remains an extremely elitist in power of the “passerelle,” or footbridge, world, one of Bos’s most original moves has between various creative fields, including art, been the creation, in 2012, of L’École Van Cleef literature, poetry, and choreography. “I have a & Arpels, a school at its Paris headquarters huge personal curiosity toward all the forms of that puts on a program of classes and lectures creation, which remains very important for me,” for the general public. Not just based in Paris, says Bos, who is currently on the committee of L’École has started to travel the world. After the Palais de Tokyo art space. stops in Tokyo and Hong Kong in 2013 and Unlike some jewelry company executives, 2014, respectively, this summer (from June Bos doesn’t believe in bringing in big-name out- 4–18) it’s taking place at New York’s Cooper side designers to create pieces that will be asso- Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum. [Full ciated with their own image. Instead, he’s for disclosure: Surface’s editor-in-chief, Spencer preserving the distinctive Van Cleef & Arpels Bailey, is on L’École’s honorary committee in identity. “We work principally with our in- New York; on June 5, he will be moderating a house designers in an integrated studio,” he says. conversation, titled “Slow Design: Jewelry and “In haute joaillerie, there’s a great importance the Garden,” between Bos and the architects of style, technique, savoir-faire—it’s a process Michael Manfredi and Marion Weiss as part of collective creation.” Virtually all the pieces of the programming.] An insight into the art are made in the workshops in Paris, except for involved in Van Cleef’s pieces, L’École is “a way some simpler traditional pieces made in Lyon of ensuring that people get to know us better,” and the Jura mountains, as part of a network of Bos says, “showing the technical side and the traditional craftsmen. historic” through classes on subjects including Van Cleef has “a style that is very delicate, precious stones and gems, technical craftsmanvery decorative, very drawn,” he says. “There ship, and the art history of jewelry. are numerous figurative pieces, very feminine, As to the future, while technique remains one very sophisticated, a vision of the world that of the strengths of Van Cleef & Arpels, Bos can is very positive. It finds inspiration from fai- see it evolving. He’s looking to integrate new rytales, ballerinas, the world of imagination technology such as 3-D modeling as a way of and fantasy, and precious stones, but it is also creating complex volumes—a meeting between distinguished by its use of three-dimensional the traditional savoir-faire and a new generation forms and asymmetry that we see in nature. It of digital-age artisans. is a joyous nature that feels positive, of flowers and butterflies. Unlike some houses, you won’t find snakes with us.” One of the challenges for Bos is “how to remain true to our style and make it contemporary,” he says. “One tries to continue to enrich our collection, reflect on how jewelry is worn today.” The brand’s range goes from the elaborate flowers and foliage of the Jardins line; to Nicolas Bos at the Van Cleef & Arpels the fantasy of the Jules Verne–inspired Voyages Extraordinaires; to a recent line, launched in headquarters in Paris. SURFACE

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Steven Kolb

The Council of Fashion Designers of America is best known for the CFDA Awards—the Oscars of fashion—but it’s also committed to education and support for its more than 450 members. Highlighting fashion’s vital, nowinextricable relationship with a certain socialmedia service, the council recently published the book Designers on Instagram (Abrams), which compiles some of the best images posted by more than 250 CFDA talents.

CEO, COUNCIL OF FASHION DESIGNERS OF AMERICA

Johann Peter Rupert

A chronograph in Vacheron Constantin’s Harmony collection, unveiled earlier this year at the SIHH fair in Geneva.

PHOTO: COURTESY VACHERON CONSTANTIN.

FOUNDER AND CHAIRMAN, RICHEMONT

After a yearlong sabbatical, the South African chairman returned in September 2014 to his position at Richemont, the luxury-goods brand that owns watchmakers Vacheron Constantin, Jaeger-LeCoultre, and IWC, among others. It has been a busy year. Vacheron Constantin, for one, opened major exhibitions in Hong Kong and Beijing, and wowed watch fans with its limited-edition Harmony collection. Richemont brands IWC and Montblanc raised eyebrows when they announced their plans to counter Apple’s new smartwatch: They’ll embed smart technology not into the cases, but into the straps.

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Marc Jacobs HEAD DESIGNER, MARC JACOBS

Axel & PierreAlexis Dumas CEO AND ARTISTIC DIRECTOR, HERMÈS

Nicolas Ghesquière ARTISTIC DIRECTOR OF WOMEN’S COLLECTIONS, LOUIS VUITTON

Sarah Rutson

PHOTO: COURTESY VACHERON CONSTANTIN.

VICE PRESIDENT OF GLOBAL BUYING, NET-A-PORTER

Sarah Burton CREATIVE DIRECTOR, ALEXANDER MCQUEEN

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In March, Jacobs announced his decision to close his secondary line, Marc by Marc Jacobs, and consolidate his products under one eponymous label. Many see this as an image-boosting move, one that will give longtime fans of the designer a simpler and more cohesive grasp of his offerings. Jacobs took the stage at this year’s Parsons Fashion Benefit, where he was honored with an award from his alma mater.

Last fall, Hermès opened a lavish, four-story flagship store in a historic brick building in Shanghai. It was a landmark event for the brand, but ultimately it’s just one more milestone on a full-speed entrée into Asian markets. (Hermès already has more than 20 stores in China, and is planning to open several more.) Photography is another recent Hermès concern; artistic director Pierre-Alexis Dumas recently announced a major partnership between the Paris-based brand and New York’s Aperture Foundation.

More than a year into his role as creative director for Louis Vuitton, Ghesquière’s vision for the brand is taking shape. The recent presentation of the brand’s cruise collection took place at Bob Hope’s John Lautner–designed home in Palm Springs and revealed a penchant for loose silhouettes and mod motifs. Ghesquiére ushered in his fall 2015 line at Fondation Louis Vuitton, the brand’s new, Frank Gehry– designed museum.

For more 20 years, Sarah Rutson took the lead on shaping the women’s contemporary department in Hong Kong–based luxury fashion brand Lane Crawford as fashion director. She now resides in New York City and has recently assumed the role of VP of global buying at popular womenswear e-tailer Net-a-Porter.

Everyone knows the dress. It’s been published online, and in magazines and newspapers, all over the world. As a result, many brides have requested a similar version for their own weddings. It’s the dress Duchess Kate Middleton wore for her wedding in April 2011. For the past five years, the English designer has served as creative director for fashion house Alexander McQueen. She was awarded Designer of the Year in 2011 by the British Fashion Awards and appeared on Time’s list of the 100 most influential people of 2012.

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Karl Lagerfeld

Chanel showed its resort collection this year at Zaha Hadid’s Dongdaemun Design Center, in Seoul—yet another example of a strong and still-growing affinity between fashion houses and high-profile architects. Lagerfeld continues to make waves at age 81 (though his

Raf Simons

Last year, fashion fans were given a behind-thescenes look at one of the world’s most storied brands in Dior and I, a documentary on Raf Simons’s high-pressure job at Christian Dior. The designer’s efforts stunned audiences most recently at Pierre Cardin’s Palais Bulles, in Cannes, a house built by Hungarian architect Antti Lovag that’s all curves and no corners.

CREATIVE DIRECTOR, CHRISTIAN DIOR

John Galliano CREATIVE DIRECTOR, MAISON MARGIELA

FOUNDER, GIORGIO ARMANI

Even human-rights lawyer Amal Clooney has taken to Galliano, who designed the dress she wore to the Met Gala in May.

Armani celebrated its 40th anniversary this year with a two-day, celebrity-packed event that included a retrospective fashion show and the opening of Silos, a four-story exhibition space in a renovated 1950s factory. It marks a major milestone for the brand as well as for its founder, who will release his autobiography (through Rizzoli) this fall. SURFACE

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PHOTO: COURTESY CELINE.

Giorgio Armani

It’s been a tough road to recovery for Galliano, who very nearly torpedoed his career four years ago with some offensive remarks. He has kept a low profile since, even after being named creative director of Maison Margiela, which showed Galliano’s first ready-to-wear and couture collections for the brand to great praise this year. The fashion world is clearly ready to welcome back his indisputable talent.

A film still from the new Raf Simons documentary Dior and I.

PHOTO: COURTESY DIOR.

CREATIVE DIRECTOR, CHANEL, FENDI, AND KARL LAGERFELD

ridiculously popular cat, Choupette, threatens to overshadow his social-media standing). The German designer recently announced plans to build a 270-room hotel in Macau. This year marks 50 years since he was named creative director of Fendi.

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Christopher Bailey

For his current role at Burberry, Bailey made the uncommon leap from chief creative officer to CEO, a transition that happened in May 2014 following former CEO Angela Ahrendts’s departure to Apple. Bailey, 43, is well positioned for the job: Since arriving in 2001, his creative vision has invigorated the label for a new generation of consumers. His conceptual-yet-wearable Prorsum line is just one iteration of the Bailey touch.

Bernard Arnault

It’s been a couple of years since Arnault abandoned his attempt to become a Belgian citizen, in move that was widely regarded as a way to protect his estimated $37 billion fortune from France’s hefty taxes. But he’s still the richest man in France and 13th richest in the world. Last fall, the highly anticipated Fondation Louis Vuitton, an art museum sponsored by

CHIEF CREATIVE OFFICER AND CEO, BURBERRY

CEO AND CHAIRMAN, LVMH

Phoebe Philo CREATIVE DIRECTOR, CÉLINE

PHOTO: COURTESY CELINE.

PHOTO: COURTESY DIOR.

A year after Phoebe Philo made Time magazine’s 100 Most Influential People list, the British designer continues to win fans with her boundary-pushing yet impossibly disciplined pieces for Céline, which opened a new store in New York’s Soho neighborhood last fall. The Paris fashion house hired an unlikely (but somehow perfect) model to be the face of its latest campaign: 80-year-old literary titan Joan Didion.

A new Céline Luggage bag. 151

LVMH and designed by Frank Gehry, opened its doors, more than a decade after Arnault first met with Gehry to discuss plans.

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Miuccia Prada HEAD DESIGNER, PRADA AND MIU MIU

Hedi Slimane CREATIVE DIRECTOR, SAINT LAURENT

Francois-Henri Pinault CEO, KERING

The just-opened Fondazione Prada in Milan (see pages 134-137) represents the heart of Miuccia’s practice of not following the rules. The campus, dedicated to the display, discussion, and development of art, is located on the outskirts of post-industrial Milan and was renovated by OMA with Rem Koolhaas as the design lead. With a bar designed by filmmaker Wes Anderson and a building finished in 24-carat gold leaf, the Fondazione’s new venue is sure to highlight Miuccia’s role beyond fashion. Slimane’s takeover of Saint Laurent has turned the company around: This year’s first-quarter earnings show an impressive increase of 21.2 percent, with sales doubling in the three years since Slimane became creative director. A series of renovations headed by Slimane for the brand’s Paris stores is underway and set to be completed in full by the end of the year.

One wouldn’t normally associate activism with a luxury-goods giant like Kering, which owns Saint Laurent, Gucci, and Bottega Veneta, among many other brands. But in May, the conglomerate released its first-ever Environmental Profit and Loss statement, which detailed the impacts its businesses had on the planet. Pinault has also led a valiant charge to fight counterfeit goods, with a federal lawsuit against Chinese e-commerce site Alibaba, and has organized Kering’s Women in Motion initiative to engage with women’srights issues.

Mark Parker CEO, NIKE

PHOTO: COURTESY NIKE.

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PHOTO: COURTESY RALPH LAUREN.

As Nike’s CEO since 2006 (and an employee of the company since 1979), Parker has been credited with growing the brand’s global business portfolio. The CEO recently met with President Barack Obama at the Nike headquarters to discuss implementing the fast-track trade legislation and a Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreement. If Congress passes this agreement, thousands of manufacturing and engineering jobs would open up over the next decade.

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Ralph Lauren

PHOTO: COURTESY RALPH LAUREN.

PHOTO: COURTESY NIKE.

FOUNDER, RALPH LAUREN CORPORATION

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The 75-year-old executive is best known for his multibillion-dollar corporation and collection of fine automobiles, including a 1931 Alfa Romeo, a 1938 Bugatti, a 1955 Jaguar, a 1960 Ferrari, and a 1996 McLaren. But Lauren has another growing empire in an entirely different category: hospitality. Following the restaurants Ralph’s in Paris and RL in Chicago, the new Polo Bar—located next to the recently opened Polo flagship on Fifth Avenue in Midtown Manhattan—gives the fashion-world

legend and his powerful friends a place to convene on his home turf. Designed in-house by the Ralph Lauren creative-services team, the clubby space offers a warm ambience full of brass, oak, pine, aged leather, and marble.

The dining room of the newly opened Polo Bar in Manhattan.

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DESIGN Osgerby discusses the duo’s ongoing collaborations with Swiss furniture company Vitra, and how they started working with brands like Knoll, B&B Italia, and Flos.

LEAD DESIGNERS, BARBER & OSGERBY

We’ve been talking to Vitra since 2009. We have a number of very serious things going on with them in the backroom right now. It was a slightly more relaxing time developing the Mariposa range—“relaxing” in the sense that we were actually designing stuff that’s super comfortable—than our current projects. So much work for the Mariposa line went into changing, evolving, and developing what happens under the fabric: the foam density, the feathers, the springs, the logistics of being able to take something to pieces and ship it around the world. The relationship with Vitra started in a quite unconventional way. Most of the time, when we work for a company, they have a product in mind, or we have a sketch of something we’ve already thought through. Our relationship with Vitra actually started almost in an academic way, in that we had a project that had been built up like a research program. We discovered there was a need for something, so we proposed a meeting with [Vitra chairman emeritus] Rolf Fehlbaum and basically presented a synopsis of what was needed. That written document became the basis of a brief. There was no sketching involved. We had this product idea that became the Tip Ton chair. It’s been a huge hit. It has taken us all by surprise, really, because we didn’t think it would have quite as much demand as it has. It’s quite an unconventional thing, a two-position chair.

Vitra, Knoll, B&B Italia, and Flos are now among our clients. It wasn’t always this way. We waited and waited and waited and waited and waited, and couldn’t pay the rent for years and years and years. We just waited. We didn’t want to bugger it up by working with the wrong people, doing crap products. For a while, we just hung out. It was like trying to get a girlfriend. Just the two of us, after the same girls. —As told to Spencer Bailey

(TOP TO BOTTOM) Barber & Osgerby’s Pilot chair (2015) for Knoll. The firm’s Mariposa sofa (2014) for Vitra.

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PHOTO: COURTESY MOOOI.

PHOTOS: TOP, COURTESY KNOLL. BOTTOM, COURTESY VITRA.

Edward Barber & Jay Osgerby

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Thomas Heatherwick FOUNDER AND PRINCIPAL, HEATHERWICK STUDIO

Heatherwick has been winning numerous honors for more than a decade, including a Structural Steel Award and an Emerging Architecture Award, for Rolling Bridge, a curling pedestrian bridge over a London waterway. In 2016, the British designer is set to construct another water-related project, a $130 million, 2.7-acre park on stilts in Manhattan’s Hudson River. Heatherwick’s high-profile projects don’t end there. With Danish firm Bjarke Ingels Group, the designer will build Google’s new headquarters from the ground up in Mountain View, California.

Marcel Wanders DESIGNER In 1996, Marcel Wanders came to international prominence in the design world with his Knotted chair, produced by Droog. The Dutch designer cofounded the design label Moooi (the Dutch word for beautiful, with an extra O for emphasis) in 2001 with Casper Vissers. Moooi’s Unexpected Welcome collection debuted during Milan’s 2015 Salone del Mobile, and the brand just unveiled a New York flagship in May. Moooi’s Power Nap sofa (2015) designed by Marcel Wanders.

David Rockwell

Zoë Ryan PHOTO: COURTESY MOOOI.

PHOTOS: TOP, COURTESY KNOLL. BOTTOM, COURTESY VITRA.

FOUNDER AND PRESIDENT, ROCKWELL GROUP

CHAIR AND CURATOR OF ARCHITECTURE AND DESIGN, THE ART INSTITUTE OF CHICAGO

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Over the past 30 years, David Rockwell has transformed interiors and sets perhaps with one question in mind: “What if?” A book of the same title, released last year, explores 35 of his projects, from idea conception to realization, with accompanying behind-thescenes text and imagery. The founder and president of the award-winning Rockwell Group is widely known for his rich hospitality designs, such as the new Virgin Hotel in Chicago and the Chefs Club in New York. Already a three-time Tony nominee, the firm has been nominated this year for its work on three Broadway shows’ sets.

Ryan was appointed the curator of the second Istanbul Design Biennial, which took place last fall and was titled “The Future is Not What It Used to Be.” Since joining the Art Institute, the London-born talent has mounted many exhibitions, authored accompanying exhibition catalogues, and contributed to wallpaper installations for the museum. She is the co-curator (with Okwui Enwezor) of a midcareer survey show on David Adjaye that comes to Chicago in September.

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Michael Bierut PARTNER, PENTAGRAM

A partner at multidisciplinary design firm Pentagram in New York and cofounder of the website Design Observer, Bierut’s expertise is widely noted and for good reason. He has led high-profile projects from reinventing the iconic Saks Fifth Avenue logo to Hillary Clinton’s presidential logo. Bierut also helped rebrand the MIT Media Lab, bringing together 23 distinctive departments under one cohesive identity.

Michael Bierut’s book “How To” (Thames & Hudson), to be published this fall.

DIRECTOR, COOPER HEWITT, SMITHSONIAN DESIGN MUSEUM

Rodman Primack EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, DESIGN MIAMI

Baumann was already a 13-year veteran at the Cooper-Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum in New York before she was named director in 2013. Baumann (who was featured in our November 2014 issue) spearheaded the $91-million initiative for the museum’s recent design overhaul and expansion, as well as its re-opening last December.

With a portfolio of past work experience that includes being chairman of London’s Phillips de Pury (now known as Phillips), director of Gagosian L.A., and a designer for architect Peter Marino, it’s no wonder Primack was tapped last year to become Design Miami’s new director. Under his leadership, the fair has launched “Design at Large,” an exhibition platform for large-scale works of historical and contemporary design.

IMAGE: COURTESY PENTAGRAM.

Caroline Baumann

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Paola Antonelli

IMAGE: COURTESY PENTAGRAM.

SENIOR CURATOR, DEPARTMENT OF ARCHITECTURE AND DESIGN, MOMA

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Antonelli, who was a juror of this year’s Lexus Design Award competition in Milan, discusses the importance of large corporations investing in design, and why elegance matters. I’ve been involved in dozens of awards since the beginning of my career. Some have been more thoughtful than others. What I love about the Lexus Design Awards is how serious they are—and involved. Let me just tell you about the process: Last November, we met in Tokyo with all of the jurors and mentors. Hakuhodo, the agency that helps Lexus put together the awards, had already selected the finalists down to a few hundred from 1,700 entries. They then presented them. The jurors distilled them down to—I wish I remembered the exact number—around 15 or 20, I think. The four mentors put dibs on their favorite three designers, and then negotiated. After that, Hakuhodo and Lexus went back to the designers to vet them and make sure each project was real, and to make sure the designers were available. Very often, when you have competitions, they tend to be either about a finished product or a concept. They don’t go from research to development. I’m really touched by how advanced this year’s works [for the Lexus Design Awards] are. They’re not rudimentary student projects, and all the designers are very young—which is not an issue to me. I mean, I wish there were 75-year-olds entering, but for some reason, 75-year-olds don’t feel compelled. Or they’re shy about it. Maybe we should do a competition that sets the minimum applicant age at 75. Anyway, it’s really quite touching to see the investment and thoughtfulness given to developing these projects. As far as I’m concerned, it’s very clear that design is a fundamental part of a company’s success. Especially when the company manufactures products, but also in general; design is a commitment to humanity. Design is one of the most complete foods one can eat. It has technology, marketing research, and functionality, but it also has a sense of responsibility toward the environment and humankind. Any company that wants to produce a commitment to the world, whether it’s in energy or watches, had better show a commitment to design. When it’s a company that manufactures products, design becomes more important, because it becomes part of the bottom line. I always say that even though I consider design to be very serious, I believe that elegance in form is a basic human right. I believe that when you make a product and make it elegant, with an aesthetic intention, you’re just doing the right thing. When you make something that’s aesthetically inelegant and ugly, you’re in the wrong. Even just from a superficial formalist viewpoint, elegance is a sign of respect toward your buyer. Elegance is something that people are increasingly

demanding. Even though you may want to fault Apple and other companies as long as you like, they have heightened the threshold of acceptance of products for people. They have had an amazingly good influence. Just in terms of expectations, I don’t think things should look a particular way—even punk, to me, is a form of aesthetics I appreciate tremendously. I just want to see that the manufacturers and designers dedicated time and thought to how the object communicates its form. Any company that markets itself—and that has an image campaign and wants to think about the future—should think about design. There are several companies that have made design into a flagship declaration. Interestingly, it happens more in the East than it does in the West. Lexus is an example, and let’s not forget about what Samsung is doing—it’s all about that. In general, not only amongst corporations but also politicians, the value of design is acknowledged more in the East than in the West. The West has to catch up. Of course, there are exceptions. There are bastions of design countries, like the Netherlands and in Scandinavia. England used to be—it has cut all the funds now, which is crazy—but the people there still like and feel design. In Italy, politicians are starting to catch up, but people have always loved design there. If you think of multinational corporations as pulverous nations, the powers that be are slowly but surely recognizing the amazing political and economic force that design is. They’re starting to invest in it, and rightly so. —As told to Spencer Bailey

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Hella Jongerius DESIGNER The Dutch designer, who met with Surface at this year’s Salone del Mobile furniture fair in Milan, discusses textiles, color, and disruptive creativity. I was asked three years ago to become the design director of Danskina when Kvadrat and Maharam took over. It’s a nice company because it has an interesting tradition of innovative yarns. I’ve just kept that quality, tried to design yarns, and then do the carpets. I first come with an element, and then spin the yarns and twine and twist them, and then use techniques like tufting and weaving. This is the way we work. There aren’t a lot of designers who have the knowledge to design textiles. I don’t have a lot of competitors. [Laughs] As a user of objects, if a product or an object has tactile value, you can attach yourself to it. This is a very important function of an object: that you can get a relation to it. The most important communication tool is the surface. And it doesn’t have to be “hairy”; it doesn’t have to be a textile. You can also have a relation with a plastic, or with a rubber, or with glass or metal. It’s not that it has to be soft—that’s not what I think tactility is. In terms of how I use color, let’s take an example: the new version of my Polder sofa for Vitra. It’s been 10 years since I first did the Polder, so I updated it this year by weaving new textiles for it. Each Polder now comes in four colorways: gold, blue, red, and green. I couldn’t find, in the existing textile world, the right color tones. So we started to weave some ourselves, started to dye existing colors in new colorways. It took me five years to update this. I think I’m very into this whole color world. Color is so individual, so subjective, not only because you’re a human being, but also how the light turns on—three in the morning is different than three in the afternoon. Color has so many angles; it’s a never-ending topic. Color is really a living surface. It’s so difficult for us to imagine how one colored yarn will mix with a different colored yarn in a certain construction. It’s always a surprise. It’s a kind

PARTNER, 2X4

(OPPOSITE) Rugs in Danskina’s 2015 collection, released at this year’s Salone del Mobile fair in Milan.

As the founding partner and creative director of New York–based global design consultancy 2x4, it’s clear why Rock has been asked to lead a range of projects for the likes of Nike, Kanye West, Harvard, and Barneys New York. In addition to projects done through his creative agency, he is the director of the Graphic Architecture Project at the Columbia University Graduate School of Architecture,

Planning, and Preservation. Curated in collaboration with Prada, his project Pradasphere, a special traveling exhibition that explores the universe of the Italian brand, made its debut in London last year.

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PHOTO: COURTESY DANSKINA.

Michael Rock

of algebra, this mixing of colors in woven textiles. That makes it exciting, that you’re never an expert. You always kind of stay amateur, because it’s so complex. I like that. It keeps me fresh. I hope that I inspire designers. Bringing something new is not enough. There’s so much more that you can add to the world. There are a lot of good designers around, but I hope that for some who are not awake—and some who are young and think the industry is boring—that I can tell them, “Don’t make your unique pieces simply for industry! Use your talent and be responsible in talking to companies. Use your brain. Be more cultural. Don’t just turn, turn, turn for profit. Don’t create just for profit. Don’t take from the Earth to make this kind of work.” I don’t have a recipe for what’s good or right. Everybody has to make his own balance. There’s much more to objects and products than the end result. I push on so many levels: I’m pushing for something that was not there, or kicking suppliers to do something new, or stretching spinners. These kinds of things are our responsibility as designers. It’s like with your dinner: You don’t want to eat the shit from the industry. We designers can play a role between you, the buyers, and an industry. I have a good hope to shake things up a bit. —As told to Spencer Bailey

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PHOTO: COURTESY DANSKINA.

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Marc Newson

Before the Australian industrial designer began exhibiting limited-edition projects in public institutions and galleries worldwide, he studied sculpture and jewelry design at Sydney College of the Arts in the early 1980s. In 2005, he was selected as one of Time magazine’s 100 most influential people of the year, and in 2010 was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) by the Queen. A riveted aluminum and fiberglass chaise lounge designed by Newson recently sold for $3.7 million at Phillips and holds the title for the most expensive design object ever to be auctioned. New designs include a pen for Hermès (see opposite page), a samurai sword, and a shotgun for Beretta.

DESIGNER

Giulio Cappellini ART DIRECTOR In partnership with Italian fashion and design school Istituto Marangoni, the Milanese architect and designer recently launched Sit Down!, a competition that invites design professionals and graduates to contribute ideas about industrial design, product design, architecture, and interior design. Cappellini’s furniture is in the permanent collections of many significant museums, including MoMA, the Victoria and Albert Museum, the Centre Pompidou, and the Musée Des Arts Décoratifs in Paris. Cappellini has also discovered and fostered great talents such as Tom Dixon, Marcel Wanders, Marc Newson, and the Bouroullec brothers, among others.

Jasper Morrison’s Orla small armchair (2015) for Cappellini.

GLOBAL CREATIVE DIRECTOR, 20/21, CHRISTIE’S

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PHOTO: COURTESY HERMES.

After founding and directing the Design Miami fair, and then launching the curated design marketplace L’ArcoBaleno, Medda recently transitioned to Christie’s as global creative director of the 20/21 design department. The multilingual 34-year-old will be responsible for curating collections of 20thand 21st-century furniture, lighting, ceramics, and sculpture. In her new role, Medda hopes to expose the auction house to fresh ideas and talent from throughout the design world.

PHOTO: COURTESY CAPPELLINI.

Ambra Medda

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PHOTO: COURTESY HERMES.

PHOTO: COURTESY CAPPELLINI.

DESIGN

The new Nautilus pen for Hermès, designed by Marc Newson.

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Gadi Amit FOUNDER, NEW DEAL DESIGN BY JORDAN KUSHINS PORTRAIT BY JEFF SINGER

PHOTO: COURTESY NEW DEAL DESIGN.

The open-plan office of San Francisco–based New Deal Design is a hub of controlled clutter and creative play. An extensive materials library contains everything from large wood sheets to tiny plastic googly eyes; Eames rockers and beanbag chairs share space with a requisite ping-pong table; and a row of private conference rooms—dubbed “war rooms”—accommodate top-secret projects in every stage of completion. This is where founder Gadi Amit and his team of industrial designers, graphic designers, and engineers thrive. Though they will occasionally work on some more conceptual “provocations,” his studio specializes in feasible, consumerfacing devices. From Fitbit fitness trackers to Google’s completely modular Project Ara mobile phone, Amit makes inventive tech products accessible to the masses. “The main problem we have now,” he says,

“is that technology has been operating with into something bold but achievable. An inithis grandfathered-in, PC-based approach— tial “design vision” process is followed by a that there’s a desktop with all these different period of “design intent”: turning that conapplications running, and the user is always cept into a full-fledged reality, complete with in control.” functional prototypes, as well as branding, An influx of so-called smart gadgets and engineering, and manufacturing plans. Amit programs competing for attention has led made an intentional choice to divide New to what Amit refers to as “alert fatigue.” He Deal’s partnerships—generally about a dozen believes that imagining more subtle interfaces at a time—between big-name companies and that require different levels of engagement small, ambitious start-ups, to leverage the will usher in a more seamless integration former’s inherent power and resources with between product and person. “It’s our job the latter’s make-or-break perspective that to ensure that these products have a sense “keeps us on our toes.” of humanity,” he says. “We always want to His work also draws attention to issues that balance IQ [intelligence quotient] with EQ might not have the sleek sex appeal that plays [emotional quotient].” such a large part in tech marketing. “Whole Maintaining relevancy in this complex swaths of the population are often forgotindustry overrun with cultural soothsay- ten,” he says, hinting at upcoming commisers clamoring to predict the next big thing sions tackling interaction design aimed at the requires a sensibility that’s both present and elderly, or improving means for diabetics to prescient—to a point. “There’s always a ten- better manage their condition. sion between being evolutionary and revoThe tools they use to achieve proof of lutionary,” Amit says. He’s found that the concept have evolved in the 15 years since middle ground for New Deal means operat- New Deal’s inception; the team now makes ing within a pragmatic schedule that extends, regular use of an on-site 3-D printer and at most, about 18 months into the future. laser-cutter, amongst a whole host of other In that time, the studio works closely ultra-modern, industrial-strength supplies. with clients to refine—and sometimes com- But those are always secondary to Amit’s pletely overhaul—the original creative brief dedication to more traditional techniques,

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PHOTO: COURTESY NEW DEAL DESIGN.

where brainstorms sketched out on white- to do, and there is often serendipity in those board walls lead to “chunky” objects like ‘mistakes,’” Amit says. This idea of serendipcomputers carved from blocks of foam, and ity is one that he returns to again and again. smaller items like wearables fashioned from His appreciation for discovery and chance fabrics. It’s those initial hands-on moments is both refreshing and—in the face of an that allow for unexpected creative revelations. ever-changing world that all but demands “The hand doesn’t always do what you want it it—imperative.

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Gadi Amit at the New Deal Design office in San Francisco. (OPPOSITE) The Google Project Ara phone, designed by Amit’s firm.

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Mathieu Lehanneur CHIEF DESIGNER, HUAWEI TECHNOLOGIES

Travis Kalanick, Garrett Camp, & Ryan Graves CO-FOUNDERS, UBER

Jonathan Ive SENIOR VICE PRESIDENT OF DESIGN, APPLE

Lehanneur delves into his new position at the global telecommunications juggernaut Huawei. It goes back more than two years now. [Ren Zhengfei, the president of Huawei Technologies] came to Paris to meet me. After that, I went to Shenzhen, China. For me, it was a very good surprise. Huawei is a kind of brain that takes time to go fast. The first time I came to Shenzhen was just to visit the headquarters. They showed me the campus with a lot of buildings on it, and I asked in a very naïve way, “What are all those buildings?” They told me, “Houses.” Frankly, I didn’t expect that Huawei was as huge as I saw it at this time. Today, they are among the top in terms of sales of smartphones. They are a very powerful group, but very young in terms of

products. The history and the previous core business of Huawei were more dedicated to networks. They were interested not just in users, but also in big operators, big cities, and big countries. They were very strong, but invisible for the user. My very first impression was that they are quite open to learning from a designer like me. They asked me to join them as a chief designer, just to help to build the brand in terms of identity, communication, and currency between devices. In today’s digital and device world, if you want to be strong enough to build something, you have to join a big company. I’m working with Huawei and at my own studio at the same time. My challenge with Huawei is to work in a totally different way, to be totally included in the big machine. —As told to Roxy Kirshenbaum

There’s something to be said when the heads of a six-year old company are some of the youngest billionaires in the world. The company, Uber, marching headstrong into global expansions with a recent valuation of $41 billion, is accelerating its pace with Kalanick as CEO and Graves as head of global operations. The Silicon Valley–based startup is now operating in more than 200 cities in 57 countries and counting. Ive’s job at Apple is to design things people love to use, a role that’s powered by a love for material—something especially evident in the Apple Watch. One material that’s particularly significant in the watch series is gold: The company developed its own 18-karat gold that is twice as hard as the standard. Ive’s sight for designing approachable technology will garner even wider audiences for the company.

Yves Béhar PRINCIPAL DESIGNER, FUSEPROJECT INTERVIEW BY SPENCER BAILEY

PHOTO: COURTESY SODASTREAM.

San Francisco–based Béhar and Tel Aviv–based Sodastream chief innovation and design officer Yaron Kopel—who for the past few years have been closely collaborating—met with Surface during this year’s Milan Design Week to tell us why fizzy-drink machines hold much more potential than meets the eye. How did you initially meet and start working together?

Yaron Kopel: A few years ago, we did a designer search. We went to some of the best designers SURFACE

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TECH in the world today, including Yves, who we had a short meeting with in Geneva. We really clicked. I liked everything Yves was doing, and I think we see things—the aesthetic and user experience—in the same way. I knew after one meeting that Yves was the right partner for Sodastream. Since then, it’s been amazing. We both really believe that something in your kitchen should be fun, aesthetically beautiful, and easy to use. Yves Béhar: They’re in Tel Aviv, we’re in San Francisco, and somehow we’re able to get to the right place really quickly. To develop something like this in about a year [points to the new Sodastream Mix machine], from a user-interface connectivity standpoint—I mean, that’s not even something that a start-up is gonna do. I work with start-ups all the time. It takes them two and a half to three years to come up with something that new and unconventional. We have a very flat layer of decisionmaking between us, which I think is good. So there aren’t a lot of bureaucratic hurdles to overcome.

YB: Sodastream is a big company, publicly traded, but the structure inside is really flat. Design decisions like this are made very quickly. YK: We don’t waste time with big meetings. There aren’t too many decision makers. We think about something, we check it, and we move forward. I like to say our products are designed in California and “innovated” in Tel Aviv. Today, Tel Aviv is one of the most innovative hubs in the world. Every big company, from Apple to Facebook, has a base in Tel Aviv. YB: When we disagree about something, it will be five, six e-mails, but immediate. It’s not, like, six hours. We argue super-fast via e-mail, and then 5, 6, 10 minutes later, we’re like, “Okay, let’s do this.”

PHOTO: COURTESY SODASTREAM.

We’re standing inside the Alchemy Lounge, a Sodastream installation designed by Fuseproject for this year’s Milan Design Week. How are you developing Sodastream from a machine into a broader conversation?

Sodastream seems much more groundbreaking when you put it in those terms.

don’t remember the last time I carried a bottle home. I really don’t.

YK: It’s wild. The thinking was always: “How can we make the ultimate carbonation experience, in the most compact, easy-to-use, nobrainer way?”

Where do you see technology going, and how will this effect what you can do with a carbonated-beverage machine?

YB: It’s all about things becoming more perYB: The thing that attracted me in the begin- sonal. It’s all about technology really having ning to work with Sodastream—because I’m the ability to cater to your needs, maybe even somebody who’s fundamentally against plastic sometimes anticipating them. The ability to do bottles, especially for water—was the fact that many different things is great. You can imagall my friends are using expensive water from ine that in the near future some machines are Europe in California, some with bottles, some gonna deliver all of your drinking needs. We’re without. It has always been really upsetting to gonna be able to get a lot closer to what it is me. It’s the worst form of consumption. The that you want and need. I think the companies fact that we could replace that waste with a that are gonna be successful are the ones that product was huge for me. What we worked on can deliver just in time the things you desire. the first year was to make the experience easy, Technology is gonna become more and more to convince people to move away from plas- predictive in that way. tic bottles. Since then, we’ve been working on things like this [points to the Sodastream Mix]. YK: People eat too much, and obesity is a worldwide problem. People stopped cooking YK: Do you know how many times you can at home. They don’t know how to make spareuse this bottle? Five thousand. It’s one of ghetti or anything else. If people just learned the most sustainable products in the world, no how to make small dishes at home, everybody matter how you look at it. would eat healthier, and I think it can be the same thing when it comes to beverages. Think about it: If you wanna add a little bit of cranWhat are your hopes as you scale and build the business beyond the machine? berry juice to your water, you don’t need to be a good mixologist to do that. If you ask me YK: Well, if you look at what Sodastream is what technology is going to do to beverages, doing today, one of the great things—and that’s what I think it’s gonna do: make it easier Yves mentioned it—is that we act as a start-up. and more personal. Where we’re headed is: Natural flavors. Really good user experience. Fun. Always designed. What are your respective backgrounds in terms of drinking carbonated beverages? I’m just curious, out of humor.

YB: Well, I personally had stopped drinking soda a long time ago. When I was a kid, I used to drink the local Swiss drink, Rivella. I don’t know if you’ve ever heard of it. It’s actually soda made from milk and derived from the remnants of cheese production. Mostly, I switched to water—always filtered. I couldn’t will myself to buy Perrier. It makes no sense. It’s such a waste. Now I can serve my friends at dinner. With Sodastream, when everybody wants sparkling water, I can serve it in a second, when it’s needed. That’s the other thing about this product: It used to be that you would plan your week, and you’d buy your Perrier at the supermarket. Then you’d carry your bottles to your apartment and consume them over the week. Then you’d go to the supermarket again the next week.

YK: The nature of all beverage companies in the world is essentially the same: They have factories, they take flavor, they take water, they take ingredients, and they carbonate them. That’s the biggest drinking category in the world. But with Sodastream it’s now in your house. You can now have your ulti- YK: I used to drink cola when I was a child, mate small carbonation machine at home. probably until the age of 25. I was addicted to You have a factory—at this size [points to the cola. I drank more cola than water. Probably by the time I was in my 30s, I started to drink Sodastream Mix]! sparkling water. I stopped drinking cola. I 165

(OPPOSITE) Sodastream’s Alchemy Lounge installation, designed by Fuseproject for this year’s Milan Design Week.

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CEO, FIAT CHRYSLER CHAIRMAN, FERRARI BY JONATHAN SCHULTZ

For all its products’ beauty and brutality, Ferrari specializes in soft power. Take LaFerrari, the 1,000-horsepower, $1.3 million supercar introduced in 2014, whose mighty V12 engine and electric motors could accelerate time itself. Here’s the soft part: Ferrari handpicked the car’s 499 buyers. Such fiendish control helps ensure the marque’s appeal even to those who never drive, let alone own, the masterpieces from Maranello. Having assumed the top job at Ferrari last fall, Marchionne is putting the brand on the march like never before, helping inaugurate a deeply immersive retail store in Milan this spring. The factory-owned location, designed by architect Massimo Iosa Ghini, engages tifosi—the brand’s fans—via simulators as realistic as those used by Formula 1

drivers. “The Ferrari brand is rare because it combines universality with exclusivity,” says Stefano Lai, Ferrari’s senior vice president of communications. “Our goal is to move people.” Beyond Marchionne’s responsibilities as the chairman of Ferrari, the 62-year-old’s primary role is to run Fiat Chrysler Automobiles. Working in the auto industry for just 11 years—prior to 2004, when he took the top job at Fiat, he had been an executive at various industrial companies—he brings an outsider perspective that’s shaking up Detroit. Recently, Marchionne made news for reportedly proposing a merger to General Motors CEO Mary T. Barra, thus earning him the title “Detroit’s Chief Instigator” in a splashy New York Times Sunday Business profile.

The interior of Ferrari’s new Milan retail space, designed by Massimo Iosa Ghini. SURFACE

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PHOTO: ANDREA GILARDI.

PHOTO: NICOLA SCHIAFFINO/COURTESY FERRARI.

Sergio Marchionne

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Tokuo Fukuichi CHIEF OFFICER OF DESIGN GROUP, DIRECTOR, AND PRESIDENT, LEXUS INTERNATIONAL

Richard Branson

PHOTO: ANDREA GILARDI.

PHOTO: NICOLA SCHIAFFINO/COURTESY FERRARI.

CHAIRMAN, VIRGIN GROUP

Elon Musk CEO AND CTO, SPACEX; CEO, TESLA MOTORS; CHAIRMAN, SOLARCITY

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Designers, however virtuosic, are not always management material, but 40-year Toyota veteran Fukuichi-san is made from stern stuff. Having been appointed to Toyota’s board of directors, as well as to president of the Lexus division, last year, the designer wasted no time in calling for more expressive styling from both brands’ teams. Lexus has responded with concept and production cars that bear aggressive scoops, strakes, and character lines, the likes of which have even

appeared on the best-selling—if historically milquetoast—Toyota Camry sedan. As the German incumbents cut the high-end auto market into ever-finer segments, Lexus particularly is striking out with a bold, designled makeover that flows directly from Fukuichi’s office. A special-edition Lexus LF-SA concept vehicle at the brand’s exhibition at this year’s Milan Design Week.

The peripatetic founder of the Virgin Group, who began as an enterprising record-shop owner, has inevitably landed in the comfort zone. Branson’s first Virgin Hotel, which just opened in Chicago, is perhaps—but don’t wager on it—the final puzzle piece in the entrepreneur’s constellation of travelcentric lifestyle brands. With furnishings and trim pieces in Virgin’s trademark red (Smeg mini-fridges may elicit more drool

than their contents ever could), the address creates a fizzy, aesthetically seamless destination for Virgin America’s O’Hare airport arrivals. Branson remains, however, a man in motion, and construction on Virgin Galactic’s second SpaceShip Two craft is nearly complete in California’s Mojave desert. Surpassing the speed of sound in a suborbital airplane remains the elusive No. 1 record Branson wants to hear.

The South Africa–born Silicon Valley entrepreneur has the cosmos in his sights and lightning at his feet. As a co-founder of Tesla Motors, he has overseen the completion of a cross-country “Supercharger” network for his company’s electric vehicles, and has broken ground on a $5-billion “Gigafactory” in the Nevada desert, where hundreds of thousands of EV-ready battery packs and home energy storage units will be assembled. But the final

frontier remains Musk’s biggest quarry, and his SpaceX initiative has logged significant milestones in 2015, including the successful test of an astronaut escape pod that resembles a rocket-fueled Philip Guston character. To see what’s next for Musk, just look to the roads— and the skies.

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PRINCIPAL, WORKAC; DEAN, COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY’S GRADUATE SCHOOL OF ARCHITECTURE, PLANNING, AND PRESERVATION Andraos speaks about her respective projects at Columbia and her New York–based firm. It’s a really interesting and exciting moment for architecture, but also urbanism and thinking about cities. I think that the school is kind of an ideal place to think about both in terms of what the future holds. What I love about Columbia is that its DNA has always been very experimental—the school pushes the disciplines forward and sideways, and is also very engaged with the issues of the time. We really do that in terms of critical thinking, in terms of visualization, and how we represent the world. The question of visualization has become really key at this school—questions of thinking about scales of environment, from architectural scale, to the scale of the brick, to the scale of an entire

city or landscape. How everything is tied together has been really important. In many ways, we pioneered the idea of global engagement and thinking about what a global practice looks like, how engaging with cities globally has reshaped the canon of the discipline. I think that our Studio-X program has been very exciting in that way. I’ve also been thinking about questions of history and how we teach history, so I’ve really brought all these questions to the school. In architecture in particular, we’ve rethought the curriculum to push these questions forward in terms of urban thinking. At this moment, there’s also the larger question about climate change, and how with our skills and tools we can make those questions visible and relevant. Our WorkAC [L’Assemblée Radieuse] project in Gabon, the conference center, which was the result of winning an international competition, is under construction. We just completed a master plan for Weifang, in China, for seven university campuses with the Columbia team— Kate Orff from Scape and Jeffrey Johnson from SLAB—and Beijing-based architect Zhu Pei. And we’re currently working on an invited competition for a new school that’s organized

by Strelka [Institute] in Russia. Here in New York, we’re completing our first residential development, turning an existing building into residential units with an added penthouse. The project is called the Obsidian. We’re working with Knightsbridge Properties, and we’re excited about it. It should be completed at the end of the summer. We’re also continuing our work with Edible Schoolyard—the next one is under construction at P.S. 7. We won a big AIA Honors award for a competition entry for the Beijing Horticultural Expo of 2019 with the same Columbia team as the Weifang plan. At WorkAC, we’ve always looked at architecture at the intersection of urbanism and ecology, and at finding ways to integrate architecture and landscape. My own teaching at Columbia, which looks into the question of the Arab city, and questions of architecture and representation, has also influenced the practice in terms of thinking about these questions in the context of today’s global practice. These are the questions right now. —As told to Hally Wolhandler The penthouse at the WorkAC designed Obsidian House in New York.

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IMAGE: COURTESY ADJAYE ASSOCIATES.

PHOTO: COURTESY WORKAC.

Amale Andraos

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Bjarke Ingels FOUNDER AND PRINCIPAL, BJARKE INGELS GROUP

David Adjaye PRINCIPAL, ADJAYE ASSOCIATES

Take a spoonful of mellow Scandinavian style, then sprinkle liberally with pop-science überfunctional mania, and you get Bjarke Ingels, architecture’s swinging bachelor-prince. With his soon-to-finish pyramidal W57 tower in Manhattan and a new semi-buried gymnasium

in his native Denmark, Ingels’s firm, BIG, based in Copenhagen and New York, is more than living up to its name.

The Anglo-Ghanaian architect isn’t just cre- “Selects” show at New York’s Cooper-Hewitt ating buildings; he’s trying to imagine a new museum (on view from June 19 through Feb. cultural order. With offices in New York, 7, 2016); the exhibition “Making Place: The London, Berlin, and Accra, the 49-year-old Architecture of David Adjaye,” curated by infuses European Modernism with African Okwui Enwezor and Zoë Ryan, opens at the motifs, then reverses that flow to reveal how Art Institute of Chicago on Sept. 19 (through African culture influenced Modernist design, Jan. 3, 2016); and the Smithsonian Museum producing a rich and varied architecture that of African American History in Washington, feels truly global. The next year or so could D.C., which his firm is designing, is slated for prove his annus mirabilis: He’s the curator of a completion next year.

A rendering of David Adjaye’s “Selects” exhibition at the Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum.

Sarah Herda IMAGE: COURTESY ADJAYE ASSOCIATES.

PHOTO: COURTESY WORKAC.

CO-ARTISTIC DIRECTOR, CHICAGO ARCHITECTURE BIENNIAL; DIRECTOR, GRAHAM FOUNDATION

Bernard Tschumi

PRINCIPAL AND LEAD DESIGNER, BERNARD TSCHUMI ARCHITECTS

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Chicago is the historical capital of American architecture, and Herda is leading the charge to keep the city at the center of global design discourse. As the head of the Graham Foundation, the country’s largest architecture nonprofit, she has both the ways and the means to steer the cultural conversation. With the launch this fall of the Chicago Architecture

Biennial, which she’s co-curating with Joseph Grima, Herda will be putting the City of Broad Shoulders in the international spotlight as never before.

Is architecture just about buildings? Or is it about the experience of being in space—the way things unfold in time, as in a movie or a dream? Tschumi, the Swiss-born designer and theoretician, has been stumping the architectural profession for 40 years with questions like these, and with buildings that are just as challenging, such as his new Concert Hall

for Rolle, Switzerland. Last year, the Centre Pompidou finally gave him his due with a full retrospective.

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Ma Yansong FOUNDING ARCHITECTS

P R I N C I PA L , M A D

BY IAN VOLNER

China’s 21st-century boom years have MAD and its collaborators finally gaining brought the country two types of bad approval for the Rome apartment building architecture: banal concrete slabs and jazzy a full two years after winning the commispseudo-iconic showpieces. When President sion to design it. Things tend to move faster Xi Jinping sounded off about “weird build- in China, however, and hopefully Ma won’t ings” this past December, it sounded to many have to wait quite as long to realize one piece like a death knell for the latter—but Ma of his Shanshui vision in Beijing: His latest Yansong is making sure the former isn’t the proposal, for a social housing project north only remaining alternative. of the city’s East Fourth Ring, is due to begin “Some developments have made people construction early next year. The design is “all feel isolated from their community,” Ma says. about emotional action,” Ma says, creating “There’s no public space. When the people “environments that can link to people’s emomeet in the neighborhood, they should know tions.” That gambit—the idea that architectheir neighbors’ names.” ture can forge connections without resorting As the founding principal of MAD to showy gestures—is the same he’s pursuing Architects, the 40-year-old Ma is taking on the in a new and very high-profile institutional challenge of socially informed design in his project, the much-debated Lucas Museum home country as part of a broader global mis- of Narrative Art in Chicago. The sprawling, sion. His firm, founded in 2004, has already teepee’d structure faces considerable political completed one major residential building headwinds, but Ma sees it as a chance to make abroad, the eerily balletic Absolute Towers in a case for his brand of urbanism to a new and Mississauga, Ontario, near Toronto, and just a still broader audience. “This is a great opporfew months back Italian officials green-lighted tunity,” he says. “China and America have to what will be MAD’s first European project, have a dialogue on culture and design.” the ultra-eco-friendly 71 Via Boncompagni in Rome. The eight-level, 145-unit complex sports a shelf-like structural system supporting a series of irregular, curved apartments interrupted by leafy green space. “Openness is the idea,” Ma says. “On the street you have real life, nature. It’s about how people use the space, rather than about creating some kind of stylish architecture.” Bringing that vision back home to China has been part of a broad-based effort that has driven Beijing-born Ma from the start. After receiving his master’s in architecture from Yale, the designer broke onto the global scene in 2002 with his experimental digital project “Floating Island,” a sort of habitable Christo and Jeanne-Claude installation featuring recreational and cultural programming hoisted on a fluttering platform-ribbon high above New York. The scheme, and much that’s followed it, was born of Ma’s sense that something—some unnameable quality—is missing from contemporary design. “I think a spiritual element has to be in the DNA of the built environment,” he says, and his attempt to reinsert that immaterial X factor has given rise to Ma’s boldly speculative vision of China: Shanshui City, an integrated environment for urban living that eschews both the sterility of the box-tower model and the spectacle of “weirdness.” Ma Yansong at his firm’s Beijing office Yansong’s recent success in the Eternal City with a model of the Absolute Towers.

PHOTO: NIC LEHOUX.

PORTRAIT BY ZACHARY BAKO

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PRINCIPAL, RENZO PIANO BUILDING WORKSHOP An interior view of Renzo Piano’s new Harvard Art Museums facility.

The 77-year-old Italian architect Renzo Piano may know the exact number of museums he has either built or renovated throughout his career; we lost count after 20. Piano has completed two in the past year—the newly consolidated Harvard Art Museums, which opened in November, and New York’s latest gem, the Whitney Museum of American Art, which opened in April. Architecture reviews of the

Whitney have ranged from the mostly positive to the ecstatic, and all have agreed that the building’s inaugural exhibition, “America is Hard to See,” works wonderfully in the space. Piano even designed a handbag, produced by Max Mara, to match his museum (see page 30).

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PHOTO: COURTESY SCOFIDIO + RENFRO.

PHOTO: COURTESY RENZO PIANO BUILDING WORKSHOP.

Renzo Piano

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Elizabeth Diller, Ricardo Scofidio, & Charles Renfro

PHOTO: COURTESY SCOFIDIO + RENFRO.

PHOTO: COURTESY RENZO PIANO BUILDING WORKSHOP.

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Renfro discusses the design concepts behind two in-the-works Diller Scofidio + Renfro projects in California: a new home for the Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive (BAM/ PFA) and Stanford’s McMurtry Building for the department of art and art history.

building, and the new, sculpted addition is primarily a form determined by the theater of the Pacific Film Archive. [The addition] is expressive and enigmatic, more of a cipher. But it also leans on the existing building and embraces it, almost literally wrapping its arm over the existing building in a symbiotic way. In recent years, there’s been such a trend in The move [of the BAM/PFA] to downtown Berkeley was a response to several issues, architecture toward multidisciplinarity and one of which was the fragility of the Mario open space, open source, and shared space Ciampi building [which the museum occu- that enables—or forces—cross-disciplinary pied from 1970 to 2014]. The second was discourse to happen. At Stanford, what we a retrenchment from the iconic, starchitec- sought to do was to make a new series of ture-driven museums of the pre-recession. spaces that operate in a third language that’s And the third was a desire for museums to neither specific to a kind of program nor is be participants of the city and not stand off the forced collaborative space that you hear from the city—to be welcoming, engaging, about so much. It’s this third space of postransparent, and attractive. sibility that allows for serendipitous encounMany of our projects operate in a kind of ter, new ways of teaching and learning, but dialectical method where there are two sides it doesn’t force those activities onto people. to the story. At Stanford there are two inter- —As told to Dave Kim locking strands: the art history strand and the art-making strand. Those two sides of the program embrace and support each other. At the BAM/PFA, the existing building is a taut, Art Deco printing plant and administration

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Frank Gehry FOUNDER, GEHRY PARTNERS

Zaha Hadid

FOUNDER AND DIRECTOR, ZAHA HADID ARCHITECTS

You know someone is the Most Famous Architect in the World when, every time you describe another designer to a non-architecture person, you have to say “They’re like the Frank Gehry of [insert period/nation/ trend].” Rave reviews greeted Gehry’s recently completed Fondation Louis Vuitton in Paris,

and even if his next marquee project, the Guggenheim Abu Dhabi, doesn’t get quite the same treatment, it’ll only serve to enhance his already unparalleled name-recognition— and reputation.

When Hadid broke onto the scene in the late 1980s, many sober-minded observers insisted that none of her fantastical-seeming designs would ever be built. How wrong they were: Besides the commercial high-rises and cultural venues in China, the museums in Rome and Michigan, and the apartment buildings in

New York and Miami, Hadid is now bringing her sinuous, spacey, over-the-top sensibility to digitally designed clothing, vases, and even door handles.

The German-born, New York–based architect cut her teeth designing spaces for Manhattan’s art-world elite, becoming synonymous with the sleek simplicity of the white-box Chelsea gallery. But in just the last couple of years, she’s begun to emerge as something more. Selldorf’s newly unveiled design for the

Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego, and her nearly-complete 10 Bond condominium in Manhattan, show how the architect can deftly modulate from her low-key default setting to create subtle and sublime poetics of light, form, and space.

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PHOTO: BAS PRINCEN.

Annabelle Selldorf

PHOTO: JACOPO SPILIMBERGO.

Zaha Hadid’s Tau vases (2015) for Italian stone company Citco.

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Rafael Viñoly LEAD DESIGNER AND PRINCIPAL, RAFAEL VIÑOLY ARCHITECTS

Norman Foster CHAIRMAN AND FOUNDER, FOSTER + PARTNERS

Jacques Herzog & Pierre de Meuron FOUNDERS AND SENIOR PARTNERS, HERZOG & DE MEURON

Rem Koolhaas CO-FOUNDER AND PARTNER, OMA

PHOTO: BAS PRINCEN.

PHOTO: JACOPO SPILIMBERGO.

One of the most surprising developments of the last decade has been that Koolhaas—the Dutch master of the surreal and the subversive—has suddenly become an architect who actually seems to care about buildings, both old and new. This year sees the debut of his Fondazione Prada in Milan as well as the longdelayed Garage Museum in Moscow, both of them renovations of existing structures. It’s precisely Koolhaas’s irreverent historical outlook that has made him the go-to architect for these and other projects for some of the world’s biggest cultural players.

A courtyard view of the new Fondazione Prada, designed by OMA. 175

This is the designer for those who like their buildings straight-up, no chaser. And what could be more straight-up than Viñoly’s latest opus, 432 Park, now the third-tallest building in the United States. The project is just one long structural tube with some of the best residential views in Manhattan. And if all goes

according to plan, it’s set to get a sister tower, with the proposed 125 Greenwich rivaling the nearby World Trade Center. Viñoly may not be one for frills or spills, but he still manages to thrill, pairing his longstanding portfolio of institutional projects with this new batch of mega high-rises.

The heir to the great tradition of visionary architect-engineers like Buckminster Fuller, Foster has been called the “high priest of high tech,” the world’s foremost purveyor of hyper-modern structural expression. Condo towers in New York, the United Arab Emirates pavilion at the 2015 Milan Expo, a

winery in Bordeaux—Foster seems to be everywhere. If one were really lucky, he or she might have gotten a Foster of their own this spring: His ex-wife just auctioned off her custom-designed wedding band.

There’s no easy way to sum up the work of the dynamic Swiss team whose ongoing projects range from the new Vancouver Art Gallery to an Ian Schrager hotel-condo tower in Manhatttan’s East Village. Their approach could be characterized as a sort of formal gamesmanship—a Napa winery built out of gabion boxes, the Beijing Olympic Stadium

composed of repeated banded strips—but whatever it is, it’s captured the global imagination and catapulted the firm to the top.

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David Chipperfield PRINCIPAL, DAVID CHIPPERFIELD ARCHITECTS Last year, Chipperfield was appointed artistic director of Driade, an Italian brand known for its ecclectic furniture collections. The position, to essentially reinvent what had become a somewhat staid, financially distressed company, may seem an unusual—or at least unnecessary—role for an architect and designer already in his prime. But Driade’s history befits Chipperfield’s penchant for distinctive, well-made things. Founded in Milan in 1968 by Enrico Astori (with his sister, Antonia, and wife, Adelaide Acerbi), Driade was the first company to put into commercial production Philippe Starck’s Café Costes chair, in 1984. Once a powerhouse of edgy and unpredictable furniture and accessories, Driade had fallen on hard times by 2013—until the Italian Creation Group rescued it. Now, as CEO Stefano Core says, Driade seeks “to reinforce brand awareness with a younger, international audience.” Chipperfield, who conceived the brand’s new interior concept and organized its newest collection, is a crucial part of this. His firm remains as in-demand as ever: Chipperfield has been chosen to extend the Metropolitan Museum in New York, to redevelop the Royal Academy in London, and to design the Nobel Prize Centre in Stockholm, even as his latest museum to open, the Museo delle Culture (MUDEC) in Milan, has been the subject of a clash with Milan Minister of Culture Filippo del Corno. Here, Chipperfield speaks about his work for and with Driade and beyond.

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PHOTOS: TOP, COURTESY ARTEMIDE. BOTTOM, COURTESY DRIADE.

Why am I tied in with Driade? The reason people, skilled workers in metal, stone, marble. for accepting the role of creative director is Yes, the whole dynamic of manufacturing furcomplicated and based on an appeal from its niture in Italy is fantastic, and yes, it is still founder, Enrico Astori. I’ve been operating there. You couldn’t dissemble it, that tradition out of Milan for 17 years, I know him well, of father and son passing on their skills and and they had hit hard times. The whole furni- heritage. Whether it’s with Driade, B&B Italia, ture industry in Italy is struggling, and Driade or Valentino, there’s a healthy understanding has been struggling with it. It’s a very personal between the designer and maker in Italy. company, a family business, and both Enrico For over 15 years, I committed to Italy, and his sister are in their 80s—and his wife had building an office there, designing shops for died. So there was this crisis of heritage. Valentino and Dolce & Gabbana. I never got The question is, how do you build upon a any architecture commissions in England— slightly idiosyncratic heritage firmly based on Issey Miyake’s shop was the first thing I ever an extraordinary design culture after the world did, followed by Katharine Hamnett. I ran my of Albini and Ponti? The answer: Go back to office on frock shops; I built a brand. Those the archives. kinds of interiors could be built quickly and Instead of the rejuvenation of Driade being interleafed with big projects as we grew. I won lots of new designers, I thought, let’s first of competitions abroad, and I began designing all reassess what Driade has achieved in the for Italian companies in the ’90s, when there last 50 years—and remind people that this is was the “clean hands” initiative, which led the origin of the company, and also the origins to a series of public scandals as alleged corof design in Italy. And what furniture was like ruption was exposed. The competitions were in the 1960s and what it is now. In the new well-organized and judged. I’m still buildshowroom, an entire floor is dedicated to the ing three of my winning projects: the San historic pieces of the company dating from Michele Cemetery in Venice, where we’ve 1968 to 1982. I think there’s a certain origi- completed one courtyard in 12 years; the nality and freshness in those pieces, which is Salerno Law Courts, which I won in 1999; and missing in so much contemporary furniture. the Ethnography museum in Ansaldo, the last For this year’s Salone del Mobile, I put into part of MUDEC [Museum of Cultures], due production two pieces from the ’70s—Enzo to open in October. Mari’s Sof Sof chair [1971] and his Elisa sofa— We had a row earlier this year over MUDEC, and reissued from the ’90s Konstantin Grcic’s the Museo delle Culture in Milan. If the city Zigzag bookcase [1996] and my own design doesn’t want to do what you want to do, it’s up for the cone-shaped adjustable Evelyn light, to you to act. It’s a long story. It was building which I designed 15 years ago for the Shore against all odds. The building isn’t bad, but you Club Hotel in Miami. can’t compromise on fundamentals. A director I like Enzo Mari. His Frate table designed of works started to compromise two years ago, at the end of the ’70s sells as well today as and in the last 18 months, the floors—50,000 it did then. It’s a great example of original square feet of basalt—were laid wrongly, design and is so appropriate for Driade today during which time I did not take one penny because of its independence of spirit. He of fees. Calling in a stone company for analydidn’t come up with a table like that to fill a sis, they said after tests, “Give us six weeks market slot. He doesn’t give a fuck; he’s not to fix it, and 300,000 euros. The city, having interested in appealing to the customer. He ignored the fault, said to the stone company, may be the grumpiest man on the planet, but “We thought you might do it for nothing!” Six his designs are still bestsellers, really market- weeks before the opening, the Culture Minster friendly though not market-placed. What’s said in front of 30 Italian journalists, “We’re so nice about his Elisa sofa is that he made sick and tired of working with Chipperfield,” the prototype and lived with it at home, sat citing the stone laying. I didn’t bring it to the on it every day. When we borrowed it to put public. The Anglo-Saxon journalists, as usual, back into production, we asked, “Why, when accused me of being in a tantrum and were it was originally made, was it upholstered in told that David Chipperfield Architects got brown?” He said, “No, no, the original color three million euros for the project—but it’s was white!” not true! Online sites need headlines to get the Konstantin Grcic is a friend of mine, an hits, so around the world went the news that independent spirit, not a slick formalist. His David Chipperfield hits the roof in Milan. It Zigzag is a really nice contribution to the col- just wasn’t true. lection. When you see the Zigzag shelves, you I always say, “Don’t wrestle with the chimsee that Konstantin was just trying to work ney sweep. After an hour, both will be covered something out; it’s old-fashioned in that way. in dirt.” After 15 years, you can’t take your It’s a combination of an idea, technology and name off a building, but as a citizen I’m pissed the tectonic, a real piece of furniture making. off. —As told to Nonie Niesewand I would say that the whole tradition of Italian design is no longer there. It’s much more formalist. The makers are still there, teams of

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(TOP TO BOTTOM) David Chipperfield’s new Vigo wall lamp for Artemide, released at this year’s Salone del Mobile fair. Driade’s Milan showroom, designed by Chipperfield.

PHOTOS: TOP, COURTESY ARTEMIDE. BOTTOM, COURTESY DRIADE.

Contributors to this year’s Power 100 list: Spencer Bailey, Charles Curkin, Natasha Edwards, Tiffany Jow, Dave Kim, Roxy Kirshenbaum, Jordan Kushins, Aileen Kwun, Julia Lu, Shirine Saad, Jonathan Schultz, Ian Volner, Hally Wolhandler 177

Gallery & Culture Club Twelve U.S. designers pay homage to the iconic Coca-Cola bottle in celebration of its 100th year. A photo portfolio of recent events in the Surface universe, including Fondazione Pradaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s venue opening in Milan.

Interviews by Spencer Bailey

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This year marks the centennial of one of America’s most iconic design objects: the Coca-Cola bottle. In 1915, the soft-drink company sent out a call for a new bottle design. The winning solution came from Indiana-based Root Glass Company, led by president Chapman J. Root, who worked with designer Earl R. Dean. While researching at a library, Dean and the company’s auditor, Clyde Edwards, discovered an illustration of a cocoa pod in Encyclopedia Britannica, leading to the bottle’s unforgettably curvaceous shape. Many iterations and updates have happened since— a plastic bottle in the late 1960s, the first aluminum version in 2005—and the design has also spawned works of art, namely silkscreens by Andy Warhol. Currently on view at Atlanta’s High Museum of Art, the exhibition “The CocaCola Bottle: An American Icon at 100” (through Oct. 4) celebrates this history. Among the pieces in the show is a 1916 version of the bottle (see the opposite page), slightly more slender than the original design. In light of this occasion, Surface reached out to 12 designers working in the United States with a straightforward yet open-ended brief: create an object inspired from the original Coca-Cola bottle design that somehow dispenses the beverage. The results vary widely, and not all the designers stuck to the request—New York–based Leon Ransmeier, for example, ditched packaging all together and instead created a Coca-Cola Tablet; Los Angeles–based Nolen Niu devised an updated version of a soda siphon. The concepts on the pages that follow suggest Coca-Cola executives may very well consider launching another call-out. >

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Amina Horozic, 32 San Francisco â&#x20AC;&#x153;There is no avoiding the fact that Coca-Cola bottle is one of the most recognizable product forms in history. I wanted to create a celebration of the Coke brand with a design that preserves its near-immortal product silhouette. The resulting vessel embraces the icon in a subtle way, respecting its heritage and transforming the ubiquitous into something precious. Thick walls of cast, green-tinted glass optically morph and distort the familiar inner form of a Coke bottle. The soft outer shape invites the hand and provides a material heft that elevates the act of pouring. A glass stopper topped by a red anodized aluminum cap protects its contents while allowing the vessel to be used again and again.â&#x20AC;?

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Joe Doucet, 44 New York City “I grew up in working-class environment, and pocket money was challenging to come by as a child. One of my most coveted indulgences was an ice-cold bottle of Coke, which could be purchased at Luke’s Store in Fordoche, Louisiana, for exactly 25 cents, including a 5-cent deposit on the glass bottle. At around 7 years old, I learned that if I were to collect just five empty bottles and return them, Mr. Luke would hand me a quarter, which I could put into the machine and retrieve a new bottle of Coke. I delighted in the fact that I would immediately be a fifth of the way to purchasing my next bottle once I factored in the nickel the

bottle was worth (after I had drained it prior to even leaving the store). I can recall vividly the weight of the empty bottles I collected, straining against aching arms, and the release I felt handing them over, knowing the awaiting reward. The alchemy of turning empty glass into a delightful refreshment using only hard work as currency has stuck with me. It became the starting point for this design. I chose a block of glass with an idealized version of the form that only becomes truly visible when filled with Coke—a simple-but-potent reminder of the lessons of my first entrepreneurial endeavor.”

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David Rockwell, 58 New York City “We based our design for a new Coke bottle on the classic 1915 contour bottle. We love it because it’s a beautiful object, but the real virtue was that it was refilled over and over again at local Coca-Cola bottling plants. Each city had its own bottling plant, which was often family-owned. Through reuse, the bottle developed this beautiful beach glass patina. Our new bottle wants to retain the iconic form with those same virtues of being local and recycled. A double-walled stainless steel container can be refilled at vending machines at home and around the world. Stickers dispensed from different vending machines would customize the bottle and track its journey, like travel stickers on vintage luggage.”

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Felicia Ferrone, 42 Chicago “My proposed bottle retains the trademark shape with jewel like facets, emphasizing Coca-Cola’s qualities of timelessness and preciousness. It looks to be the future of Coca-Cola as its new icon for the next 100 years. The bottle itself has always been considered ephemera and a collector’s item, and this bottle will takes its place in that lineage. It elevates the contents, giving it an even more precious quality, creating a luxury for all. The bottle is made of the signature Georgia Green glass and integrates the iconic logo onto the bottle itself, just as the original bottles were branded.”

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Frederick McSwain, 37 New York City “The classic Coca-Cola bottle always has a way of sparking my sense of nostalgia. Childhood summers of amusement parks, frozen treats, and ‘suicides’ at soda fountains became the driving catalysts when contemplating the bottle’s 100th anniversary. Coke seemed to always be in the mix. In homage to the original 1915 design and all its subsequent iterations, my project is a light-hearted nod to the timeless icon. Instead of reimagining the bottle itself, I aimed to create a playful companion, designed to offer personalization to both experience and taste.”

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Gregory Buntain, 31, and Ian Collings, 29 Brooklyn â&#x20AC;&#x153;We appreciate the mass-manufacturing process of the original mold-blown glass bottle, as well as its material qualities, so we decided to utilize that process as a design constraint to work within. There was no denying the functionality of the iconic 1915 hobble skirt design weâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re celebrating, so we wanted to translate that into our own language rather than dismiss it. The result is a modern take on the iconic form that references the original bubbly vertical ribs in the form of 10 vertical faces that are then divided horizontally by pushing and pulling points to mimic the original form, resulting in a total of 100 celebratory facets.â&#x20AC;?

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Dana D’Amico, 37 New York City “In approaching this design challenge, I realized the classic 1955 glass Coca-Cola bottle was to be celebrated, not altered. As my work explores the juxtaposition of texture and form, I designed a fine etched pattern broken up by the contours of the bottle. My goal was to enhance the quiet beauty of the bottle while adding a tactile experience for the user and paying homage to this design icon.”

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Marc Thorpe, 36 New York City â&#x20AC;&#x153;The design of this carafe is directly inspired by the architecture of the original 1915 bottle. The frosted glass vessel appears to be suspended in space above a high polished darkened steel base. On the base is the laser-engraved logo of Coca-Cola. I wanted to produce a form that not only reflects the historical references of the past, but also symbolizes movement toward the future. The carafeâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s inspired details include the exaggerated curvature of the 1915 glass body, frosted pale green glass, vertical top to bottom fluting, and a polished steel cap.â&#x20AC;?

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Leon Ransmeier, 35 New York City “In response to the ever-increasing concern about packaging waste and resource-intensive logistics, we chose to eliminate the bottle altogether. Rather than create another plastic or glass container for what is predominantly water, we’ve designed a super-concentrated carbonated lozenge. Simply drop the Coca-Cola Tablet into 16 ounces of cold water and it effervesces to create a refreshing glass of Coca-Cola in less than a minute. Roughly the same diameter as a traditional bottle cap, the Coca-Cola Tablet simultaneously references both candy and medicine, raising interesting questions about health and soft-drink consumption.”

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Liz Daily, 30 Chicago â&#x20AC;&#x153;My bottle is a bit of a shape-shifting, origami-inspired design. The bottle is rigid plastic and silicone, so the shapes can change and squish to form the iconic bottle shape, but also deform and move for different curves and varieties. The interaction and playful form are my translation of the fun of the Coca-Cola brand and bottle.â&#x20AC;?

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Jonathan Nesci, 33 Columbus, Indiana “When this project was presented, it appeared to me that it was about legacy. Specifically, how to embrace the strong, culturally significant history of the Coke bottle and its identifiable and celebrated contour. I also knew I wanted to express something new. My home in Columbus, Indiana, holds one of the country’s early Coca-Cola bottling plants, a franchise that dates back to 1912. Many times during the week I would pass the facility and take for granted that it was right in my own backyard. I recently took a tour of the space from a passionate third-generation owner and quickly realized that the Coke bottle, in essence, is also rooted in commerce. The specifics of this project

started where most of my works start: geometry. I found the hyphen in the Coca-Cola logo was in fact a rhombus, which inspired the hex shape. By changing the footprint of the bottle to a hexagon, I was able to add efficiency and update the look in a subtle way, allowing the forms to interconnect without wasting space during shipment. I knew I did not want to completely abandon the iconic silhouette, and I was able to modernize the look and feel of the bottle while still keeping it recognizable to all.”

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Nolen Niu, 40 Los Angeles “I have a love/hate relationship with the two-liter bottle of Coke. I love that it’s two liters of thirst-quenching CocaCola Classic, but I hate that it becomes flat and fizzle-free practically the moment you open the bottle. The soda siphon has been around as early as the 1800s. Once bottled carbonated drinks became more readily available, the siphon quickly became a relic. Here, I’ve created a modern-day concept that plays with an old idea. The design of the Coca-Cola Siphon has a couple notable features, such as the thumb stop above the dispensing button (to insure stability and control when serving), and the nozzle and button are reminiscent of a fountain gun.

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The handle and siphon straw are composed of brushed stainless steel, and the siphon spout and bottle connector are made of anodized aluminum, in order to achieve Coke’s signature red color. Once its user has a two-liter bottle of Coke in hand, they can simply uncap the bottle, screw into place the siphon, gently shake the bottle a few times (to allow the carbonation to build up), and then press the button on the back of the handle to dispense the Coke the way it should be.”

QUI PLATINUM EXTRA AÑEJO TEQUILA

TASTE THE UNSEEN

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Culture Club Edited by Roxy Kirshenbaum Cinco de Mayo Tequila Tasting at Tijuana Picnic To celebrate Cinco de Mayo, Jon Neidich and Jean-Marc Houmard hosted a private dinner and tequila tasting at their new restaurant, Tijuana Picnic, on Manhattanâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Lower East Side. The menu aims to elevate casual Mexican fare to something more in the fine-dining vein. Guests included Christopher Kane, Kate Young, Amirah Kassem (pictured), and Sabine Heller. (Photo: Ben Rosser/bfanyc.com) 195

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“Four Decades” Reception at the Paul Kasmin Gallery On May 7, New York’s Paul Kasmin Gallery hosted a reception for “Four Decades,” its first exhibition of photography by Tina Barney (pictured). Eleven of the artist’s most iconic large-scale fine art and editorial photographs were on display in the 10th Avenue space. Barney’s work reveals candid moments in the elusive lives of the American and European upper class. Several of her subjects were guests at the reception. (Photo: Sam Deitch/bfanyc.com) 197

CULTURE CLUB Miu Miu Opening in the Miami Design District (LEFT) On April 30, Miu Miu celebrated (in partnership with ArtBinder) the opening of its new store in the Miami Design District with a cocktail reception inside the new space. Drinks were followed by a seated dinner at the nearby Cypress Room with guests including Natalie Joos, Andi Potamkin, Marvin Ross Friedman (pictured, with Adrienne Bon Haes), and Meg Sharpe. (Photo: Getty Images)

The New York Edition and Frieze Opening Parties (TOP RIGHT) To announce its launch, Ian Schrager’s New York Edition hotel hosted a week of events featuring a celebrity guest list from the art and fashion worlds. W magazine editor Stefano Tonchi joined Schrager for an opening party that also doubled as a celebration for the magazine’s annual Art Issue. Later in the week, fashion label Maiyet hosted a cocktail party with Milk Made and Conscious Commerce to celebrate the upcoming weekend of the Frieze Art Fair. Guests throughout the week included Leonardo DiCaprio, Hans Ulrich Obrist, Barbara Bush, Olivia Wilde, Richard Armstrong, and Yigal Azrouël. (Photo: bfanyc.com)

Alex Katz Collaboration Party (BOTTOM RIGHT) On May 13, Barneys New York hosted a celebration for its collaboration with Art Production Fund and renowned artist Alex Katz (pictured, with Dennis Freedman) at the Barneys flagship store. Cocktails were shared at the private party while the artist signed copies of the book he published especially for the collection, which comprises home goods and accessories. The line features Katz’s iconic line drawings joined by a 60-foot mural on display in all four of the store’s Madison Avenue windows. (Photo: David X Prutting/bfanyc.com)

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Club Monaco Presentation On April 22, Club Monaco presented its 2015 women’s and men’s collections alongside an assortment of food and cocktails prepared by famed chef Mads Refslund and mixologist Søren Krogh. The event, hosted at an Upper East Side townhome, was transformed to reflect the look, feel, and style of Club Monaco stores. Guests included Patrizio Bertelli (pictured on the left, with Damien Hirst), Leandra Medine, Hilary Rhoda, Kate Foley, and Chelsea Leyland. (Photo: bfanyc.com) 200

CULTURE CLUB Guggenheim Young Collectors Party On March 19, New York’s Guggenheim Museum hosted its annual Young Collectors Party. Sponsored by DeLeón Tequila, the event featured cocktails, as well as kale and purple cauliflower salad and filet mignon. A musical performance by D.J. Afrika Bambaataa kept the pulse of the event lively. Fashion designers Prabal Gurung and Peter Dundas made appearances. Other notable guests included Nell Diamond, Evan and Ku-Ling Yurman, Dree Hemingway, Bee Shaffer, Ines Toledano, and Selby Drummond. (Photo: Jerritt Clark/Splash)

Moschino Late Night with Jeremy Scott at Coachella On April 11, designer and Moschino creative director Jeremy Scott hosted a party, sponsored by DeLeón Tequila, at the Coachella music festival in Bermuda Dunes. Skrillex and Diplo deejayed throughout the night while guests danced and sipped Deleón cocktails. Adorning the event were oversized Moschino pool toys and giant teddy bears. Katy Perry, Fergie (pictured, with Scott), Robert Pattinson, FKA Twigs, Jourdan Dunn, Zoe Kravitz, and Alexander Wang were among the guests. (Photo: Michael Simon/ Startraks Photo) 201

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LACMA 50th Anniversary Gala To celebrate LACMA’s 50th Anniversary, the museum hosted a gala on April 19 to debut an exhibition of major gifts, “50 for 50: Gifts on the Occasion of LACMA’s Anniversary.” The gala welcomed more than 750 guests and raised $5 million for the museum’s programming. Cloud drummers welcomed attendees on the red carpet and an unveiling of the exhibit followed a cocktail reception. The evening culminated with a special performance by Seal. Guests included Hitoshi Abe, Frank Gehry, Hans Ulrich Obrist, Stewart and Lynda Resnick (pictured, with Katherine Ross and Michael Govan), and Barbra Streisand. (Photo: Getty Images)

NEW MUSEUM GALA

Fondazione Prada Opening Dinner The Fondazione Prada venue in Milan, designed by OMA, hosted a formal dinner on May 3 to celebrate its opening on May 9. (For more on the Fondazione, see page 134.) The building, a former distillery, is located in an industrial complex that OMA preserved while also adding new structures to create constant interaction. Guests at the dinner included Prada’s Patrizio Bertelli (pictured left), artist Damien Hirst (right), Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi, Mayor of Milan Giuliano Pisapia, Rem Koolhaas, Hans Ulrich Obrist, Michael Govan, and Okwui Enwezor. (Photo: Getty Images)

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CULTURE CLUB 40th Pritzker Prize Ceremony in Miami This yearâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s late Pritzker Prize laureate Frei Otto was honored with a black-tie dinner and award ceremony at the New World Center in Miami Beach on May 16. A four-point tensile tent designed by Otto (and reconstructed by Shigeru Ban) was made for the event. Architect Christine Otto-Kanstinger accepted the award on behalf of her father. Guests included former Pritzker Prize laureates Norman Foster, Zaha Hadid (pictured, with Patrik Schumacher), Glenn Murcutt, and Jean Nouvel. (Photo: John Parra/Getty Images)

Met Gala After-Party at the Mark Hotel On May 4, after the 2015 Met Gala, the worldâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s fashion elite gathered at the Mark Hotel for an evening of celebration hosted by Michael Kors. Guests were treated to a special performance by Miguel at the Mark Restaurant by Jean-Georges and partied early into the morning. Attendees included Alexa Chung, Anna Wintour, Joan Smalls, Mario Testino (pictured), and Michael Bloomberg. (Photo: Ryan Kobane/bfanyc .com) SURFACE

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CULTURE CLUB “The Convergence of Art and Architecture” at Soho House For this year’s Frieze Art Fair, Soho House New York and BMWi collaborated to host an art talk titled “The Convergence of Art and Architecture.” British architect David Adjaye and Art in America editor-in-chief Lindsay Pollock (pictured, with Adjaye) led a discussion on Adjaye’s recent projects and how their design elements support the creation of art. Among those in attendance were Helen Toomer, Elissa Edgerton Black, David van der Leer, Ricardo Vecchio, and Jennifer Weiss. (Photo: Zac Waldmab)

ICFF Opening Party at MoMA British designer Tom Dixon brought his new collection of Melt lighting to ICFF from May 16–19 and celebrated this year’s ICFF at MoMA, where he performed with his band, Rough. The sold-out event hosted 1,200 attendees, who listened to a band comprising Bradford Shellhammer (of the e-commerce platform Bezar), Del Marquis, and John Weingarten, as well as Dixon. During the fair, Dixon’s booth also featured the Wingback chair, Cog candelabra, and Etch light pendants. (Photo: Emily Andrews) SURFACE

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Boiler Alert

THE MUJI KETTLE BY THE NUMBERS:

2.4 Weight, in pounds, including the base charger 7.7 Height, in inches, including the base charger 500 Water capacity, in milliliters 80 Time it takes, in seconds, to boil 150 mL of water 5 Number of prototypes developed before Muji decided a final design 20 Number of team members involved in the kettleâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s design and production 5,000 A ge, in years, of the Chinese earthenware that inspired the kettleâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s design 500 Number of stores in which the kettle will be sold 95 Price, in dollars 25 N umber of years Muji has been making home appliances 40 Total number of appliances Muji offers

PHOTO: COURTESY MUJI.

In July, Muji launches a new collection of home appliances designed by Naoto Fukasawa, including this kettle steeped in Japanese tradition.

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