The Style Special: September 2020 Issue

uk £10.00 us $16.99 aus $16.99 cdn $17.99 dkk 129.95 fr €14.0 de €14.90 ita €14.50 jpn ¥2000 sgp $28.50 es €14.00 chf 18.90 aed 85.00

*Architecture � Design � Art � Travel � Entertaining � Beauty & Grooming � Transport � Technology � Fashion � Watches & Jewellery

september 2020

SEPTEMBER 2020

INNER VISION

The Style Special

Style Special Virgil Abloh and Mercedes-Benz | Clare Strand | David Adjaye and Samuel Ross | Silvia Rosi | Claudia Comte

G-FORCE Virgil Abloh switches gear with Mercedes-Benz LAB WORK The serious science of beauty at LVMH WAY FINDERS David Adjaye and Samuel Ross talk new directions

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DISTANCE LEARNING How the Covid crisis reframed fashion

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SEPTEMBER

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FASHION

124

Next up New York’s need-to-know fashion talent

146

Master clash Material contrast as Dior Men jewellery pays homage to Judy Blame

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Making tracks Hussein Chalayan’s musical foray Tool master The fine art of horological decoration at Jaeger-LeCoultre Path finder Mateo founder Matthew Harris on jewellery, Jamaica and dreaming big

Cut & fold Clare Strand’s 3D fashion challenge Mission ready Menswear looks to the future Self-composed Silvia Rosi puts fringing in the picture ARCHITECTURE

100 118

Pop star A hotly hued Hollywood Hills home Sharp turn Simplicity with soul for an Indian temple ARTIST CLARE STRAND GIVES FASHION A NEW DIMENSION. COAT, £4,350, BY BALENCIAGA. SEE PAGE 124

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SEPTEMBER FOOD

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Artist’s palate Claudia Comte’s ‘Eggplant Baby’ FRONT OF BOOK

049 ‘COALESCE’, BY STUDIO TRULY TRULY, PART OF THE UPCOMING ‘KNIT! BY KVADRAT’ EXHIBITION IN COPENHAGEN, SEE PAGE 094

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ART

104

Auto motif Virgil Abloh and Mercedes-Benz reimagine the brand’s classic G-Wagen BEAUTY

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Secret vials The serious science of Dior beauty at LVMH’s Hélios R&D centre in France

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Rising above Brussels-based Cobra Studios makes a bold breakthrough Place maker Armani Casa celebrates 20 years of interior style Close knit Emerging designers stretch the scope of Kvadrat Febrik textiles

The Vinson View Hotel San Pietro’s spaghetti al limone, and other reasons to love Italy INTELLIGENCE

078 114

DESIGN

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Newspaper Womenswear’s in chains; menswear’s all for leather; specs are lightening up; and homemade pies are on the menu

Dual purpose David Adjaye and Samuel Ross talk anti-racism and creative futures The show must go on Fashion’s Covid-enforced digitisation has been a revelation, opening up a world of new possibilities MEDIA

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WallpaperSTORE* Refined design, delivered to your door RESOURCES

168

Stockists What you want and where to get it

Wallpaper.com facebook.com/wallpapermagazine @wallpapermag @wallpapermag

Editorial Editor-in-Chief Sarah Douglas Senior Editor Nick Compton Executive Editor Bridget Downing Commissioning Editor TF Chan Art Deputy Art Director Anne-Laure Fuchs Designer Ben Rimmer Junior Designer Daniel Faltys Photography Photography Director Holly Hay Assistant Photography Editor Sophie Gladstone

Architecture / Design

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Nick Vinson Isabelle Kountoure Emma O’Kelly Hugo Macdonald Henrietta Thompson Suzanne Trocmé Alice Morby

Interiors

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Watches & Jewellery

Arts Editor, Digital Harriet Lloyd-Smith

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Interiors Editor Hannah Jordan Deputy Interiors Editor Olly Mason Interiors Coordinator Jacqui Scalamera Travel Travel Editor Lauren Ho Entertaining / Beauty Entertaining Director Melina Keays

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THE MERCY COLLECTION

W W W.G E O R G J E N S E N .C O M CO P E N H A G E N • STO CK H O LM • LO N D O N • N E W YO R K • SY D N EY • TO KYO • MU N I CH • S I N GA PO R E • TA I P E I

CONTRIBUTORS BAFIC Photographer Remote photography has its upsides, says Bafic, who shot Virgil Abloh and Gorden Wagener, chief design officer at MercedesBenz, for our story on their art-car project (page 104): ‘It all feels heightened. The funnier moments are funnier, the awkward moments are more awkward, but the silent moments are mostly because of bad internet connection. I used a combination of Zoom, Microsoft Teams and vMix Call to take the portraits. I then used my printer and camera to re-shoot the images. A copy of a copy.’

LIZ JOHNSON ARTUR Photographer

JACQUETTA WHEELER Model

‘David Adjaye was my first Zoom portrait,’ says Johnson Artur, who also shot Samuel Ross, founder of fashion label A-Cold-Wall*, in person. ‘It felt a bit like shooting the unknown,’ she says of the remote job. ‘I tried to apply the same feeling to my encounter with Samuel.’ See the portraits on page 078, where Adjaye and Ross talk creative futures.

Known for documenting the lives of people of African descent, Johnson Artur is currently making a book about PDA.

Wheeler brought her celebrated poise to the photographs taken by George Harvey and styled by Wallpaper’s Jason Hughes for artist Clare Strand’s intervention (page 124). ‘It was great to get back to set after lockdown,’ she says, adding that the period ‘had the positive effect of reigniting my own passion for photography. So I’ve been working on my portfolio and find myself asking photographers lots of questions when I work with them. Hopefully it’s not too annoying!’

CLAUDIA COMTE Artist Comte’s evocatively named ‘Eggplant Baby’, an Italian-American dish believed to have childbirth-inducing powers, features on our Artist’s Palate page (p170). Combining geometric rigour, playful ambition, a penchant for ‘the memory of materials’, and a love of the planet, the Swiss artist has had a meteoric rise in the past few years. Having welcomed her first-born this February, she is preparing for a solo exhibition at Austria’s Kunstraum Dornbirn, to open 26 November.

038

CLARE STRAND Artist

LYNETTE NYLANDER Writer

‘The project is an effort to go beyond the traditional fashion page and take it to a third dimension,’ says the British conceptual artist of her 22-page story for us (page 124).

Casting geometry nets over George Harvey’s black and white photographs of the season’s looks, she urges readers to get creative with scissors, folding and glue sticks. Nominated for the Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation Prize, to be awarded in September, Strand is currently showing at The Photographers’ Gallery, London.

‘Matthew Harris is incredibly charming,’ says Nylander, who was tasked with interviewing the founder of the New Yorkbased jewellery brand Mateo (page 098).

‘He was a delight to speak to. He’s got such great vision for what his brand is and where it’s going. And he even had time on the call to give me travel tips on Jamaica, my favourite place in the world.’ An alumna of Forbes magazine’s ‘30 Under 30’ in the media, Nylander is originally from London and now lives in New York.

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EDITOR’S LETTER

Let’s Get Physical Newsstand cover

by Clare Strand Photography:

George Harvey Fashion: Jason Hughes Model: Jacquetta Wheeler See page 124, where Clare Strand encourages readers to take our fashion story to a new dimension.

Have your scissors at the ready

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We are living and working in a world that has digitally accelerated – and it is this heightened sense of the virtual, combined with a relative withdrawal from the external world, that has emphasised our engagement with our own physical products, spaces and environments. And our two covers have fully embraced this.

For her newsstand cover and 22-page feature, conceptual artist Clare Strand was inspired by Edwin Abbott Abbott’s Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions to create a series of graphic interventions on George Harvey’s black-and-white fashion photography. She was drawn to the idea of readers engaging and interacting with the images and even creating their own artworks. Much like the protagonist of Flatland, we’re being challenged by Strand to seek a new perspective, cutting and folding to create three-dimensional objects from the two-dimensional templates presented on the pages. The monochrome palette accentuated Strand’s geometric forms, with the artist explaining ‘it helps boil the world down its essentials’.

Virgil Abloh contributes our limitededition cover to coincide with his collaboration with Mercedes-Benz (see our feature, page 104). He was likewise drawn to the idea of cutting as activation, creating a dotted-line-with-scissors graphic to encourage readers to cut the magazine in half. It’s a bold gesture that celebrates the tactility and sheer actuality of print. Reinforcing engagement with the physical object, Abloh explained he wants people’s fingerprints to be left on the matte white surface. He will be personally cutting a special series of 100 copies, videoing the process (see Wallpaper.com and @wallpapermag) and selling these on canary---yellow.com, with all proceeds

going to the Virgil Abloh™ “Post Modern” Scholarship Fund to benefit Black students of academic promise.

September Wallpaper* is our Style Special and reflects the seemingly effortless talent of our fashion director Jason Hughes.

With ideas and vision aplenty, he has injected such a modern, fresh take on the season. He’s also mastered new ways of working in the era of social distancing, styling via Zoom and calmly taking challenges in his stride.

Harriet Quick tackles this changing fashion landscape in her piece, ‘The Show Must Go On’, surveying the industry’s innovative solutions to limitations on travel and public gatherings. While producing this issue, we witnessed the birth of shows-in-abox – notably with Loewe and its exquisite and collectable M/M Paris-designed cabinet of curiosities, and Bottega Veneta’s Tyrone Lebon film, which came in a green neon box with projector included. They’re finding ways to still be physical, to engage, to touch. We’re craving this now and brands are responding. But it’s the co-existence that is most exciting, how far we can push the digital experience and make the physical more desirable, more intimate.

Elsewhere, we celebrate Armani Casa’s 20th anniversary with a peek into the home of a pair of imaginary clients; Tilly Macalister-Smith talks to David Adjaye and Samuel Ross in a wide-ranging conversation touching on architecture, fashion, anti-racism and the future of the creative industries in a post-Covid world; artist Silvia Rosi delivers the season’s finest womenswear in a series of self-portraits; and Jaeger-LeCoultre peels back the curtain on the rare craft of guilloché.

Enjoy the issue!

Sarah Douglas, Editor-in-Chief

Limited-edition cover

by Virgil Abloh

Abloh created our special cover in a nod to the physicality and tactility of the printed magazine, inviting readers to cut along the dotted line. See our interview on page 104, where he discusses his new collaboration with Mercedes-Benz Limited-edition covers are available to subscribers, see Wallpaper.com

Tangente Update. Made in Germany. The bestselling NOMOS model is now available as Tangente neomatik 41 Update—with the patented ring date and an innovative mechanical movement. This automatic timepiece has received a number of awards,

including the Grand Prix d’Horlogerie de Genève. Find it now at selected retailers, as well as here: nomos-glashuette.com

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Newspaper* Wallpaper’s hot pick of the latest global goings-on Dress, £17, 985; tank top, worn underneath, £530; boots, £1,155, all by Salvatore Ferragamo For stockists throughout, see page 168

Think links this season as fashion enjoys a chain reaction

Model: Bethany Erin Duffy at Linden Staub. Hair and make-up: Laura Taff. On-set tailor: Katie Barclay

Hot metal

PHOTOGRAPHY AND SET DESIGN: ADAM BARCLAY FASHION: JASON HUGHES WRITER: TILLY MACALISTER-SMITH

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049

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Newspaper

ina Arena said it first. I’m in chains.

Perhaps it’s the new challenges of restricted movement, or an eagerness to break free of domestic monotony; chains are chiming with the times.

Paul Andrew, confidently proving his might as the creative director of Salvatore Ferragamo, delivers an exquisite column dress crafted from fluid strands of flat gold chains, with loose ends that dance around the legs.

It recalls the drapery of the dresses of Greek goddesses that he pinned to his mood board, and also nods to the exuberance of the Roaring Twenties.

At Bottega Veneta, Daniel Lee wove chains into the necklines of knitted sweater dresses, while at Boss, buttons were replaced with chain fastenings.

Accessories, too, are linking up.

JW Anderson launches its ‘Lid Chain Bag’ this autumn. Playing with proportion, the perfectly sized bag is embellished with four giant gold links.

Hermès’ suede court shoe rests on a heel of silver chain link. And at Saint Laurent, Anthony Vaccarello dressed models in choker-style chain necklaces, from hefty loops to neat links, against bare skin or over featherweight blouses.

T

Above left, jacket, £2,020; blouse, £960; shorts; £610; necklace, £615; belt, £350, all by Saint Laurent

by Anthony Vaccarello Above right, shoes, £1,700,

by Hermès Right, coat, £1,835; bag, £1,045, both by JW Anderson

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051

This page, left, shirt, £2,350; roll-neck, worn underneath, £645; trousers, £2,800; bag, €1,650, all by Dolce & Gabbana

Opposite, jacket, £5,400; shirt, £795; trousers, £855, all

by Louis Vuitton. Boots, £985,

by Ermenegildo Zegna XXX

Above, bag, £1,350, by Dunhill

I

t’s been a long six months of tracksuit bottoms, flannel shirts and sweats. September signals an annual ‘back to school’ snap of the synapses and this year is no different. Those hankering for something with a little more bite will enjoy the restrained tension that comes with autumn’s leather offering.

At Louis Vuitton, Virgil Abloh was captivated by rapidly evolving workwear. His leather bomber-blazer hybrid, which gives the clever illusion of layering, will set pulses racing. When the weather closes in, you will be grateful for Prada’s durable, pull-on leather boots with a round-square toe and signature heavy sole.

Marni and Salvatore Ferragamo, too, offer robust pairs.

Elsewhere, fetishist undercurrents tantalise in Dolce & Gabbana’s head-to-toe leather look and Dunhill’s new ‘Lock Bag’ inspired by the brand’s signature Rollagas lighters (perfectly proportioned for phone, wallet and hand sanitiser); Alexander McQueen’s black leather trench; a black leather twopiece at Lemaire; a polished chocolate brown leather blazer at Acne with whisperings of 70s counterculture; and Matthew Williams’ straight-leg leather trousers at 1017 Alyx 9SM. Just the tonic for regaining a little necessary frisson – at home and away.

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Model: Zuhair Abdulkadir at Models 1. Grooming: Laura Taff. On-set tailor: Katie Barclay

Below, coat, £2,130; gilet, £825; trousers, £695; boots, £1,130, all by Prada

Newspaper

Dignified but with a dash of daring, leather looks signify a return to style

Hide and sleek

PHOTOGRAPHY: ADAM BARCLAY FASHION: JASON HUGHES WRITER: TILLY MACALISTER-SMITH

Newspaper We’re entering into a fragrant affair with Jonathan Anderson

New flame

PHOTOGRAPHY: ADAM BARCLAY WRITER: MARY CLEARY

Bringing the fresh scents of the outdoors in, Loewe’s new line of home fragrances is inspired by the vegetable garden at creative director Jonathan Anderson’s London home. The collection features candles, rattan diffusers, soaps and room sprays in 11 plant-inspired scents, including tomato leaves, cypress balls, pea, coriander, and cannabis.

Since taking the helm of the Spanish house in 2013, Anderson has championed modern craft, and this appreciation

extends to the presentation of the new line. The home fragrances are housed in handcrafted ceramic containers that evoke the elegant simplicity of Ancient Greek drinking vessels, and come in a variety of colours from striking black to powder pink. The packaging, an artwork in itself, features bold still-life photographs of plants from Franco-Swiss photographer Erwan Frotin.

Pictured are wax candleholder, £68; candles, from £70 to £305, loewe.com

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055

illustration Giacomo Bagnara

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Clay — table

design Marc Krusin

Newspaper

Camera case, price on request, by Ermenegildo Zegna. Leica Q2, £4,500,

by Leica

Contemporary chic meets old-school appeal in a finely crafted camera case

Soft focus

As life appears to change more rapidly than ever, so increases the desire to capture meaningful moments as they happen. Moreover, carrying a proper camera implies the possibility of putting down our smartphones: going offline, savouring the view, documenting it.

Perhaps with that in mind, Ermenegildo Zegna’s artistic director Alessandro Sartori channelled his hallmark precision into a new accessory.

This refined camera case comes in understated chestnut and black leather versions, finished with top stitching and subtly embossed with an archival example of the brand’s logo. You can

PHOTOGRAPHY: ADAM BARCLAY WRITER: TILLY MACALISTER-SMITH

choose from a holster style or a classic over-the-shoulder model.

What to carry in it? A Leica Q2, of course. It’s the latest evolution of the German manufacturer’s most straightforward contemporary camera – a fixed lens, full-frame pocketable shooter that continues its long tradition of covetable but low-key cameras.

Ermenegildo Zegna, a 110-year-old business, remains a bellwether for creating modern Italian menswear.

Similarly, Sartori has an intuitive sense for providing his customers with what they want: camera case in point. zegna.com; store.leica-camera.com

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Newspaper

‘Strip Titanium’ 9624 spectacle frames, price on request, by Lindberg

Titanium makes for impossibly strong, light and now newly refined frames

Super vision Titanium, forged in the burning core of supernovas, is a weapons-grade material. Its storied strength and super lightweightedness informs Lindberg’s 9600 series of spectacle frames. The brand’s relationship with titanium dates back to its origin in the 1980s. Frustrated by the lack of light, strong, well-designed glasses, founder Poul-Jørn Lindberg made his own, teaming up with architect

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Hans Dissing, an Arne Jacobsen acolyte and a designer of bridges, including the Great Belt Fixed Link, between the Danish islands of Zealand and Funen.

Dissing helped Lindberg create minimal, flexible, durable, hypoallergenic, noncorrosive spectacle frames inspired by geometric figures and architectural lines.

The new ‘Strip Titanium’ 9624 and 9625 models are slimmer and more feminine,

adding widened temple sections and a thin-lined front. With temple ends multi-adjustable for a perfect fit, each pair of 9600 frames is made without screws, rivets or welded parts, entirely of finely honed, feather-thin titanium plates, charged with the meteoric thrill of supernovas, and strong enough to span nasal bridges and Scandinavian archipelagoes. lindberg.com

PHOTOGRAPHY: ADAM BARCLAY WRITER: SIMON MILLS

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Model: Bethany Erin Duffy at Linden Staub. Hair and make-up: Laura Taff. On-set tailor: Katie Barclay

Jumper, £1,700; trousers, £5,500, both by Hermès

Hermès elevates the jumper by building in a scarf

New twist

Few brands can lay claim to having a true icon in their midst. But the Hermès silk scarf has effortlessly transcended trends, retained cult status and never gone out of fashion. Now, Hermès’ artistic director of women’s ready-towear, Nadège Vanhee-Cybulski, has masterfully integrated the brand’s signature item into this sweater, with a lightweight gauge and an elegant drop shoulder. What’s more, you can switch out the scarf for a necklace of your own. Satiating our desire for easy-to-wear, stay-at-home dressing,

PHOTOGRAPHY: ADAM BARCLAY FASHION: JASON HUGHES WRITER: TILLY MACALISTER-SMITH

this beautifully understated piece is a worthy investment.

Hermès introduced its silk scarf in 1937, exactly 100 years after the company was founded. Each one is still produced in Lyon in France, with no shortcuts taken to meet unfaltering demand – they are silk-screen printed by hand, using on average 27 colours per scarf, and finished with hand-rolled, handstitched edges. Craftsmanship is a word as over-used as ‘icon’ these days, but Hermès adroitly delivers on both. hermes.com

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061

R

ich in spiritual references and supposedly endowed with health benefits, crystals have long held the human race bewitched. Hedi Slimane has fallen under their spell for the Les Cristaux Celine collection, intertwining jewels in historical references. The crystals, beautiful in their raw geometry, teeter on circles of gold-finished brass. On a cuff, a crystal of rutilated quartz is held suspended, seemingly untethered. On a ring, a sheaf of pyrite – more colloquially known as fool’s gold and which once enthralled the Incas with its alluring glow – is haphazardly placed, cutting a striking architectural silhouette. In a necklace of star mica, the honey-hued stone, floating in its circle of brass, makes for a tantalising talisman. celine.com

Clockwise from above, necklace; cuff; ring, all price on request, by Celine

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Newspaper

Crystal and gold-finished brass sparkle with intrigue at Celine

On the rocks

PHOTOGRAPHY: ADAM BARCLAY WRITER: HANNAH SILVER

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Newspaper

Coronation Chicken Pie, with delicately spiced chicken and a layer of mango jelly,

by Calum Franklin. From left, medium tumbler, £32; water pitcher, £119; thin tumbler, £32, all part of ‘Drinking Set No.286 Normal-Special’, by Ilse Crawford, for Lobmeyr.

Aluminium and brass tray, £360, attributed to David Marshall, from Bureau of Interior Affairs

Chef Calum Franklin reveals secrets of pastry perfection in a new book

Nice as pie

Many of us reserve a special affection for pies – the classic shape, so pleasingly selfcontained, promises a hearty dinner. A beautiful pie speaks also of occasion and opulence, and of the skill of its maker.

Hailed ‘The King of Pies’, Calum Franklin creates edible works of art from London’s Holborn Dining Room, which includes a retail space, The Pie Room. He drew up the designs for the space, all marble, brass and dark wood, and takes inspiration for his pie designs from London architecture, carved doorways, church windows and

PHOTOGRAPHY: ADAM BARCLAY ENTERTAINING DIRECTOR AND WRITER: MELINA KEAYS

all. His pies’ visual splendour is matched by their exquisite taste. Now his new book explains his recipes and techniques for melting pastry and perfect latticework. Keeping us going till then, made by Franklin just for Wallpaper*, is this Coronation Chicken Pie. We’ve paired it with a smooth Chablis, served in Ilse Crawford’s ‘Drinking Set No.286 Normal-Special’ for Lobmeyr. Tuck in.

The Pie Room, by Calum Franklin (Bloomsbury, £26), available 24 September, holborndiningroom.com/pie-room

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Newspaper

Chanel’s classic fragrance is reimagined for night-time

Sweet dreams Chanel’s Coco Mademoiselle gets ready for bed with the latest fragrance offering from the French fashion house, Coco Mademoiselle L’Eau Privée.

Almost 20 years since the creation of the original perfume, L’Eau Privée offers a warmer, subtler interpretation, particularly formulated for night-time wear. Always one to respect its heritage, Chanel has ensured that the new scent

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retains some hallmarks of its forebear, including the unique distillation of patchouli that was pioneered with Coco Mademoiselle and has since become a mainstay in the perfume industry.

For L’Eau Privée, the vibrant woody notes of the original are toned down in favour of the subtle sweetness of mandarin, delicate musks, and soft florals such as rose and jasmine.

The result is, in the words of Chanel perfumer Olivier Polge, ‘a soft and hazy fragrance, like a watercolour’.

Intended for use on fabric as well as skin, L’Eau Privée can be sprayed on before bed, or used to infuse bedsheets and sleepwear with an instant essence of luxury, ensuring that your sweetest dreams are only a spritz away.

50ml, £67; 100ml, £95, chanel.com

PHOTOGRAPHY: ADAM BARCLAY WRITER: MARY CLEARY

Hand made in Italy / ceramicacielo.it

Le Acque di Cielo: —— Colour is our attitude!

Catino Ovale washbasin in Anemone finish, Oval Box mirror: design by Andrea Parisio, Giuseppe Pezzano Era sanitary ware in Anemone finish: design by Luca Cimarra

Newspaper

From left, large pot in terracotta, £85; watering globe, £35; small pot in stainless steel, £75; small reversible planter, £100; medium reversible planter, £145; medium pot in terracotta, £65; watering can, £85, all part of the Terra collection, by Snøhetta, for Georg Jensen.

Plants, from a selection, from Of the Wild

Snøhetta and Georg Jensen take a shine to gardening

Growth area Given the recent swell of interest in home gardening, the arrival of Snøhetta’s plant accessories for Georg Jensen could not be timelier. Titled ‘Terra’, the nine-piece collection brings together the Danish brand’s characteristic mirror-polished stainless steel with terracotta: ‘We’re literally introducing dirt into a polished and shiny world, bringing to the table something textural and imperfect, just like the plants themselves,’ says Snøhetta’s director of product design, Marius Myking. The material combination also harks back to Georg Jensen’s origins (its eponymous founder was a ceramicist before launching the company in 1904). The planters, which combine

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streamlined silhouettes with cylindrical saucers, invert the form of typical plant pots. Wider at the base than at the rim, they ‘give the plant the opportunity to take root the same way it does in nature’, says Myking. The stainless steel versions are reversible – they can stand either way up – while a watering can and watering globe, in the same material, further elevate the tone of plant care. Adds Georg Jensen’s chief creative officer, Nicholas Manville: ‘Isolation has given many people time to reflect on the power of nature and how we co-exist. Terra is a decorative statement that truly honours the human relationship to plants.’

Available from September, snøhetta.com; georgjensen.com

PHOTOGRAPHY: ADAM BARCLAY WRITER: TF CHAN

Column

THE VINSON VIEW Quality maniac Nick Vinson on the who, what, when, where and why

HOTEL SAN PIETRO’S SPAGHETTI AL LIMONE Enjoy a taste of Italian summer courtesy of the hotel’s signature dish Prepare a lemon infusion by steeping lemon zest and juice in a jar of water 24 to 36 hours in advance. When you are ready to cook, place 50-80g of spaghetti per person in salted boiling water. Cook for 7 minutes.

Meanwhile, heat a little olive oil in a large pan.

Add a finely chopped garlic clove, but don’t allow it to brown. Add thinly sliced lemongrass, lemon zest, finely chopped parsley and a knob of butter. Pour a couple of ladlefuls of the pasta water into the pan, together with some of the strained, pre-prepared, lemon-infused water to create the sauce. Toss in fresh or dried chilli if you like a kick. Once the sauce is simmering and the oil and butter are blended nicely, remove from the heat. Cooking too much can turn the lemon bitter.

Drain the spaghetti (reserving the water) and add it to the pan with the sauce in, returning to the heat to mix thoroughly. Add more parsley, oil and pasta water as necessary, and salt to taste. Grate lemon zest over the plated spaghetti and serve.

01

Happiness is Made in Italy

Picky Nicky falls in love with his adopted home all over again

Confined to London for the first ten weeks or so of Britain’s Covid-19 lockdown, I missed travelling to Milan for what would have been my 21st year at Salone del Mobile, had it been staged. For me, the annual trip includes spending the weekends before and after the fair in the house I share with my husband Álvaro and our two Weimaraners in the hills outside Florence. Italy has been my home, either full time or part time, for the past 20 years and I longed to return.

I longed to shop at our greengrocer-ona-truck in Florence’s Piazza della Libertà, and at Galanti, my local rosticceria (Italy’s slow-food take on the takeaway); to eat at Zeb Gastronomia and Trattoria Cammillo, my restaurants of choice; and to enjoy the ritual of morning coffee, standing up, at Pasticceria Stefania. The coffee, prepared without my having to ask, comes with a very fine brioche or two. It’s my preferred way to start the day, after I’ve ridden there on my Vespa.

I also longed to return to scouting for the best that Made in Italy has to offer.

There is nothing quite like the passion and precision that Italian technicians and artisans can achieve when partnered with creative talent. I never turn down an invitation to see how things are produced, anywhere from the factories of Agape, B&B Italia, Cassina and Zegna to the tiny

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ceramic workshops in Grottaglie in Puglia.

Whatever they make, they share a pride in doing so, striving to make the best, rather than the most. That to me is Italian quality.

Another thing I longed for was to dive into the sea, off Italy’s magnificent coast.

And so I did; returning to Italy in mid-May to produce a shoot for this issue’s Armani Casa story (page 082), I then stayed put for the whole summer.

This year is the 50th anniversary of Hotel San Pietro, perched above the rocks outside Positano on the Amalfi Coast. It was opened in 1970 by Carlo Cinque and today is run by his niece, Virginia, and her two sons, Carlo and Vito (family businesses are another pillar of Made in Italy). Álvaro and I have visited every July for seven years. After a high-speed train from Florence to Salerno and a four-minute walk to the port, we get a 40-minute speedboat ride to the hotel’s beach, sometimes accompanied by dolphins.

We go to Carlino, the beach restaurant, and dine in the shade, heading to our room only at the end of a day spent in and out of the sea, kept going by a serving or two of watermelon and an Aperol spritz. Evenings begin on the terrace for an aperitvo, while a mandolin-and-guitar duo play Neapolitan tunes. We depart the way we arrived, after settling the bill on the beach, and never leave without making another booking.

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02 My next steps I want to climb the frescoed ‘stairway of knowledge’, decorated by Gio Ponti between 1936 and 1941, at the University of Padua’s Palazzo Bo. unipd.it

03 Burri treasure I also want to revisit Città di Castello in Umbria, to see 128 works by Alberto Burri shown in an industrial facility appropriated by the artist in 1990. fondazioneburri.org

ILLUSTRATOR: DANAE DIAZ

Shop now at store.wallpaper.com

‘Rota’ pendant lamp, Minimalux —— €492 ——

‘Gila Monster’ vase, L’Objet —— €385 ——

‘Potte Present’ vase, Michael Verheyden —— €247 ——

‘Tadao’ console table, Forma & Cemento —— €384 ——

‘Bavaresk’ chair, Dante Goods And Bads —— €840 ——

‘Cross’ side table, Case Furniture —— €510 ——

‘Carved’ vase, Tom Dixon

Swan statuette, Pulpo

—— €300 ——

—— €140 ——

‘Neptune’s Cup’ vessel, House of Today ‘Triple Slinkie’ rug, CC-Tapis —— €9,142 ——

—— €300 ——

‘City’ vase, Rosenthal —— €429 ——

‘Foresta’ tabletop stand, Alias —— €200 ——

Design

RISING ABOVE

Breakthrough design from Brussels-based Cobra Studios PHOTOGRAPHY: JEROEN VERRECHT WRITER: ROSA BERTOLI

Clockwise from this picture, ‘Cicero’ dining table, €12,500; ‘Otho’ lamp, €1,350, and ‘Priape’ side table, €3,500; and ‘Santa Maria dei Clarici’ coffee table, €6,250, all part of the Solids collection, by Cobra Studios

The story of Cobra Studios begins with its founders, Kenny Decommer and Hugues Delaunay, in their need for a new dining table for their apartment. Based in Brussels and with backgrounds in architecture and fashion respectively, the pair designed and made furniture for themselves, before launching their studio and debut collection this year.

While working at architecture practice Explorations Architecture, Decommer had collaborated with Dominique Perrault on new furniture for Paris’ Bibliothèque Nationale, sparking his interest in design.

Delaunay studied fine art and developed his scenographic approach working as a visual merchandiser for Ralph Lauren and Paul Smith; he currently divides his time between Paris and Brussels, working for Chloé.

‘I am more technical, Hugues is more conceptual and colour-minded. ‘We complement each other,’ says Decommer.

‘We like geometry and symmetry, but we also like asymmetry and breaking the visual balance,’ adds Delaunay.

Two years in the making, their debut collection, Solids, is inspired by Roman ruins, which the designers have studied during trips to the Italian capital, and which have fascinated Decommer since childhood.

In particular, he was interested in how these ancient elements are at once disconnected

from and coexist with the modern city.

The new designs are based on ‘a vision of a Roman Forum’; majestic columns and walls are translated into a series of pure shapes made out of resin in bright jewel hues. These elements pierce through simple white tabletops, in tactile, sanded acrylic with a chalky finish, that appear to float.

While the dining table and a low coffee table were planned from the start, the third element, a side table, was created to make use of leftover shapes. The tables’ names nod to their classical inspiration: ‘Cicero’ (the dining table), ‘Santa Maria dei Clarici’ (the coffee table), and ‘Priape’ (the side table).

Completing the collection is the ‘Otho’ lamp, with steel tubes and textured glass, that references postmodern forms.

Throughout the design process, Decommer and Delaunay experimented with materials and played with found objects.

For production, they worked with friends and people in their local creative community, learning along the way. ‘We want to create our own identity and our own entity,’ says Decommer, adding that they want to continue combining design and production, overseeing every element themselves, keeping things at a manageable scale.

But they recognise the opportunities that come from sharing ideas and being open.

Their home city is an important influence on their work. ‘When we arrived in Brussels six years ago there was an underground design scene, but now you have the impression that the city and the authorities are pushing that forward to create a vibrant place,’ says Decommer, referencing projects such as the Kanal Centre Pompidou, which opened in 2018. ‘The city is generating excitement about where it can go and what could happen in the next few years; everybody’s going with that flow. It’s eclectic.’ The duo’s predominantly Turkish neighbourhood has also been an inspiration, and they are currently looking at earthy materials, such as terracotta and stone, and working on a collection that will incorporate more varied visual elements.

Other upcoming projects include private commissions, as well as a collection of seating (‘We need chairs, so let’s just design them ourselves and try to have fun in the process,’ they say), and designs inspired by architectural elements such as arches (they have been looking at Rome’s Palazzo della Civiltà Italiana). The pair are also exploring reusing and recycling materials and objects, including their left-over resin stock, to create new pieces. The Solids collection is a firm start from a studio full of promise. cobra-studios.design

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073

Next up Innovative and experimental rising stars are behind New York’s most exciting labels For all its pros (democratic show schedule) and cons (venues spread all over Manhattan and Brooklyn, made worse by bad traffic), New York Fashion Week still pulls out enough surprises to thrill each season. For A/W20, it owed its most memorable moments to emerging designers who have taken almost everything into their own hands, be it eschewing the official Spring Studios venue or rethinking the conventional runway experience. This show of rebellion is evidenced in a new wave of glamour, extravagance and social consciousness that has come to distinguish the most exciting labels. Experimental, unapologetic, and certainly not for the introverted, here are the rising stars we should all know better.

CHRISTOPHER JOHN ROGERS CHRISTOPHER JOHN ROGERS

ROGERS’ A/W20 COLLECTION OFFERED A MODERN TAKE ON EVENING DRESSING AND SAW SATURATED COLOURS AND PEARLESCENT FABRICS

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Much has been made of Christopher John Rogers’ ascent. Upon graduating from Savannah College of Art and Design, he moved to New York and landed a job at Diane von Furstenberg. In 2018, while still working full-time, he secured a slot on the official New York Fashion Week calendar under his own name. His S/S20 collection, also his runway debut, garnered him the 2019 CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fund prize and a mentorship with Tory Burch CEO Pierre-Yves Roussel.

Rogers’ aesthetic is rooted in his childhood in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and the pride and self-respect that’s synonymous with donning your Sunday best for church.

‘My parents [taught] me that when I leave the house, I must look my best and give no excuse for someone to treat me badly,’ shares Rogers, who is now 26. ‘The idea of making sure that the shirt matched the pant matched the shoe, my love of a monochromatic look stems from

that. I’ve always loved really bright colours, graphic combinations, the contrast of black and white. These are motifs that continually show up in the work.

‘I’ve never really led with my Blackness and I’ve never really led with my queerness either, because for me, they’ve been inescapable,’ says Rogers. However, he adds, ‘I felt like fucking with expectations was integral to my expression. If something was monochromatic, the shirt would be Kelly green, the tie would be fluorescent lime. They might not have “matched”, but there was a synergy, an understanding [of] putting myself together.’

His latest collection reinterprets the work of Madame Grès through tweaked proportions and amorphous shapes that mimic the crumpled texture and volume of a garbage bag. In shades like tangerine and fuchsia, it was a hit of the season. It’s about ‘being unapologetic about who you are’, he affirms. christopherjohnrogers.com ILLUSTRATOR: DYLAN QIN WRITER: PEI-RU KEH

Fashion

BRYN TAUBENSEE, CLAIRE SULLIVAN AND PATRIC DICAPRIO VAQUERA

Vaquera, the label helmed by Bryn Taubensee, Claire Sullivan and Patric DiCaprio, has continued to prove that there’s power to be found in a design collective, especially when that’s translated into tailored, avant-garde silhouettes, peppered with puns and social commentary. Since its inception in 2013, the Brooklynbased label has evolved from underground art project to esoteric street couture, while retaining the raw emotion and deliberate point of view that won over its early fans.

The designers have spoken candidly about how press and industry accolades don’t always equate to a viable future. Despite being finalists for the CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fund in 2017, the trio had planned to release only a lookbook for their A/W20 collection, due to a lack of resources. ‘But as fashion week neared, our PR team connected us with Dover Street Market New York and they offered their space to us. The idea was a small presentation, but it spiralled into a full-fledged guerilla show. That energy felt reminiscent of our earliest shows.’

The collection, which pitted multilayered dresses in sombre black against sequined trousers and jackets in camouflage print, struck a resounding chord with its balance of fantasy and fatality. ‘It’s hard to imagine now, but we felt we were at a dead end,’ they say. A/W20 was about ‘channelling our feelings of uncertainty into passion and motivation, which in turn lent itself to a powerful collection’. With renewed energy, they are forging ahead on a collection for S/S21. vaquera.nyc

VOLUMINOUS CAMO PRINT AND BELL-HEMMED TROUSERS AT VAQUERA FOR A/W20, AND THE COLLECTIVE’S DESIGNERS, ABOVE, FROM LEFT, TAUBENSEE, SULLIVAN AND DICAPRIO

HILLARY TAYMOUR COLLINA STRADA

A SILK DRESS FROM TAYMOUR’S COLLECTION, WHICH WAS CREATED FROM DISCARDED CLOTHING, DEADSTOCK FABRIC AND A TEXTILE MADE FROM ROSE PETAL FIBRES

Despite its reputation as an emerging brand, Collina Strada was founded by designer Hillary Taymour in 2009. Since then, Taymour has moved from Los Angeles to New York and transitioned from designing handbags and accessories to ready-to-wear, all the while honing the label’s aesthetic to reflect exactly who she is.

Today’s Collina Strada serves as a platform for social issues, and its radical transparency and individualistic attitude have made it a cult favourite and also earned approval from the establishment; Taymour was a CFDA/ Vogue Fashion Fund finalist in 2019. ‘I’ve been able to get [things] to the place where now I can make exactly what I want, whenever I want to make it,’ says Taymour. ‘I’m less scared of what people think. I really want to focus on sustainability.’

The environment was front of mind in Collina Strada’s A/W20 collection. It features upcycled dresses, trousers and shirts, as Taymour repurposed discarded clothing from the US that wound up at Ghana’s Kantamanto market, and serves as a critique of the waste and pollution of the used goods economy. Elsewhere, diaphanous dresses, button-up shirts and draped trousers are constructed from deadstock fabrics sourced within the US or from rose sylk, a lustrous textile made from spinning rose petal fibres into cellulose.

‘It’s hard,’ Taymour says of balancing both ecological and design commitments. ’I’m not trying to create products for products’ sake. I’m going to make what I can with the materials that I have.’ collinastrada.com

MASTER CLASH Dior Men pays homage to the controlled chaos of Judy Blame PHOTOGRAPHY: BENJAMIN BOUCHET FASHION: JASON HUGHES WRITER: HANNAH SILVER

Joyful new jewellery is part of an A/W20 collection at Dior Men that salutes the late stylist and accessories designer Judy Blame, who passed away two years ago. ‘It was important to pay respect to someone who inspired me,’ says Kim Jones, Dior Men’s artistic director. Blame’s work referenced punk, new romantic and rave culture, creating an art wholly his own.

‘What I admire most is that he could make something beautiful out of absolutely anything. We’ve replicated a lot of his work and Dior-ised it,’ continues Jones.

Blame’s fascination with the quotidian is translated into bold jewellery pieces that disregard standard proportions. Safety pins, a mainstay of his style, are recast in rhodium-finish brass and piled haphazardly onto rings; juxtaposed against tightly knit chains, the sharp geometric outlines emphasise the controlled chaos that defined Blame’s designs.

‘He was very tactile in the way he worked, just collecting and putting things together,’ says Yoon Ahn, Dior Men’s director of jewellery. She sifted through Blame’s collections of found objects – cap bottles, screwdrivers, a wrench, keys. ‘Even these seemingly mundane and disposable items can become decoration, and that’s the important part of the story,’ says Ahn. ‘Sometimes jewellery is purely self-expression.’

She has rethought archival pieces in tonal hues of grey and silver. Key chains and necklaces are a joyfully erratic clash of crystals, banknote charms and animal figures. Other pieces are softer: lustrous orbs of motherof-pearl, set against sterling silver roses, are an elegant foil for the otherwise sharp silhouettes. In a brooch, pearls edged in white resin spell out ‘Dior’.

The dynamism of this collection is a loving retelling of Blame’s story. ‘I hope people can feel that energy and have fun wearing the jewellery,’ says Ahn. dior.com

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Photography assistant: Clémence Lavigne

Jewellery

This page, rhodium-finish brass necklace, with all-over roses and Dior and Judy Blame medallion details, £1,200; gloves, £635, both by Dior Opposite, top, rhodium-finish brass Dior Oblique brooch, with white resin pearl detail, £520, by Dior Bottom, rhodium-finish brass asymmetrical earring, with white resin pearl and loop, and crystal detail, £335, by Dior

Intelligence

DUAL PURPOSE David Adjaye and A-Cold-Wall’s Samuel Ross on architecture, fashion, Covid-19, anti-racism, and the future of the creative industries PHOTOGRAPHY: LIZ JOHNSON ARTUR WRITER: TILLY MACALISTER-SMITH

‘Architecture and fashion move away from each other, and then come really close, and then move away again,’ says Sir David Adjaye, on a video call from Accra. He is in conversation with Samuel Ross, stationed in London. It’s mid-summer and the world is in the grips of the Covid-19 pandemic and anti-racism protests. This is a transformative moment for both industries.

The architect behind the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture, Adjaye was recently commissioned to create Brixton’s Cherry Groce Memorial and Abu Dhabi’s Abrahamic Family House. He continues to work on the landmark Ghana National Cathedral, and champion new African architecture and architects.

Ross, who founded A-Cold-Wall* in 2015, is a rising star of the fashion industry. A natural master

of cross-disciplinary collaboration, he has partnered with brands as wide-ranging as Nike (to create emergency blankets upcycled from plastic bottles, with aspirations to make them freely available in parks), Apple, Converse, Diesel, Oakley and Dr Martens, as well as recently establishing a grant fund for Black creatives.

Their discussion covered the impact of technology, localised production, the politicisation of architecture and fashion, anti-racism, the effects of pandemic, and the future of creative industries.

Right after, they were photographed – Ross in person and Adjaye via video call – by Liz Johnson Artur, who has dedicated her three-decade career to documenting people of African descent.

The following conversation has been edited and condensed; for the full version, see Wallpaper.com »

Architect David Adjaye (opposite) and fashion designer Samuel Ross (above), photographed via video call and in person, respectively, after their Wallpaper*-chaired conversation on 24 June

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I’m working with communities here [in Accra] and discovering that compressed mud has incredible properties that we totally underestimated. We just assumed that it was primitive, but actually it’s one of the best performing and most abundant materials on the planet.

W*: How much of your work is about educating people in your respective professions, to push your industries forwards?

DA: With all design there is a kind of public role, especially if you’re interested in pushing the limits of your industry. You deliver things to the public, so the public needs to be able to hold you accountable.

I taught for about a decade and then I stopped, because I was teaching in elite schools to kids who are already very privileged. Instead, now I mentor and I’m interested in finding emerging voices that are not getting attention, trying to support them or to help them think about their businesses in the early stages.

W*: How hard was it for you to break into the industry and find a foothold? What motivated you to choose your respective disciplines?

DA: I chose architecture because it was part of a language that was very much under-represented from the position of a person of colour within the global discourse. I wanted to be part of that conversation about how we make the contemporary world.

SR: This idea of having a hyper-intelligent approach to design, formed and carved by the Black hand, is still moderately new if it doesn’t default into, say, the status quo of streetwear or the more Parisian type of fashion.

My job is to carve out this new ergonomic vernacular, and respond from a design perspective.

DA: That is something that I really loved about your design practice and noticed about your work as you started to emerge. You are really understanding culturally what is happening and trying to make the architecture of the body of the 21st century.

It is about you, but through your lens it feels very contemporary and relevant.

W*: How important has the role of mentor or mentee been in your career? When you started out, could you identify Black creatives you related to?

Images: courtesy of Victoria Miro Gallery, Adjaye Associates and A-Cold-Wall*

Wallpaper*: How does the responsibility of creating lasting works – as opposed to ephemeral ideas – influence your designs and process?

DA: There’s a bit of a myth with this idea of permanence, because nothing is really permanent, not even architecture. It all ends up disappearing.

Architecture [just] has a larger duration.

SR: It all comes down to having the ability to quantify if a product should exist, which goes back to functionality and use.

W*: As a discipline, architecture can be really slow, whereas fashion feels faster – but that’s not always the case as the after-effects can last a long time.

DA: Fashion seems to be absolutely immediate, but [its] impact might be in the way we look at the bodies of males and females. [Take] for example the work of Yves Saint Laurent: it’s profound, it changes and resonates through generations.

SR: Totally. I kind of look at fashion like a moving slipstream. This idea of [how garments can serve] changes from generation to generation, as times move forwards and as social movements move forwards.

W*: How do the materials you use embody the ideas that you want to portray in your work? Does sustainability play into your material choices?

SR: I’ve dabbled with technical and synthetic materials, although I’m moving into more sustainable materials.

There is a movement happening within big tech that needs to be integrated into fabrication, which can then define fashion as a whole for the 21st century. Fashion should mean smart materials and patented weaves that are antibacterial, that cling and mould to the body, versus just being about a point of expression.

DA: In the built environment, we spent the 20th century industrialising, making very efficient materials that will get things done fast. With speed came excess and pollution and degradation and destruction. Now we are asking, how do we build responsibly? In architecture, we are talking about microbial issues and creating healthy environments. That’s become much more heightened with Covid-19. We have to look at the things that destroy the planet – pandemics and ecological collapses – and really be responsive.

Intelligence

DA: A real hero for me when I started was Joe CaselyHayford. He was simply a man of colour doing really excellent work. And I thought, ‘Why don’t we have that in other places?’ It actually drove me to want to do it. I have a stubborn disposition. To be faced with ‘You can’t do this because…’, well, the ‘because’ better be damn good! It made me angry when I was younger.

I’m much more chilled out these days.

SR: Mentors have been seminal to my journey. I shifted my direction [from product and graphic design] towards fashion to be a little more expressive. At that time, Virgil [Abloh] and Kanye West happened to come across my work, and I started working underneath the two of them. They were great mentors, able to articulate between Western European and North American ideologies, whilst having an intrinsically Black imprint on the work they were producing. They took these references to an industry, cross-referenced them through channels of mass communication, and built a new language and discourse that a lot of designers of my generation now operate within. From these two mentors, I learned how to communicate ideas and to have this ‘scatter diagram’ approach to zig-zagging across industries.

W*: In terms of communication, is fashion more inherently attuned to marketing, whereas architecture is built on letting the work speak for itself ?

DA: Absolutely. There’s a desire to depoliticise architecture continually, and I fight against that all the time. For me, the act, the statement, the building, is always political, it’s always making a statement about the world that we are in, it’s always positioning an ideal of some sort. The building isn’t mute, it speaks volumes about a certain world value and morality.

SR: The work I showed at Serpentine Galleries [Ross won the 2019 Hublot Design Prize], and the work I’m soon to do with Marc Benda from Friedman Benda gallery, is about that. I’m pivoting towards the long form conversation, and how we stabilise and re-chisel the playing field for the next generation.

W*: How does collaboration enrich your work?

DA: When I left the Royal College of Art I missed not

being in a campus environment. I would collaborate across disciplines, with a scientist or a musician. When I did the Venice Biennale with Chris Ofili in 2003, we flipped roles – I said, ‘you design and I’ll do the visuals’.

It was amazing to see my now dear friend talking about architecture, to learn what was interesting to him.

It teaches you different ways of seeing the world.

SR: I’m a moderately sized brand, so collaboration offers access to tooling and technology. It’s also about having an opportunity to push forwards a social consciousness. I’m thinking how I can carry as much information through a macro partner, let’s say Nike, without being too cumbersome: can I hijack a community to a certain degree and fix the attention?

W*: Practically, has Covid-19 affected your business?

DA: I moved to Accra as I’m doing a lot of work in West Africa right now. This decade feels like the decade of Africa to me. This pandemic has unleashed this new connectivity that I’m very grateful for. I have three offices on different continents, and most of my time was spent moving between those. And now it’s become very technologically based. What’s kind of amazing is that it all works! Apart from the amazing aromas that you miss, I love the aroma of construction sites!

SR: We’ve decided not to do two shows a year any more. This idea of a continuous critique to an open market every six months when you’re building and growing didn’t necessarily sit right with me in the first place, but I was willing to participate and spar and win in that arena to show a more intellectual Black approach within fashion design. But moving forward, the idea of showing collections needs to be completely rearticulated. We are looking at more personable presentations, which almost feeds back into the early days, when counter-cultural movements actually began to swirl and churn around fashion brands. I’m becoming a bit more hands on with discourse with consumers. We’ve been able to compress and condense down the modelling of the company. And be more emotive and sensitive to market needs. And take a lot more risk. I’m hoping that it will kick start a few other contemporaries in a similar situation to ourselves. adjaye.com; a-cold-wall.com

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Opposite, from left, artist Chris Ofili’s Within Reach, the British Pavilion at the 2003 Venice Biennale, designed with Adjaye and engineered by Charles Walker, Arup, featuring a glass sculpture titled Afro Kaleidoscope above the main gallery space; Adjaye Associates’ design for the Abrahamic Family House on Abu Dhabi’s Saadiyat Island, comprising a mosque, a synagogue and a church Above, from left, a look from A-Cold-Wall’s pre-S/S21 collection, Ross’ Beacon 1, presented at Serpentine Galleries as part of the 2019 Hublot Design Prize exhibition

THE DINING ROOM ‘Ned’ table, 2018, £17,100, by Armani Casa. Also pictured, from left, ‘Catilina’ chairs, £2,205, by Luigi Caccia Dominioni, for Azucena, available from B&B Italia. Lingham with Blue; Lingham with Violet, both oil on wood, by Tobit Roche. ‘Plasterworks A’ rug, €6,069, by David/Nicolas for CC-Tapis.

‘Dishes to Dishes’ ceramics, from €36, by Glenn Sestig, for Valerie Objects. Tall vase; marble sculpture, both artist unknown. Vase, price on request,

by Brute Ceramics, for Colville. ‘Pleasure Dome’, by Glenn Sestig Architects and Van Den Weghe, commissioned for Wallpaper* Handmade 2015. ‘Crossbill’ (inside dome), £375, by Theodor Kärner, for Porzellan Manufaktur Nymphenburg. ‘Moretta’ silver carafes, €1,190 and €675, both by Afra and Tobia Scarpa, for San Lorenzo. Striped vase, by Roksanda Ilincic and Linck Ceramics, commissioned for Wallpaper* Handmade 2016. Candlesticks, £1,150 and £1,510,

by Ted Muehling, for Nymphenburg, from Matchesfashion

PLACE MAKER

With a new series of images debuted here, Armani Casa marks 20 years at the heart of the well-considered home PHOTOGRAPHY: BEPPE BRANCATO ART DIRECTION: NICK VINSON WRITER: TF CHAN

Design THE STUDY ‘Euclide’ desk, 2011, £13,050, by Armani Casa. Also pictured, from left, ‘Scala’ stool, €2,270, by Stéphane Parmentier, for Giobagnara. ‘Plasterworks A’ rug, as before. Pair of vases, by Robert Loiseleur. Vase, by Lino Bersani. Affiche Avant no. 187 lithograph, by Eduardo Chillida. ‘Pigreco’ chair, €600,

by Tobia Scarpa, for Gavina, from Canificio. Eduardo Chillida notebook, €50, from Chillida Leku museum. Silver teapot, milk jug and sugar bowl set, £4,512, by Afra and Tobia Scarpa, for San Lorenzo. Bamboo box, artist unknown. ‘Rhinoceros Clara’, £2,390, by Peter Anton von Verschaffelt, for Porzellan Manufaktur Nymphenburg. French iron chain-link floor lamp, £800, from Béton Brut

Design THE FOYER

‘Evans’ console, 2011, £10,800, by Armani Casa.

Also pictured, from left, armchairs, €12,000, by Mario Asnago and Claudio Vender, from SG Gallery Milano. ‘Cut Out Monocromo’ rug, €6,831, by Parisotto + Formenton, for CC-Tapis. Japanese screen print; blue glass dish; vase, all artist unknown. Bird,

by Eleni Vernardaki, from Martinos Antique and Fine Art Gallery. Violent Rose artwork; Vile Eye artwork, both price on request, by David James. Jug; zinc lamp base; marble pyramid, all designer unknown.

Wooden cube mirror, by John Makepeace For stockists of available items, see page 168

I

t’s exactly two decades since Giorgio Armani launched his Armani Casa label, bringing his geometric lines and striking proportions into the realm of interiors.

In addition to a now extensive range of furniture, Armani Casa has collaborated with industry-leading partners including Dada (part of the Molteni Group) on kitchens, Roca on bathroom fixtures, Rubelli on textiles, and Jannelli & Volpi on wall coverings. It also has its own interior design studio, responsible for Armani-branded hotels and luxury residences.

Mr Armani is rightfully proud of how far his design label has come. ‘I successfully and independently expanded into sectors beyond fashion to offer my all-embracing philosophy of lifestyle. I can say this is an enormous achievement,’ he says. Still, mindful of the current climate, he has eschewed the usual anniversary fanfare, instead marking the moment with elegant understatement by

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commissioning an editorial campaign titled ‘Living with Armani Casa’.

Art directed by Wallpaper* contributing editor Nick Vinson and photographed by another of our stalwarts, Beppe Brancato, the campaign, revealed exclusively in these pages, envisions the home of a pair of longtime Armani Casa clients. The space is a harmonious blend of old and new: traditional boiserie panelling and marble flooring, offset by contemporary and midcentury design and art. It reflects a considered accumulation of pieces over the years, rather than one ambitious shopping spree.

An Armani Casa piece anchors every space – in the foyer, it’s the ‘Evans’ console from 2011, with its rectilinear central element (clad in a technical shagreen fabric) suspended among a pair of satin brass frames that fit flush against the sides. The dark and handsome ‘Euclide’ desk, from the same year, is the centrepiece of the study, its slender

top and symmetrical chests of black maple drawers supported on painted steel ribbon legs. In the dining room, the 2018 ‘Ned’ table is in spotlight, its three elliptical legs joined by leather-upholstered spokes underneath the dove grey, Tamo wood-veneered surface.

Each piece brings together refined forms with a luxurious yet thoughtful material palette, and the fine Italian craftsmanship that is a hallmark of the Armani brand.

Equal care has been given to the selection of accoutrements. They vary from a pair of 1940s, wood and raffia armchairs, by Italian Rationalist architects Mario Asnago and Claudio Vender, to a finely striped 2019 rug

by Lebanese design duo David/Nicolas.

Likewise, the artworks suggest diverse creative inspiration: a Japanese screen print, a lithograph by the Basque sculptor Eduardo Chillida, a pair of small oil paintings by contemporary British artist Tobit Roche.

This eclectic backdrop accentuates the versatility of Armani Casa’s pieces.

Despite a global economic downturn, Armani Casa is soldiering on – March marked the launch of the Residences by Armani Casa condo tower in Miami, a collaboration with the late architect César Pelli and the brand’s largest project to date. The 2020 collection, intended for launch during Salone del Mobile but postponed to September, pays homage to the abstract art of the early 20th century while emphasising salvaged materials – wood and stone for furniture, fabrics for accessories. Due in 2023 is a revamped flagship on Manhattan’s Madison Avenue (which will also house Armani’s fashion offering), with 19 apartments above. ‘But it’s the public support and feedback at the early and most dramatic stages of the current crisis that fill me with pride,’ reflects Mr Armani.

‘They demonstrate a solid relationship built over time.’ armani.com/casa

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MAKING TRACKS Why Hussein Chalayan, Mark Moore and Dan Donovan turned the fashion designer’s daily comings and goings into musical compositions PORTRAITS: SAMUEL JOHN BUTT WRITER: DAL CHODHA

According to intrepid polymath Hussein Chalayan, we’re living in an era driven by a homespun sense of gumption, of amateur energy, where ‘everyone feels like it’s their right to do anything they want, without worrying about not having the skills’. He channelled this can-do spirit back in February at his A/W20 women’s show, standing at the side of the bare stage, performing tracks live from a synthy EP entitled Dreamtracks, which he produced with S’Express’ Mark Moore and Big Audio Dynamite’s Dan Donovan.

‘I wasn’t nervous, I was excited. The actuality of an event is like a curtain hanging in front of you and the audience, so you’re protected,’ Chalayan says.

The collection was influenced by the animist beliefs of Aboriginal Australians, notably the idea of ‘songlines’ – routes across the land created by ancestors that are translated into music and stories. Chalayan had the idea to create melodies that express his own movements to and from his London studio.

He was then introduced to Moore and Donovan by a mutual friend; neither had worked with a designer in this way before, but they were impressed

by Chalayan’s sincerity of intent. Ahead of meeting them, Chalayan borrowed a neighbour’s keyboard and recorded melodies on GarageBand to accompany his lyrics. ‘He was very embarrassed to play them to us at first,’ Moore says, ‘but what was refreshing is that it reminded me of making my first record, back when I didn’t know the rules. It brought me back to a space I never want to stray too far away from, ripping up the rulebook rather than getting too caught in certain traps of professionalism.’

That sense of unknowing was edifying for all. ‘It’s a very bold and interesting thing to do,’ Donovan says.

‘There’s a language to making music. As a professional musician, I’m constrained by the rules, but he wasn’t – it was an amazing collaboration because one of us would pull it one way and someone else would pull it another. Hussein was always asking questions about the emotional content of the music, the lyrics. What are they saying? What is the emotion here? That was a really good thing.’ In the track ‘Apathy’, Chalayan speaks about being in a disembodied state and the psychology of feeling isolated, while ‘It Is What It Is’ explores rootlessness and how we may project our own mood onto the faces of strangers in a crowd. Part

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protest, part trance, the lyrics take on a new pathos in a world now stirring after months under lockdown.

Readings of Chalayan’s clothes are often informed by their presentation – his cerebral excursions into performance and pageantry. A/W20 is not the first time the designer has participated in one of his shows.

During his S/S03 show, he played in a band that included choreographer Michael Clark and artists Cerith Wyn Evans and Susan Stenger. For S/S10, he compered in French, and for S/S12, he appeared as a waiter serving glasses of champagne. Also for 2012, Chalayan was commissioned by Britain Creates to work on a project with the artist Gavin Turk.

The result was ‘4 Minute Mile’ – a limited-edition vinyl record on which he recites quotes from an interview with Turk, laid over the pounding of running feet and the sound of breathing.

The immediacy of sound is what appeals to Chalayan. ‘Making Dreamtracks was so satisfying because it wasn’t about having a good voice or a bad voice. I didn’t see it like “music”. I thought of it as an idea – it was what it was. I’m excited by music because it’s the most visceral medium, much more than anything visual. It goes right in.’

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Fashion

This page, from top, Hussein Chalayan; record producer, DJ and S’Express founder Mark Moore; and composer, remixer and Big Audio Dynamite keyboardist Dan Donovan, who all collaborated on the EP Dreamtracks Opposite, Chalayan mapped his ‘daily urban paths’.

Different sections of the route were turned into different tracks, such as ‘It Is What It Is’

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Watches

One of Jaeger-LeCoultre’s vintage guillochage machines, which cut patterns that must be true to the smallest fraction of a millimetre, relying on weight for stability and precision adjustment of the set-up

TOOL MASTER

Humans have the upper hand at Jaeger-LeCoultre, where artisans control historic machines to give precision detailing its edge PHOTOGRAPHY: BENOIT JEANNET WRITER: CARAGH MCKAY

D

ecorative horology techniques can sometimes come across as a luxury add-on, a veneer of value to an otherwise ordinary watch dial. But the truth is, manual methods can produce results that programmed machines just can’t match. Guilloché – a very precise form of patterning – is one such art. This is why watchmakers such as Jaeger-LeCoultre, in Switzerland’s Vallée de Joux, are so careful to nurture experts whose particular feel for centuries-old crafts can make all the difference.

At the company’s Rare Crafts Atelier, in its HQ village of Le Sentier, up to 30 experts are collaborating at any time on a range of craft techniques, including enamelling, engraving, gem-setting and guilloché work.

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Above, complete accuracy is everything in cutting this dial’s sunray pattern – seen finished, opposite – with the blade controlled by a ‘ligne droite’ guillochage machine from the 1920s to achieve a perfectly uniform depth for each groove

This last technique uses heavy, engine-turning lathes, set up to cut repetitive patterns. The skill comes in the maintenance of a perfectly regular cut, which depends on the operator having an acute feel for the material under the cutter; the regularity is achieved by making constant, almost imperceptible adjustments of pressure as the tool bites. The size and weight of the machines ensures absolute stability, and because each plate or dial has minute, unpredictable variations, the process relies on experience gleaned over years at the job. It takes almost unreal levels of concentration.

However, Murielle Romand, Jaeger-LeCoultre’s in-house – and sole – guillocheur, is nonplussed by the respect accorded to her work. ‘I find it relaxing,’ »

Watches

Watches

‘What craftspeople achieve in a material is all about personal feel. You can’t get that with a machine’

she says. Romand joined Jaeger-LeCoultre in 1997 and, having previously studied micromechanics, took the decision to focus on the guilloché technique five years ago. Today she also trains an apprentice. Fine watchmakers such as Jaeger-LeCoultre are working hard to attract young people to rare artisan ateliers, lest skills such as Romand’s disappear with time.

She works between two traditional, restored machines, one of which is set up for circular cutting and the other for linear patterns. The designs emerge from a collaborative process between the watch designers, technicians and fellow craftspeople: guilloché is often overlaid with enamel, for instance, another time-consuming technique that requires master precision from all involved.

Nevertheless, Romand has responsibility for the precise size and pattern and is the ultimate designer of any guilloché pieces the house produces. The special edition ‘Hybris Artistica Ivy’ watch, for which she applied the guilloché to the dial’s micro-miniature leaves, highlights not only the level of her skill but how far the watch house will go to make use of its talent.

‘What craftspeople like Murielle achieve in a material is all about personal feel,’ says Stéphane Belmont, Jaeger-LeCoultre’s director of heritage and

This page and opposite, guilloché relies on tools that have been refined over time to cut with total control and precision.

They can be adjusted to the finest tolerances and react to the slightest change in force from the operator. The required combination of steadiness and sensitivity can take years to truly master

rare pieces. ‘We can’t get that with [an automated] machine.’ And he should know. Belmont admits that, some time ago, the house tried to automate the guilloché process for a watch design in an attempt to control enamel over-flowing the dial during firing.

‘Using a machine, we could control the enamels onto the edge, but the decorative effect was flat – the surface of the dial was not shiny enough, the impressions were not good, and the light effect was poor. We noticed that the older [manually controlled] machines were better, and so we did trials and saw very different results.’ So, while the focus returned back to the craft machines, the watchmaker focused on developing a laser-cutting solution to trim the excess enamel where needed (the tolerances required to ensure water-resistance being fractions of a millimetre).

When Romand is at the wheel, Belmont says, the result is consistent: ‘Murielle’s technique means the result is the same every time – she cuts the same line three times, the pressure and speed is her own.

The results are unique.’

There’s also a life in the finished dials that reflects Romand’s passion, ‘I’m happy to work on beautiful, fascinating machines. I’m proud to be the only one.’ jaeger-lecoultre.com

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Design

Creations by four of the 28 emerging designers given an open brief by Kvadrat Febrik to explore the scope of its knitted textiles. From front left, ‘Coalesce’, by Studio Truly Truly; ‘Ofset’ seats (throughout space),

by Ana Kraš; ‘Berg’, by Lim + Lu; and ‘Chroma Columns’, by Raw Color

CLOSE KNIT

Talent and textiles come together in a new project by Kvadrat Febrik PHOTOGRAPHY: SIMON HEGER KNUDSEN WRITER: PAUL SEPHTON

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his year’s 3 Days of Design, which is set to take place in Copenhagen from 3 to 5 September, will see Kvadrat Febrik explore the potential of its knitted textiles in an exhibition titled ‘Knit!

By Kvadrat’. The young Dutch brand, formerly known as Febrik and newly acquired by Danish textile giant Kvadrat, has commissioned 28 emerging designers from around the world to create furniture and objects using its fabric range.

‘The textile is the protagonist; we’re giving the designers the freedom to do whatever they like,’ says Njusja de Gier, Kvadrat Group’s senior vice president of branding and communications, and curator of the company’s many collaborations. ‘Knit! By Kvadrat’ is the fourth in its Design Projects series, following

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installations dedicated to the Hallingdal 65, Divina and Canvas textile ranges.

For Febrik’s co-founder and creative director Renee Merckx, the new exhibition is a celebration of knitting innovation. ‘The knitting technique gives us so many possibilities and ways to design a textile; not only can we work with colours, but we can also play with a knit’s three-dimensionality by creating new binding structures,’ she says.

The pieces – four of which are detailed here – are eclectic and colourful, bringing to life the opportunities offered by Kvadrat Febrik’s product.

‘Knit! By Kvadrat’ runs 3-5 September at the Kvadrat showroom in Copenhagen, Pakhus 48, Klubiensvej 22. A virtual tour is available from 3 September at kvadrat.dk

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Above, Lim + Lu’s ‘Berg’ is inspired by an iceberg and features white fabric upholstery that appears to float above a stainless steel base Opposite, Ana Kraš’ collection of ‘Ofset’ chairs references gallery or waiting room seating

Design

‘Berg’, by Lim + Lu Hong Kong-based duo Elaine Lu and Vincent Lim were drawn to a specific fabric when they created ‘Berg’ (opposite and previous page), which references the majesty of icebergs while accentuating the sculptural properties of Febrik’s knits. A departure from the couple’s typically vibrantly coloured output, ‘Berg’ utilises a crisp white fabric to accentuate the knitted texture. This is complemented by a polished stainless steel base, to create the illusion that the fabric is floating. The design was inspired by Lim and Lu’s honeymoon in Iceland, where they were astonished by the architecture of icebergs. ‘An iceberg as an object has a universal mystique that everyone is drawn to,’ says Lim.

‘Ofset’ chairs, by Ana Kraš When Ana Kraš received her fabric samples and laid them across her desk, she loved how they worked together. She wanted to construct something using multiple fabrics. ‘When I decided on chairs, I thought about something more conceptual – something that would mimic the experience of visiting a gallery, something temporary,’ says the New-York-based designer. Created with offset panels, her collection of seats (above and previous page) evokes a waiting room. In a palette ranging from brown, apricot and tan to rich blue and grey, the chairs incorporate the linear motifs for which Kraš is known, while powder-coated aluminium fabric joints eliminate the need for stitching.

‘Coalesce’, by Studio Truly Truly Manipulated materials feature frequently in the work of husband-and-wife duo Kate and Joel Booy, of Rotterdam’s Studio Truly Truly. They were captivated by the flexibility of Febrik knits, and their piece explores creative ways to upholster an object. ‘That technicality is interesting – seeking out the rules, then figuring out how to play with them,’ says Joel.

Their ‘Coalesce’ chair (previous page) represents their dual creative impulses: to explore material processes, but also create pieces that are aesthetically polished.

The chair is bolted onto a glass bottom, to appear as if it’s pressed into the glass; there’s seemingly a conversation between hard and soft elements.

‘Chroma Columns’, by Raw Color Colour was the natural starting point for this Eindhoven-based, multidisciplinary design studio, which decided to create something more playful than a standard furniture piece. ‘Chroma Columns’ (previous page) is a vertical display that highlights the shifting nature of colour. The studio installed a series of upholstered triangular prisms on motorised plinths, which rotate to create a kaleidoscopic effect.

‘You feel the sense of beautiful colour combinations,’ says studio co-founder Christoph Brach, ‘and the sense that the piece is open to be interpreted in the space in which it lives, be it as a display piece, a room divider or otherwise.’

PATH FINDER Matthew Harris, founder of jewellery brand Mateo, on going his own way PHOTOGRAPHY: DAVEY ADESIDA WRITER: LYNETTE NYLANDER

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Even mid-interview, Matthew ‘Mateo’ Harris is in designing mode. During the Covid-19 pandemic, he has experienced an uptick in sales, a testament to the enduring quality of his designs. ‘I am making a piece as we speak,’ he laughs on the phone from Los Angeles, where he is enjoying his last week on the West Coast before decamping to Houston, Texas, where he has just bought a home.

Since establishing his brand in 2009, Harris has become an exciting name in jewellery – eschewing trends and bringing a touch of modernity to more classic jewellery pieces, with a bespoke service to match.

‘I want my clients to be a part of the Mateo family, I want to know how they are doing, how they are enjoying their pieces from me.’

He has developed an acute understanding of craft, construction and the power of relationships. He grew up in Montego Bay,

Jamaica, the son of a seamstress who made clothes for clients as well as local children.

‘She would take their measurements but also just give them gummy bears and make them laugh. People want to have a connection with whatever you’re buying and I think that happens less and less now.’ He describes Jamaica as ‘idyllic’. ‘I grew up very lucky.’

During his formative years at an all-boys Anglican high school, Harris knew he was different from his peers. ‘I excelled, not in a cocky way.’ He went to university in New Hampshire, then slipped into an unexpected path: modelling. ‘I hated it,’ he says. ‘It wasn’t for me. I like to have control of my life.’

Despite his early exposure to the fashion industry, Harris never considered working in design. Instead, he studied hospitality management. ‘It all boils down to being Jamaican. The economy thrives from tourism.

Jewellery

Model: Nya Kong at Elite

Opposite, far left, Mateo founder Matthew Harris, whose latest collection includes, near left, 14ct gold enamel and pearl cascade earring, $4,750; and, right, 14ct gold graduated pearl hoop with pearl drop, $1,950

So I thought this was my only option. No one teaches you how to dream or even consider fashion as a career growing up in Jamaica.

The moment you say you want to work in fashion, there’s this homophobic backlash.’

It was only when he began a consulting business to help designers with sales and marketing, that Harris realised he had a knack for jewellery design. He soon launched his own men’s jewellery label, adding women’s fine jewellery in 2014. ‘The trend was super gaudy, skull motifs, and this hyper-masculinity that was not my aesthetic at all. I was doing construction in my apartment and a screw fell out of the wall; I thought, “Why isn’t this a necklace?” As a designer it doesn’t make sense to do something that is already out there. I am always trying to fill the blank space.’

An avid follower of architecture and fine art, Harris acknowledges the futuristic work

of Norman Foster and the distinctive mobiles of Alexander Calder as inspiration. Often crafted in gold, silver and pearl with delicate diamond or malachite accents, his pieces read like petite sculptures, carefully considered for the body. ‘I flew all the way to Moscow just to see Kandinsky’s work. I also did a collection around Brâncuși’s sculpture – I try to incorporate it all. It can even just be a woman on the train, who just has impeccable style.’

Rihanna wore one of Harris’ zipper necklace designs, adding celebrity kudos to his already burgeoning business, and Harris added retailers such as Bergdorf Goodman, Browns and Barneys New York. He opened a flagship in 2016 in New York’s Nolita and was a CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fund finalist in 2017.

‘I’ve been super blessed as a Black designer.’

He has added a successful handbag line, with his brand DNA of simplicity, clean lines

and wearability at an affordable price point.

‘Those classic shapes that never go out of style at a price that doesn’t break the bank.

I want a younger generation to be able to meet us where they are at, to grow with the brand. I have seen other jewellery brands wildly overcharge and I refuse.’

He also seems set on creating his take on a lifestyle brand. ‘I have a candle line that is wildly popular,’ he says, mentioning an upcoming perfume based on his Black Onyx scent. ‘I would also love to make objects for the home. I just took up pottery, so who knows?’ Mateo is relaunching men’s jewellery after a hiatus, and making a concerted effort to go direct-to-customer, to more carefully craft its brand narrative. ‘If Covid-19 has taught me anything, it’s that community is so important. That’s the future for me.’ mateonewyork.com

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This page, skylights illuminate an informal family room in the house’s lower volume, where concrete is softened by grey-stained wooden floors, and Ligne Roset ‘Togo’ sofas add colour Opposite, the upper volume, clad in bright green perforated aluminium, houses the family’s bedrooms

Pop star A house in the Hollywood Hills is a stand-out hit PHOTOGRAPHY: MATTHEW MILLMAN WRITER: ELLIE STATHAKI

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Architecture

Architecture

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he slopes of Los Angeles’ hilly suburbs are home of some of the world’s finest modernist residences – think Pierre Koenig’s Case Study House No 22, and John Lautner’s Chemosphere House. This is what a couple – an interior designer and an entrepreneur – had in mind when they began hunting for a family home. Their search led them to an unlikely plot in the Hollywood Hills, ragged, empty and neighbouring a nature reserve. The steep slope, while offering striking views, was almost unbuildable.

Called upon to help, architect Douglas Burnham, principal of Berkeley-based

Envelope Architecture + Design, was unfazed.

The clients snapped up the plot and with it the chance to build from scratch in the Hills, to create a contemporary answer to those modernist classics. The architects made the slope safe and landscape designer Matthew Brown refortified the site with native species. Soon, a curious, green volume started peeking out from the foliage.

The site is enveloped by a sculpted concrete wall, but this bright, cantilevered upper volume makes the house hard to miss.

‘There’s an exuberance to LA architecture,’ says Burnham. ‘There’s room to experiment.

Above, the upper green volume, its colour partly inspired by the verdant setting, contains bedrooms and a guest wing, and is tilted to create more space below. To the left is the separate garage and motorcycle workshop Opposite, the indoor/outdoor living space, with ‘DS-600’ De Sede sofas, offers views across LA

The green shade came from the client’s preferences, but also out of the tree canopy– albeit ours is very much an artificial green.’

The house has almost no conventionally shaped rooms at all. ‘The floorplan is very kinked and faceted, not much is parallel or perpendicular,’ says Burnham. ‘We tried to enhance movement through the house, so it’s about spaces of motion and flow. This happens in plan but also in section, with the master bedroom volume tilted up a bit, giving more room to the space below. The broken geometry gives a casual, informal feeling.’

Driving into the plot, a courtyard leads to a garage, its door clad in dichroic glass that changes colour through the day. The owners’ motorcycle fabrication workshop is also located here. A pathway around this volume leads down and into an open-air ‘plaza’, the heart of the composition. From here, there is an entrance to the main house’s open-plan ground floor, with living spaces, a discreet kitchen and an outdoor dining area and swimming pool. The volume above houses the bedrooms. A guest suite sits somewhat separately in an eastern wing that can be closed off. From the living space, a corridor leads to what Burnham calls the ‘control room’, an informal family room lit by skylights through to the garden above.

‘The light cannons in the control room are our “Corbusian moment”,’ says the architect.

Materials and patterns highlight a sense of discovery. The main volume’s lower level is made of concrete, but the floors are wooden, stained in a concrete-inspired grey to soften the interior. Visual accents around the house include Memphis-patterned Formica in the laundry room, foil wallpaper and a Droog rubber sink in the powder room, and a bathroom with chequered surfaces

by Dtile and green Vola fittings. The design balances opposites: industrial elements and soft shapes, hard concrete and colour pops, minimalist details and patterned surfaces.

The owners informed decisions, such as the treatment of openings, and the perforated aluminium cladding of the green volume.

‘Gridded surfaces and works by James Turrell and Olafur Eliasson featured in the initial mood board, as did experiential chambers, immersion spaces and, strangely, nuclear reactors and bunkers,’ says Burnham. ‘They reference LA’s obsession with pleasure, and the sense of precariousness that comes with living in this time and this place.’ Perched lightly on its steep, leafy slope, overlooking this city of contrasts, their thinking seems very appropriate. envelopead.com

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Art

AUTO MOTIF

Virgil Abloh gets behind the wheel to reimagine a Mercedes-Benz classic STILL-LIFE PHOTOGRAPHY: FREDERIC SEEMANN PORTRAITS: BAFIC WRITER: SOPHIE LOVELL

Our photographs preview the collaboration, which reinterprets the Mercedes-Benz G-Class as a work of art. Luxury is expressed partly through a ‘filler grey’ finish, sanded in patches to highlight the layers of labour

At the beginning of 2020, Mercedes-Benz offered Wallpaper* a preview of a new collaborative art project it was working on, due for launch later this year. The raw material was its four-decade-old, classic SUV series the G-Class, or G-Wagen, as it is also known. The collaborators were Gorden Wagener, the brand’s chief design officer, and Virgil Abloh, the designer, architect, entrepreneur, DJ, artist, artistic director of Louis Vuitton menswear and CEO of his own fashion label, Off-White.

This collaboration is quite a coup for the car maker. The resulting piece, to be unveiled this autumn, is called Project Geländewagen (Geländewagen is German for ‘terrain vehicle’, from which the G-Wagen gets its name).

Abloh has become one of the world’s hottest designers in recent years. Originally

trained as an engineer and architect, he works across a whole range of media, but specifically with brands, their products and where they interact with popular culture.

He has been called an ‘arch appropriator’ and indeed he does specialise in editing existing objects or tropes. Give him the core parameters of a brand, product, object or form typology and he will deconstruct and realign their narratives, making them ‘of the now’ by endowing them with new context – both historical and contemporary. This is not so much appropriation as an understanding and continuation of the cultural fractioning that defines our post-postmodern world: editing and remixing what went before.

Brands such as Nike, Evian, Ikea and Vitra love Abloh for this fluency, not to mention the potential access he brings to a younger

global generation also adept at growing new contexts from fragmented sources and re-expressing them in a language of emojis, memes, acronyms and filters.

This is a generation that, despite its love of appropriation and its ease with commodification, is becoming increasingly distanced from aspirations of ownership of large possessions – such as cars. So, did Abloh approach this automobile brand project in a different way to past ventures, a pair of Nike Jordans or a Jean Prouvé chair for Vitra, for example? ‘It’s of the same language,’ he replies. ‘I’m investigating the same thing across all objects aside from fashion. If you ask an average person on the street, they realise that fashion has an ongoing practice of designing a new pair of pants, shirt or whatever, but they don’t »

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Art

‘A previous generation has been immersed in Mercedes-Benz, but the younger generation needs to see how a historical brand or historical ideas of luxury can relate to them’

Choosing to evoke speed and power, Virgil Abloh, above, and Gorden Wagener, opposite, have brought racing car touches to the G-Class’ boxy SUV shell, including original DTM-series safety belts, right

notice a door handle design unless it’s broken.

They are not thinking about where objects are derived from, and I want to use my career as a way for a young generation to appreciate design in its full capacity – not just fashion.’

Therefore, what made this particular collaboration interesting for Abloh was not so much the chance to rethink a single distinctive product, as to identify the core narrative thread of the Mercedes-Benz brand: ‘I told Gorden when we first met that I am an aficionado of boxy objects and boxy cars.

There’s only a few on the market and that’s part of why the G-Wagen is so iconic – its design language comes from a different point.

But when I walked into the design hall at Mercedes-Benz I stepped into the whole ethos. [The G-Class is just] one car among a hundred cars,’ says Abloh. That narrative thread, in Wagener’s view, is luxury. ‘I don’t see Mercedes-Benz simply as a car brand,’ he says. ‘I see it as an international luxury label and my aim is to make it the most loved luxury brand. So, of course, you have to come up with a new definition of luxury and that’s really what Virgil brought in.’

Adds Abloh, ‘It’s about me coming in and understanding the universe that Gorden oversees. It was the understanding of the

matrix, what the brand means and also where the brand started – because for me you can’t start designing without knowing the history.’

Once he has absorbed this, he can then set about trying to bring a new audience to that historical context through design: ‘A previous generation has been immersed in MercedesBenz, but the young generation needs to see how a historical brand or historical ideas of luxury can relate to them.’

The G-Class’ history is one of a powerful, robust, functional, off-road vehicle, first launched in 1979, which also handles well on the road. Originally designed for both civilian and industrial use, it has also had a long and distinguished military career with many armed forces, gradually gaining in popularity as a luxury private vehicle as well. Today’s G-Class image is of a strictly luxury machine and it is this market that interests Wagener most: ‘Of course it’s a luxury product, of course it is urban. Nobody really goes off-road with a $200,000 car – at least most people don’t. With a luxury product, it is not so much about functionality, it is about a feeling for the brand you are selling. And it all starts with the silhouette – that unique silhouette that no other car has.’ The G-Class’ distinctive, box-like, utilitarian silhouette

he is talking about implies protection and safety. ‘It is favoured by many female customers because of that: you sit high, you feel protected, you feel like nothing can harm you – and the design expresses that,’ he adds.

The first impression of Abloh and Wagener’s Project Geländewagen is that it has little to do with the vehicle’s functional origins or with luxury as it is commonly understood. Both Abloh and Wagener are long-term G-Class owners and drivers and both own Mercedes-AMG G 63 models, which are monster powerhouses with fourlitre biturbo V8 engines. ‘There is an essence of the car that is really fast,’ says Abloh.

At a glance, the G-Class may call to mind ‘off-roading, military and, like, a truck truck, but when you step on the gas pedal it moves more nimbly and faster than you’d imagine’.

So the most striking aspect of their design is that it evokes speed, power and the race track: the vehicle is low and broad with a widened track to accommodate extra-wide, smooth racing tyres. All the windows, apart from the windscreen, have been removed and replaced with a mesh material. The inside is considerably stripped down, almost all comforts, panelling and padding having been removed. There’s an inner framework of »

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exposed roll bars painted baby blue; a Mercedes-AMG One hypercar racing steering wheel; immaculately upholstered DTM-series bucket racing seats and racing safety belts; and a reduced, functional dashboard. ‘It is the opposite of the G cliché of an SUV,’ says Wagener. ‘This is an on-road vehicle – a race car basically.’ But because this is an art project, not a functioning prototype, there is no engine inside or other technologically innovative additions to the signifiers of speed.

The essence of the G-Class survives on the surface, which of course still includes the distinctively edgy chamfered shape and the spare wheel slung on the back.

Abloh’s key signifier of luxury for the vehicle comes in the ‘filler grey’ exterior paintwork that has been carefully sanded in patches to reveal multiple layers beneath.

‘It’s about taking the old-world idea of luxury, this idea of hand-finishing, and letting the surface show remnants – that a hand touched it,’ he explains. ‘When you see an object that was handmade or human-made, you can connect with it in a different way to if it was machined to a perfect finish. So we played with that notion and what you see is layers removed. It’s not just a colour, it’s a finish technique that we developed and I’m super proud of.’ With it, he also alludes nicely to the fact that the G-Class vehicles are mostly hand-assembled in a factory in Austria.

Project Geländewagen has taken place at an extraordinary moment globally, amid a climate emergency, a pandemic, a recession and civil rights uprisings, to name but a few ongoing events. How, then, has this affected the two designers? Has either of them felt the need to rethink their perspectives or for systemic intervention, that is, redesigning the systems within which their product worlds are generated? Both designers pause for a while before answering – maybe this is not a question to expect when talking about an art car project, but unexpected times call

Left, Virgil Abloh designed this month’s limited-edition cover, intended to highlight the magazine as an object.

He will cut 100 special copies in half and sell them on canary---yellow.com, with proceeds going to the Virgil Abloh™ “Post Modern” Scholarship Fund.

Limited-edition covers are available to subscribers, see Wallpaper.com Opposite, the reduced dashboard of Project Geländewagen and, above, its extra-wide smooth tyres are among its racing-inspired details

for unexpected conversations. ‘The world is not the same as before, that’s for sure,’ says Wagener, ‘but as designers we have a longterm approach. Of course, culture always reflects on design and we will see how we will interpret that, but in general, at least on my work, it doesn’t have a huge impact now.’

‘The question you are asking is broader than design,’ says Abloh. ‘It’s in every field and humanity as a whole, from media to fashion to food. It’s about how we as humans relate to one another and look after one another. As the future rolls on, it’s my ambition to write history in a way that corrects itself. It’s no secret that there is a disproportionate [number] of Black designers in the world today, so how will the future change? I like to let the work speak for itself and I also take on initiatives to open doors to make sure that people can follow in my footsteps. This project is one way. I was a kid of African immigrants that came to Chicago, and through my work but also through the legacy of the programmes that I’m building behind me, I’m going to make sure that other kids like me can continue on.’

Project Geländewagen will be unveiled with a digital event on 8 September, at 4pm CET at mercedes-benz.com; canary---yellow.com

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Left, materials used by researchers at Hélios, whose works spans skincare, cosmetic and fragrance development Opposite, a researcher whips up a sunscreen emulsion

SECRET VIALS The R&D of skincare and make-up is a serious, and closely guarded, science. Dior affords Wallpaper* an insider’s tour of its high-tech travails at LVMH’s Hélios centre in France’s Cosmetic Valley PHOTOGRAPHY: IMAGE GROUP WRITER: AMY SERAFIN

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douard Mauvais-Jarvis was an ex-veterinarian studying pharmacology when he became fascinated by skincare. ‘People tend to believe that cosmetics are superfluous,’ he says. ‘But cosmetics have an essential role to play in social relations. The skin of your face is the first thing that others see when you establish a personal connection.’ There is an evolutionary aspect, too – our initial impressions can attract us to a healthy person as a potential mate, or warn us away from an unhealthy one as a possible carrier of disease.

As France gradually reopened after the Covid-19 lockdown this spring, Mauvais-Jarvis, now Dior International’s environmental and scientific communications director, took Wallpaper* on a tour of Hélios, the state-of-the-art centre where LVMH, Dior’s parent company, conducts research, creates, and innovates around perfumes and cosmetics for some 14 different brands. Dior is the luxury group’s biggest beauty brand, and represents a whopping 70 per cent of the centre’s activity.

Inaugurated in 2013 in St-Jean-de-Braye, near Orléans, Hélios is part of Cosmetic Valley, one of France’s so-called ‘competitiveness clusters’ (bringing together businesses, research centres, suppliers and more working in the same sector). Nestled in a grassy site surrounded by trees, the building is located on a 55-hectare production site for Parfums Christian Dior.

The French architectural firm Arte Charpentier designed the 18,000 sq m structure as a three-storey equilateral triangle around a central atrium. True to its name, the nearly all-white building is filled with natural light, which enters through a roof made of semi-transparent ETFE (fluorine-based plastic)

cushions that modulate the internal temperature.

Soft edges and a façade of white screen-printed glass help the building to merge into the landscape.

Inside Hélios, around 350 researchers work on different stages of R&D. Laboratories line each side of the triangle, their windows offering views of atrium and forest. Mauvais-Jarvis takes us to see a lab devoted to skincare formulation, where a counter is set with glass jars containing dried flower buds, powders and extracts. He points out an extract of Rose de Granville, a seventh-generation hybrid descended from a wild rose that grows on the cliffs of Normandy, bravely resisting salt air and ocean winds. Hélios’ researchers have isolated eight unique molecules from the hardy rose as active ingredients for Dior Prestige’s new Micro-Huile de Rose Advanced Serum.

Nearby, a scientist in a white lab coat is using a contraption resembling a kitchen mixer to whip up a smooth white emulsion for a sunscreen. Beyond her, creams are lined up on the windowsill to see how they react to the natural light of a hypothetical customer’s bathroom.

Many of the contents of the lab are strictly off-limits to visitors, but if Hélios is wary of outsiders seeing its secrets, it is because the stakes are extremely high.

France dominates the global cosmetics industry, controlling nearly one quarter of market share. (A major reason for this pre-eminence is its investment in R&D – according to a 2019 report by the consultancy Asterès, the French cosmetics industry spends two per cent of annual turnover on innovation. For big groups such as LVMH, this investment rises to three per cent.)

When asked what sets Hélios apart from other research centres in Cosmetic Valley, Mauvais-Jarvis

The 18,000 sq m Hélios R&D centre, designed by architects Arte Charpentier and opened in 2013, brings together all of LVMH’s research teams

Production: Parent Global. Assistant: Laurent Chouard. Retouching: Myonghwi Kim

responds, ‘Our R&D covers a spectrum of disciplines integrated in a single building, which is exceptional.’

Botanists, chemists, biologists and other experts all work side by side, specialising in more than 20 scientific fields, including ethnobotany, physical chemistry, powder formulation, delivery systems, sensory analysis, toxicology and cell biology.

One example of this range is Dior’s work with a neuroscientist from the University of Tours, testing how changes in the skin affect our perception of a person’s age. Their research found that our brain determines the apparent age of another person in less than 100 milliseconds, based on visible signals of health in the skin, such as tone, radiance and texture. ‘The impact of these signs on apparent age can be even greater than that of wrinkles,’ Mauvais-Jarvis says.

Using AI and machine learning, Dior then created a database of faces, teaching the computer to evaluate age in the same way the human brain does, and measuring the relationship between visible indicators of health and perceived youthfulness.

The researchers found that the skin’s signs of good health (or lack thereof ) can make a 43-year-old look as young as 38 or as old as 49. Mauvais-Jarvis says that Dior is using this information to make products that target wrinkles and firmness but also ‘focus on corrections that might seem minor but have a huge impact on appearance and perception’.

For the past two decades, Dior has also been conducting research into stem cells, the only cells that can endlessly self-renew and rejuvenate the skin. In 2018, Dior Science made the surprising discovery that stem cells do not decrease in number over time.

Instead, they lose their energy potential. The finding was impressive enough that Dior Science subsequently signed a research partnership with the CiRA Laboratory at Kyoto University, directed by Nobel Prize-winner and stem cell specialist Shinya Yamanaka.

‘We are very flattered to have them as a partner,’ says Mauvais-Jarvis. ‘Their interest in working with us attests to the quality of our scientific research.’

Floral science is another one of Dior’s specialities, going back more than five decades. Plants contain a wealth of molecules, and scientists have only started to scratch the surface of their cosmetic and therapeutic properties. Over the past 25 years, Dior has planted eight flower gardens around the world, all organic or as close to organic as possible. A laboratory at Hélios analyses the flowers, and has developed its own customised methods for extracting individual molecules, which Mauvais-Jarvis says represent 60 to 80 per cent of Dior’s active ingredients. ‘We cultivate particular flowers in a specific way, harvest them at a specific time and use our own extraction techniques, to develop something that is very high quality and difficult to copy.’ It was after screening nearly 1,700 flower ingredients for their ability to reboot tired stem cells that ethnobotanists selected four particularly vigorous varieties for a new formulation of Dior’s Capture Totale Cell Energy anti-age cream and serum: Madagascan longoza (which can even grow on burnt land), Chinese peony, white lily, and Chinese jasmine.

The entire new Capture Totale range contains, on average, 84 per cent natural ingredients, as sustainability has become a priority for Dior. A laboratory at Hélios is dedicated to making its formulas as natural as possible and removing any suspect or

Spatulas ready for use in one of the laboratories, where the research covers everything from stem cells to rose extracts

non-biodegradable ingredients. Dior’s packaging has evolved, as well – plastic bottles are being replaced with glass, outside packaging is made with recyclable FSC cardboard, and packaging volume has decreased by as much as 30 per cent. As Mauvais-Jarvis points out, ‘You can have the cleanest formulas in the world, but with dirty packaging they are useless.’

He underlines that it has been a Herculean task to reformulate Dior’s existing products and recipes while maintaining their performance and sensoriality – the same scent, consistency, glide and so on. He compares the challenge to ‘making a meringue without eggs’. And yet it is vital to get it right: ‘You use a skincare product for a long time. If there is no sensory pleasure, people will stop using it after a week.’

Science has taken skincare and make-up a long way since ancient Egyptians wore eyeliner made with lead and Renaissance Italians used mercury sulphide as blush. ‘There is a reason people have used cosmetics for millennia,’ says Mauvais-Jarvis. ‘By putting something on the skin, we can improve our appearance.

For a long time, the approach was empirical. You applied something, and if it did something, great.

Then, little by little, we began to understand how and why it worked.’ dior.com

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The pandemic may have put paid to physical fashion shows, but July saw an outpouring of creativity and ingenuity as designers and brands turned to other channels to present their S/S21 menswear and haute couture collections. The challenge to create designs and figure out new methods of showcasing them also occurred during lockdown, with teams collaborating remotely via Zoom and on socially distanced shoots. The big democratising upside of digital fashion weeks that started with Shanghai in March is that everyone worldwide has a front-row view.

Out of this chaos and seemingly impossible circumstances, fashion has been shot into digital space and it is proving a fascinating journey. The shows did go on, with designs featured on avatars (Ralph & Russo, August Getty Atelier), in 3D animations (Botter, Louis Vuitton) and in delightful mini films that blend real and fantasy worlds. Iris van Herpen cast Game of Thrones’ Carice van Houten in her Escherinfluenced multifaceted film, with hyper-real close-ups of fabric and embellishments.

At Dior, Maria Grazia Chiuri enlisted film director Matteo Garrone (Dogman, Pinocchio) who created a schmaltzy fairytale short, Le Mythe, that saw nymphs frolic in CGI bucolic landscapes and encounter the collection in the form of miniature gowns that arrived in a portable ‘maison’ carried by bellboys. The piece was bookended with real footage from the couture atelier, featuring the petites mains making couture gowns at 40 per cent scale, echoing the miniature

mannequins that Christian Dior created to promote collections in 1944.

Meanwhile at Maison Margiela, John Galliano and Nick Knight collaborated on a thrilling film spun out through teaser clips on Instagram to promote the Artisanal collection. It features models swaggering and posing in painterly chromatic compositions, like otherworldly spectres in dramatic silhouettes. You could call it hallucinogenic haute couture. Knight also worked on a film to accompany Valentino’s collection, debuted at a live show at Cinecittà Studios in Rome.

Some presentations were punkish and DIY – Boramy Viguier’s spinning lookbook images overlaid on a Dadaist collage background – and others, airy and lyrical. Issey Miyake’s choreographed ‘show’, entitled Meet Your New Self, blended free-form dance sequences with fantasy flights across cityscapes and animations of blooming fabric houseplants made of the brand’s signature Pleats fabric.

The film was directed by Yusuke Kobayashi, with digital effects by Whiteboard Ltd. While fashion creatives are acutely aware of what they are missing – the emotional and storytelling impact of IRL fashion shows – and editors and buyers yearn for the group experience and the tactile examination of collections, eyes have had to be opened to new alternatives. Just as football teams adjust to the reality of empty stadiums, fashion is adjusting to displaced realities.

‘The pandemic in all its awfulness has allowed people to step off the treadmill and address how they want to express themselves

creatively. The question of showing a collection through any means except for a catwalk has stimulated invention,’ says Knight, who set up Showstudio as a hub for fashion filmmaking some 20 years ago. ‘The medium of the catwalk show really came into being in the 1940s. The fashion business is a different beast today, yet the show system has not changed and there’s a big disconnect.

‘I have been working with models on Zoom shoots,’ he says. ‘The make-up artist might be in LA, the stylist in Jamaica and I “direct” the web camera, working with the available light in the room. It’s thrilling and just as creatively demanding as working on set. I am a firm believer in using everything that comes to hand, whether that’s an iPhone or a thermal camera or a security camera or a 3D scan, or an X-ray – these are all tools like charcoal or oil or a pencil. Art has come out of the gallery and film out of the physical “set”.’ It is strange, he adds that while fashion is a cutting-edge art form, the show system ‘has been so wedded to the past’.

During lockdown, he masterminded a CGI avatar of Kendall Jenner for Riccardo Tisci at Burberry. It started with Jenner photographing herself at home, with Knight creating a digital Jenner body using a model in a motion-capture suit, and was set against a minimalist architectural background in CGI resembling an empty pool. Burberry will be staging a live show in September outdoors but with no spectators.

As brands turn to animation, CGI and VFX, there are learning curves on both »

THE SHOW MUST GO ON Models are avatars, looks are rendered in software suites and we’re all in the front row. Creative talents spearheading the industry’s digitisation ponder fashion’s post-Covid future WRITER: HARRIET QUICK

Image: courtesy of Maison Margiela and Showstudio

MAISON MARGIELA John Galliano and Nick Knight’s dramatic promotion of the house’s A/W Co-Ed Artisanal collection

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tired narratives of couture, a series not a show, a new world not our old one.’

The project will be introduced through social media, web and press as a series over six months. Says Young, ‘Strategically we built in a level of intrigue and a narrative with crescendos and characters. The characters and landscapes are beyond our realities, very fitting for a brand that is thinking beyond seasons. The viewing is no longer confined to old hierarchies of front row or backstage, or the limitations of live streaming. This is a democratised viewing portal.’

Digital showcases can also be nostalgic.

Lisi Herrebrugh and Rushemy Botter, co-founders of the Botter menswear label, commissioned animation studio Trappist Monk to create a game featuring their character, Aqua Novio. ‘My first experience of virtual worlds was through Nintendo. We wanted to recapture some of the excitement of choosing your player and the outfit,’ says Botter of their amiable cartoon figure, who tries on outfits with the click of a cursor.

‘The most important thing about fashion is to

RALPH & RUSSO An avatar called Hauli, created by studio VSLB, poses in looks from the A/W20 couture collection

express emotions and put out something new, but you can’t compare these digital pieces to a catwalk show, which is when you invite people into your world with music and real emotions. It is a complement,’ says Herrebrugh, who also presented a short film shot in the atelier with two models.

At Louis Vuitton, Virgil Abloh likewise embraced a sense of playfulness. His cartoon The Adventures of Zoooom with Friends saw stowaway characters bursting out of shipping containers and gamboling through the sites of Paris in Abloh’s sunny clothes. The tenminute work married FX animation by Reggieknow, of Fashion Figure Inc, with 3D modelling, texturing and scenic visuals. To note: the credit list, spanning studios, styling, casting and visual effects, was longer than the IRL fashion show equivalent.

Such animations are not a budget option.

It takes two days just to render a couture look on an avatar, and a suite of software tools. ‘We analyse the fabric weight and drape against the flesh and calculate this exact detailing when simulating the collision

Images: courtesy of Ralph & Russo, Institute of Digital Fashion, Botter

sides. Creative digital studios might be whizzes at building immersive AR worlds for gaming, but rendering the lustre, embroidery, and detail of an £80,000 haute couture gown, and translating the ‘dream’ of fashion into movement and setting demands new skill sets, processes, deep pockets and patience.

‘There are a lot of similarities between a digital atelier and a couture one. We replicate seams and cuts so the clothes move in tune with the body, as the materials would IRL,’ says Leanne Elliott Young, co-founder of the London-based agency, Institute of Digital Fashion. ‘Yet brands often have no idea of the application involved, the timelines or the processes. The current crisis has acted as an accelerator. Tuning into a digital experience would have been a massive ask for consumers, buyers and press; now we have found our audience much more open,’ says Young, who with co-founder and digital artist Cattytay is working on a series called Tinnitus for LAbased August Getty. The designer, an activist within the LGBTQ community, describes it as ‘a modern biopic, a bold alternative to the

between garment and digital human,’ says Cattytay of digitisation’s painstaking process.

For its avatar-driven couture presentation, Ralph & Russo worked with Seoul-based digital design studio VSLB. Tamara Ralph’s idea was for a cyber model called Hauli (meaning strength and power in Swahili) to pose in front of the Seven Wonders of the World. Says Sarah Schmidt, VSLB’s CEO and founder, ‘First, we built the avatar body with the precise body type for haute couture and set the poses and created the textures for the skin, eyes and hair. Next, we modelled the base shape of the garments to the avatar in a T pose. From the T pose, the avatar was animated to the final pose to simulate the look. Fabric textures followed, while jewellery and accessories were created in different software. Each piece was brought as a raw file into the final rendering software, where we textured the look. Each back plate received special lighting settings to enhance colours.’

The digital reinvention of the show might have been considered ‘counter-cultural’ five years ago. Now, the medium appears a viable

alternative. It’s also friendlier to the planet than physical shows and shoots, with their elaborate sets and vast teams that, along with the audience, fly into fashion capitals from all over the world. The Fashion Innovation Agency at the London College of Fashion is working on a project with experience creation studio Helo, AR pioneers Rewind, and design agency Twin Studio. ‘The shift is being brought about by necessity, but the benefits will far outweigh the criticism in the long term. Covid-19 has accelerated the dawn of the fourth industrial revolution in many industries, including fashion. Digitisation is less wasteful and more inclusive,’ says Phoebe Smith, managing director of Helo, which has bases in London, New York and LA. There is a cluster of brands and designers who are also choosing to show off-grid or in hybrid ‘phy-gital’ shows. Saint Laurent and Gucci will not be taking part in forthcoming September fashion weeks. Meanwhile, show design and production agency Bureau de Betak set up a division, Bureau Future, two years ago, specialising in digital strategy and

technology that amplifies the live event online. Says founder Alex de Betak, ‘One of the tools that will help fashion become more eco-responsible is digital broadcasting.

Covid-19 has accelerated that need, as will the recession. Nothing can replace the live events and physical encounters, but the parameters of the show need to be updated with a reduction in the size of the audience.

Without the constraints that come with a huge audience, designers are freed up creatively.’ De Betak produced a Jacquemus show off-schedule in a Paris suburb in July for a restricted audience, and a Dior cruise presentation in Puglia, Italy. ‘We are looking at how to amplify the experience online with interactive features and AR. With that shift brands can attract fresh eyes and audiences.’

What the new era of showmanship is giving fashion enthusiasts as well as industry professionals is an unprecedented insight into the ateliers, the processes and the inspirations behind the collections. It is pushing the parameters and expanding the ideals and aspirations that fashion embodies.

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Animations are not a budget option.

It takes two days just to render a couture look on an avatar

AUGUST GETTY ATELIER Developed by the Institute of Digital Fashion and Cattytay, Tinnitus is a series with characters and narrative, seen here in progress

BOTTER A digital cloakroom developed by Trappist Monk allows users to dress cartoon character Aqua Novio for S/S21

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Sharp turn An Indian temple’s simple, open design puts its users first PHOTOGRAPHY: EDMUND SUMNER WRITER: HARRIET THORPE

In the small town of Bansberia in West Bengal, architect Abin Chaudhuri has replaced the 100-year-old Narayantala Thakurdalan temple – much-loved but awkward and unremarkable as a structure – with a modern upgrade. Chaudhuri, founder of Abin Design Studio, grew up in Bansberia. Now based in Kolkata, 55km away, he is well-versed in the local culture that orients around religion and football. He had attended the Narayantala Thakurdalan since childhood, joyfully participating in religious celebrations, yet also seeing how people spilled out into the street causing accidents and traffic jams, due to its location on a busy corner.

He knew he could design a better temple for his community. He also knew that it wasn’t the crumbling brick and plaster construction that made the place special. ‘Thakurdalan’ translates as ‘permanent covered podium’ in Bengali. Religious idols are placed inside the temple twice a year during celebrations, but for the most part, it is visited for daily prayers and meditation.

‘As a child, I saw that even when there was no idol, people left their shoes outside. They treated it as a sacred space, but it was not about the structure, it was about belief,’ says Chaudhuri. So instead of designing the new Narayantala Thakurdalan as a ‘temple’, he was guided purely by context and function. The aim was to protect this sacred space.

His design is a carefully tailored response to the community and their activities. While much smaller than the original temple, at 71 sq m with a capacity of 40 people, it offers much more useful space. The column-free interior and wider glass-and-steel door allows for an easy flow of people in and out, and now during festivities, they spill out into a courtyard with a new concrete bench, instead of onto the street.

The low-maintenance structure was designed and completed within six months. While simple, it is also an expression of tradition and craft, as seen in the chunky lattice-work façade that nods to traditional Indian architecture. The patchwork of rectangular concrete modules was pre-cast at the Adisaptagram Workshop, set up by Abin Design Studio to invest in education and employment for local craftsmen, and ensuring the best craft and skills for his projects.

With Chaudhuri now working on a clubhouse for local footballers and a town hall, the new Narayantala Thakurdalan is part of a string of sensitive architecture projects contributing to place-making in Bansberia. abindesignstudio.com

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The design, keeping cost and maintenance to a minimum, responds to the space’s use by the local community, the courtyard and column-free corner allowing celebrations to spill outside. Detail comprises precast lattice modules made at a local workshop

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SPANISH CLASS With a mandate to showcase the best of the country’s design and act as an incubator for the industry’s talent, Interiors from Spain builds on rich local traditions of invention, resilience, quality and craftsmanship. Here, cool, calm, collectable Spanish design makes for a superior interior PHOTOGRAPHY: GERAY MENA

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SEPTEMBER IS ALL ABOUT...

Taking style to the next dimension

p124 FOLD ON Artist Clare Strand has us making shapes p146 BRAVE NEW WORLD Dressing to face the future p158 AUTO FOCUS Photographer Silvia Rosi’s self-portraits 170 BIRTH BITES Claudia Comte’s ‘Eggplant Baby’ ∑

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Grab your scissors. Conceptual artist Clare Strand suggests we sharpen up and get creative to take the season’s key looks to a new dimension

Photography George Harvey Fashion Jason Hughes Model Jacquetta Wheeler

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Jacket, £2,560; trousers, £750; boots, £940, all by Bottega Veneta.

Earrings, worn throughout, £50, by i+i. Necklace, £750, by Alighieri

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Jacket, £3,005, by 1017 Alyx 9SM

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Jacket, £7,400; belt, price on request; skirt, £15,500, all by Herm•s

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Jacket, £9,435, by Chanel

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Shirt, £880, by Jacob Cohën. Roll-neck, £195, by Wolford. Skirt, £515, Nanushka. Bracelets (just seen), from £350, all by Alighieri

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Jacket, £655, by MSGM

Coat, £3,770, by Paco Rabanne

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Gloves, £910, by Givenchy

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Jacket, £4,400, by Bally

Jacket, £2,420, by Sportmax

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Trench, £6,160; necklace, price on request, both by Saint Laurent

by Anthony Vaccarello. Rings (set of two), £210, by Alighieri

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Shirt, £3,100, by Tod’s

Trench, price on request, by Dior. Boots, £1,415,

by Bottega Veneta. Necklace, £750, by Alighieri

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∑ Trench, £4,300, by Celine

Jacket, £2,420, by Sportmax

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Jacket, £4,080, by Louis Vuitton. Earrings, £150, by Alighieri

Art

Model: Jacquetta Wheeler at Viva London. Make-up: Emma White Turle at The Wall Group using Chanel. Casting: David Steven Wilton. Photography assistant: Andrew Goss

Dress, ÂŁ6,300, by Fendi For stockists, see page 168

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magine a vast sheet of paper on which straight Lines, Triangles, Squares, Pentagons, Hexagons, and other figures, instead of remaining fixed in their places, move freely about, on or in the surface,’ posits A Square, the narrator of Edwin Abbott Abbott’s Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions. Published in 1884, the Victorian satirical novella proposed a segregated society of geometric figures, spanning multiple dimensions. It is this perspective-bending approach that Brighton-based artist Clare Strand has brought to these very pages.

Strand devised a special series of graphic interventions based on Abbott’s novella for this fashion story – photographed

by George Harvey and styled by Wallpaper* fashion director Jason Hughes – and also designed the newsstand cover for this issue.

She was drawn to the idea of the viewer (our readers) interacting with and even creating their own artworks. ‘The project is an effort to go beyond the traditional fashion page and take it to a new, third dimension,’ she says.

Much like the protagonist of Flatland, we’re being challenged by Strand to seek a new perspective, creating 3D objects from the 2D templates presented to us. ‘I find the geometry nets awkward yet extremely aesthetic, almost like a hieroglyphic writing system,’ Strand says. ‘The colours of the lines are a key: the black lines are for cutting, the red are for folding.’ (The red lines are also a subtle nod to Strand’s current show at The Photographers’ Gallery in London, where she is exhibiting images inscribed with a red number code, alongside work by her fellow nominees for the 2020 Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation Prize.)

Harvey’s black-and-white images provided the ideal foil for Strand’s investigation; the artist herself often works in monochrome, stating that ‘it helps boil the world down to its essentials’. ‘Though I work with photography and have made photographs, I am not a conventional photographer,’ she notes, describing herself as ‘an ideas-driven artist with photography at the core’.

While Strand has made a fine art of the complex themes of geometry and dimensional travel (citing Dalí and Duchamp along the way), inspiration sometimes hits closer to home. When creating her initial Spaceland/Flatland body of work in 2012, Strand recalls her eldest daughter – then aged seven – was studying geometry in school and would bring home geometry nets from class, creating shapes with paper. ‘It often happens that what I am doing in my own world connects with what my daughters are doing in theirs – and vice versa,’ says the artist, who used the geometry nets in some of her own works. ‘Perhaps we should have supplied a Pritt glue stick with each copy [of the magazine]!’ she quips. Jessica Klingelfuss Deutsche Börse Photography Foundation Prize 2020, extended until 20 September, The Photographers’ Gallery; clarestrand.co.uk

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MISSION READY New frontiers for autumn/winter Photography Romain Duquesne Fashion Jason Hughes

This page, jacket, £875, by Margaret Howell. Turtleneck, worn throughout, price on request, by Raf Simons.

Headband, worn throughout, price on request, by Lanvin. Opposite, trench, £3,350; trousers, £1,180, both by Dior.

Boots, worn throughout, price on request, by Raf Simons. Gloves, worn throughout, £100, by Ines

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Fashion

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This page, jacket; trousers, both price on request, by Raf Simons.

Opposite, suit, ÂŁ3,550, by Ermenegildo Zegna XXX

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This page, left, jacket, £3,150; gilet, £2,500, both by Prada Below, jacket, £590; trousers, £655, both by Salvatore Ferragamo Opposite, jacket, £1,525; shirt, £143; trousers, £410, all by Paul Smith

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Fashion

Fashion

This page, jacket, £2,250; trousers, £590, both by Valentino.

Opposite, jacket, £4,350; trousers, £855, both by Louis Vuitton

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This page, jacket, £2,200; trousers, £2,400, both by Gucci.

Opposite, gilet, £6,635; trousers, £655, both by Bottega Veneta

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Fashion

This page, left, coat, £3,850, by Fendi Below, coat, £3,200,

by Giorgio Armani Opposite, coat, £3,350; trousers, £459, both by Loewe For stockists, see page 168

Model: Junior Pereira at PRM Grooming: Takuya Uchiyama using Bumble & Bumble Set design: Samuel Pidgen Lighting assistant/digital operator: Daniel Gurton

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Fashion

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SELF-COMPOSED

Rising star of photography Silvia Rosi explores fringed fashions in a series of self-portraits in Modena, Italy Fashion Jason Hughes

Top, £399; dress, worn underneath, £749, both by Boss. Boots, worn throughout, £810, by Jil Sander by Lucie and Luke Meier. Earring, £353, by Petar Petrov

Dress, ÂŁ1,511, by Petar Petrov. Earring, price on request, by Cristiano Burani

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Coat, £7,000; skirt, £1,020; necklace; £700, all by Prada

Top, £1,800; dress, worn underneath, £1,530, both by Jil Sander by Lucie and Luke Meier

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Top, £410; skirt, £520, both by Issey Miyake

Jacket, £1,045; trousers, £460, both by JW Anderson

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Art

Jacket, £745, by Joseph. Top, £3,910, by Alberta Ferretti. Earring, price on request, by Cristiano Burani

Coat, £9,500, Dolce & Gabbana

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Art

Coat, ÂŁ935, by Max Mara. Dress, ÂŁ16,115, by Bottega Veneta. Earring, price on request, by Cristiano Burani

Dress, £2,955, by Salvatore Ferragamo

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For stockists, see page 168. For more about Silvia Rosi, see Wallpaper.com

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Stockists 1017 Alyx 9SM alyxstudio.com

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Akris Tel: 44.20 7758 8060 (UK) akris.com Alberta Ferretti Tel: 44.20 7235 2349 (UK) albertaferretti.com Alighieri Tel: 44.20 8065 0302 (UK) alighieri.co.uk Armani Casa armani.com/casa Azucena, from B&B Italia bebitalia.com

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Balenciaga balenciaga.com Bally bally.com Béton Brut betonbrut.co.uk Boss Tel: 44.20 7734 7919 (UK) hugoboss.com Bottega Veneta Tel: 44.20 7629 5598 (UK) bottegaveneta.com

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Canali canali.com

D

David James davidjames.dj Dior Tel: 44.20 7355 5930 (UK) dior.com Dolce & Gabbana Tel: 44.20 7659 9000 (UK) dolcegabbana.it Dunhill dunhill.com

E

Eduardo Chillida maeght.com

Gucci Tel: 44.20 7235 6707 (UK) gucci.com

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Martinos Antique and Fine Art Gallery martinosart.gr

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i+i iandijewellery.com Ines inesgloves.com

J

Jacob Cohën jacobcohen.it Jil Sander by Lucie and Luke Meier jilsander.com Joseph joseph-fashion.com

Giobagnara giobagnara.com

JW Anderson jwanderson.com

Giorgio Armani Tel: 44.20 7235 6232 (UK) armani.com

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Lanvin Tel: 44.20 7491 1839 (UK) lanvin.com

Margaret Howell Tel: 44.20 7009 9009 (UK) margarethowell.co.uk

Matchesfashion matchesfashion.com Max Mara Tel: 44.20 7499 7902 (UK) maxmara.com MSGM msgm.com

N

Celine celine.com Chanel Tel: 44.20 7493 5040 (UK) chanel.com Chillida Leku museochillidaleku.com Colville colvilleofficial.com Cristiano Burani cristianoburani.it

Raf Simons rafsimons.com

S

Saint Laurent by Anthony Vaccarello Tel: 44.20 7235 6706 (UK) ysl.com Salvatore Ferragamo ferragamo.com

Nanushka nanushka.com

San Lorenzo sanlorenzosilver.it

O

SG Gallery Milano sharongoldreich.com

Of the Wild ofthewild.co.uk

P

Paco Rabanne pacorabanne.com

Canificio canificio.com CC-Tapis cc-tapis.com

Porzellan Manufaktur Nymphenburg nymphenburg.com Prada prada.com

F

Givenchy Tel: 44.20 7199 2919 (UK) givenchy.com

Petar Petrov net-a-porter.com

M

Ermenegildo Zegna XXX zegna.com

G

Louis Vuitton Tel: 44.20 7998 6286 (UK) louisvuitton.com

Paul Smith Tel: 44.20 7493 4565 (UK) paulsmith.com

Hermès Tel: 44.20 7499 8856 (UK) hermes.com

Issey Miyake Tel: 44.20 7851 4620 (UK) isseymiyake.com

Fendi Tel: 44.20 7927 4172 (UK) fendi.com

Loewe loewe.com

NEXT MONTH

GUEST EDITORS Design Emergency takes the Wallpaper* reins for a 27-page investigation into design’s response to Covid-19. Paola Antonelli and Alice Rawsthorn on the ingenuity and generosity of designers and makers worldwide, working overtime to protect us from the pandemic and prepare for the radical changes it will introduce to our lives.

Plus, Hannah Starkey’s London in lockdown; Bahamian artist Tavares Strachan; Italian architect Paolo Portoghesi; and designing from a distance with American Hardwood.

ON SALE 17 SEPTEMBER

Sportmax Tel: 44.20 7499 7209 (UK) sportmax.com

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Tobit Roche tobitroche.com Tod’s Tel: 44.20 7493 2237 (UK) tods.com

V

Valentino Tel: 44.20 7647 2520 (UK) valentino.com Valerie Objects valerie-objects.com

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Wolford wolfordshop.co.uk

Coat, £4,480; trousers, £440, both by Canali. Turtleneck; boots, both price on request, by Raf Simons. See page 146

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Artist’s Palate

CLAUDIA COMTE’S ‘Eggplant Baby’

#113

From underwater cactus sculptures and dazzling Op Art interventions, to a forest of carved reliquaries, and a functional fairground installed in Basel’s Messeplatz: Claudia Comte’s output is varied, memorable, and always characterised by a sense of humour. The same goes for her ‘Eggplant Baby’, a dish she recently used to kick-start the birth of her son, Kai Nikolai.

The recipe originates from Scalini’s, an Italian restaurant in Georgia, US, and is said to have induced labour for more than 300 expectant mothers. As Comte recalls, ‘My partner, Samuel Leuenberger, prepared the meal for me, and remarkably within a few hours I was in labour!’ claudiacomte.ch; for Comte’s recipe, visit Wallpaper.com

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PHOTOGRAPHY: LEANDRO FARINA SET DESIGN: MIREN MARAÑÓN FOOD: NATALIE STOPFORD WRITER: TF CHAN

S A LVAT O R I _ O F F I C I A L