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- Photo courtesy of alsacehotella.com
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- Photo courtesy of alsacehotella.com
The Home Studios-designed Alsace LA draws its design from its artistic roots.
+ Alsace LA is located in the West Adams neighborhood, which served as a central inspiration point for its design. West Adams is known for its varied architectural tradition, as well as being a spot with an influx of young community artists and entrepreneurs.
+ Home Studios created the hotel’s interiors as a visual story, with soft curves, a mashup of vintage and modern furniture, terra-cotta plaster, and warm wood materials to subtly reference Southern California’s diverse desert environment. They also leveraged the artistic community to create site-specific artwork, such as Lukas Geronimas Giniotis’ hand-painted mural on glazed tiles. “Like scenes from mythology, each of Giniotis’ tile motifs hint at the use of space throughout the hotel’s common areas: divers near the exit to the pool, figures playing near the gym, and bodies ascending stairs,” the design team told Dezeen.
Photo courtesy of Herman Miller
In other design news, Herman Miller’s best-selling Aeron Chair gets a sustainable upgrade.
+ Each chair will be made with up to 2.5 pounds of ocean-bound plastics—in other words, plastic that has not yet found its way to the water but is considered “mismanaged waste,” as items such as bottles, jugs, caps, and fishing gear are often not dispersed of properly and as a result can be found within 50 kilometers of a shoreline.
+ Herman Miller predicts that the change will help keep more than 150 tons of plastic out of the ocean annually—the equivalent of about 15 million single-use plastic water bottles.
Photo courtesy of justinkeene.com
Justin Keene shares how photography is a powerful tool for identity and representation.
+ Justin’s powerful portraiture in his latest series, “It Must Be Built From The Ashes,” challenges media representations of his home in South Africa. The series chronicles youth in Mitchells Plain, a town located outside Cape Town that was built in the 1970s as a relocation area during apartheid.
+ “I know it’s a bit of a cliché, but many people in areas like Mitchells Plain want their stories to be told and heard, but there is often no one to listen and provide a platform,” he told Creative Boom. So he became that person, using his camera as a way to share untold stories.
“People now want their own custom interior—especially non-residential interiors. Restaurants are especially fond of it. We’re getting many requests from the Gulf states—Qatar and Kuwait—because it’s unlike almost all their designs.” Photo courtesy of Dmitry Reutov
These eight emerging interior designers are the ones to have on your radar.
+ From East to West and everywhere in between, Architectural Digest put together a list of the American interior designers making waves in the industry.
+ The list includes Faith Blakeney, sister of Justina Blakeney of Jungalow, to New Orleans’ Bradley L Bowers and the LA-based firm BC, who previously worked for Anna Karlin.
17 designers reinterpret Dior’s iconic Medallion Chair for Salone del Mobile.
+ The Medallion Chair became an emblem for the fashion brand dating back to 1946, when Christian Dior himself used the chair to play up the fashion house as the epitome of French aesthetics. (The classic oval-backed chair was said to be used by Louis XVI at Versailles.)
+ The fashion house invited India Mahdavi, Pierre Yovanovitch, nendo, and more to reinterpret the chair using modern methods to continue its legacy through contemporary design.
Here’s a peek at the happenings behind Design Miami/’s return to Basel.
+ Opening September 21 in Basel, Switzerland, the design fair will focus on “human nature” with a slate of work from newcomers and big names that can be accessed both in-person and online.
+ One highlight is Shylights, a multi-sensory experience by DRIFT, the Amsterdam-based artist duo Ralph Nauta and Lonneke Gordijn. The exhibition creates an upside-down forest of moving flowers that mimics the process of nyctinasty, or the cyclic movement of plants in response to the arrival of dusk or dawn. If you’re feeling stressed out about being back in-person, step into the space for a brief yoga or meditation session. Namaste.
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