Jonathan Adler on Happy Chic and following your heart in design

UPDATE!! I came across this video of Jonathan Adler (one of my former bosses) speaking at Behance’s 99% Conference. In his lecture, Jonathan talks about the importance of following your heart, staying true to your vision and saying “fuck it,” in regards to other people’s opinions of your work. This comes in great contrast to what one learns in school and the world of marketing, but I believe there’s a lot of heart and truth in what he’s saying here. As someone that was in a similar situation in grad school (Jonathan tells his story about an oppressively unsupportive teacher in design school), his message resonates with me. Ultimately, you’ll be the most happy making the work you want to make, instead of the work you have to make, and if you’re lucky, and work hard, success is the best revenge.

Get into it and feel the joy.

Speaking of joy, this past Thursday I headed to the 92Y Tribeca to catch Jonathan and Simon’s talk, Style, Craft, Joy. The hour long program covered stories about Jonathan’s upbringing, the story behind building his brand, and the house that Jonathan & Simon built together on Shelter Island. Pictures of their dream house are found in his new book, 100 Ways to Happy Chic Your Life. My favorite part of the lecture was the Q&A session that followed. One person asked about criticism he receives for creating work that isn’t particularly “serious,”  … work that is happy, joyful and quirky. Jonathan said that many people don’t view him as a legitimate “designer” because he creates this type of work, and his work is somehow less-designed because it isn’t overtly serious and conceptual. I can easily relate to this idea as my thesis studied the importance of Joy in design and process. In an academically-based MFA program, I spent a majority of my time making the case for this area of study, of its merit for an MFA thesis. In the end, I finished my thesis and couldn’t be happier with my results. And Jonathan continues to expand his brand from interiors, to fashion and just about everything else that can be housed in your home or office. So cheers to joy and happy chic!

And to help bring more happy chic into your home, this weekend only enjoy 20% off in stores and online at Jonathan Adler!

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Let’s be Frank.

 

Photos: William Waldron, courtesy of Elle Décor.

Today I’m giving you a glimpse into the home life of Frank Muytjens, head menswear designer at J.Crew. I’ve seen editorial features on Frank for a while, popping up in magazines and online, but I particularly enjoyed this profile at Elle Decor giving readers a tour inside his country home 2 hours outside of NYC. Not only does Frank have excellent taste when it comes to designing menswear (at least half of my wardrobe is J.Crew these days), but he’s equally adept at designing beautiful interiors. When in the city, Frank calls Williamsburg, Brooklyn home (we’re neighbors – I must meet him!), and he’s created an equally beautiful space there. So happy Friday, and get into these beautiful interiors by Frank Muytjens, the man behind the men at J.Crew.

 

Living room – looooove the light and flowers.

Simple kitchen.

In front every great designer, is a great desk. It all starts with a desk.

Love the painting on the wall, and the fan/stack of National Geographics.

How amazing is this closet? SUCH ENVY.

Frank at home in the country (above). Frank and his two-year old Dutch.

These spreads are featured in the Dec 2012 issue of Lonnymag.com

Love the bed. Neutrals forever.

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The internet lives … in NC

 

For the first time, Google released photos of one of it’s data centers showing the complex networks of pipes, servers and technology the technology giant uses to power the internet. The facility, located in Lenoir, NC, is part of a complex of buildings recently built in North Carolina. Apple also recently broke ground a data center in Maiden, North Carolina – so the internet is alive in NC! I love how Google color-coded their infrastructure to match their iconic logo – what a great idea. Playful, and very organized. It’s mind blowing to think of the level of organization needed to design and build one of these centers. See more photos below.

 

To see more photos, visit 8 places your computer has already been.

Technology is beautiful!

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Brooklyn’s Wythe Hotel

Today as I was enjoying my morning coffee and browsing Tumblr, I stumbled across the image above from the Wythe Hotel in Williamsburg Brooklyn. As coincidence would have it, I visited the Wythe Hotel last week for dinner + drinks and fell in love with the place, but I’d only seen the lobby and restaurant. Freshome, a design and architecture blog, recently featured the hotel on their website showing a bunch of beautiful photos. I love that the building was a textile mill in its former life and was renovated into a beautiful modern day hotel with much of its original character intact. After spending so long designing for a hotel company, I can really appreciate all the design and details that go into these projects.

The Hotel’s press release states, “Built in 1901, this former textile factory has been meticulously converted into a 72-room hotel offering service and amenities yet to be seen in the borough, while the building’s industrial character – like its concave corner entrance, original pine beams, masonry, arched windows and cast-iron columns – has been beautifully preserved.  Renowned Brooklyn restaurateur Andrew Tarlow, of Marlow & Sons, Diner, and Roman’s, manages the hotel’s expansive food and beverage program. Venues include Reynards – a ground floor restaurant and bar with a wood-fired oven and grill, courtyard seating, and a daily menu featuring market-driven American fare and seasonal cocktails, and Ides – a 6th floor bar and terrace with stunning Manhattan and Brooklyn views.”

Beautiful view right?

Library.

Lobby.

Guestroom.

Love the headboard wall detail.

Beautiful pattern.

Bathroom.

Really like their logo and the design of their website, beautiful really.

These simply line drawings of the room layouts are really quite nice.

They have a custom-made neon sign outside. Absolutely STUNNING at night.

The map.

For more information, visit their website here.

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Architectura Inspiration

It’s been a crazy week since I last posted. I recently moved from one Brooklyn apartment to another and have been preoccupied with settling in, unpacking and adjusting to a new neighborhood. And since I’m been examining and planning for my new space, I’ve had interior design and architecture on the brain a lot this week. A few days ago I found this awesome blog, Architectura. This blog is curated by 4 design students/graduates Paula Gonzalez (Ireland), Samuel Zeller (Switzerland), Tiago Leal (Portugal) and Timothy Hyde (Austria). I’m not really sure how these four got together and started their blog, but I love the variety of images they collect showcasing industrial design, interior design, and modern + historic architecture. While I’m planning to start a schedule of more frequent posts next week, sit back and enjoy a few of my favorites from Architectura, and check out their archive of images here.

One of my favorite buildings in NYC, near the High Line Park.

Love this interior.

Cool stairway design (above and below).

Another great interior.

Lastly, someone buy this place for me. Pretty sweet beach house no?

Their June 2012 archives. Pretty awesome!

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Enjoy Summer on Shelter Island with Adler & Doonan

Photography by Joshua McHugh

Jonathan Adler and Simon Doonan grace the pages of July’s Architectural Digest where they invite readers for a sneak peak of their Shelter Island home. As someone lucky enough to work for JA, I’d always been curious about this storied summer retreat. So hot off the presses, here are a few of my favorite shots. Be sure to pick up the July issue on newsstands now, and check out  Jonathan’s 10 Essentials for Summer Fun. Enjoy and happy summer!

How great are these tiles for outdoors?

I always smile at portraits of the married couple. So much personality.

Living room.

Again, how great are these tiles? The dark blue looks great with the orange.

Happy paddling and happy summer!

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Revisiting Florence Broadhurst

 

In February I blogged about the work of wallpaper/pattern designer Florence Broadhurst after Kate Spade NY featured her iconic prints in their new collection. I was so inspired by her work and story that I bought her biography, Florence Broadhurst: Her Secret & Extraordinary Lives by Helen O’Neill. I finally got to reading it this weekend and I couldn’t put it down! Broadhurst was an amazingly complicated woman: singer, actor, clothing designer, socialite, truck yard operator, and finally, iconic wallpaper designer in her 70′s. How could one person lead so many lives? Her life came to an untimely end when she was brutally murdered in her studio and her murder remains unsolved until this day.

It was particularly interesting to hear about her life and travels, and how it influenced the studio she lead for over 15 years. In the book you learn about her curious methods, the artists she hired to work for her, many of whom were incredibly young and how she constantly reinvented herself. You also get to see the huge breath of her work, which stands close to 500 different pattern designs.

Sadly after Broadhurst’s death, her designs were quickly forgotten. Wallpaper went out of fashion and so did the bold iconic designs for which she was known. Minimalism was in. For years her screens lay unused in a factory falling into decay. There were several times when all her designs were almost thrown away because they were deemed to expensive to even store. It wasn’t until the 1990s that her work was rediscovered, collected and restored. Luckily for us, her work was saved and is being produced by hand once again day by Signature Prints.

Florence and her crazy orange hair at her desk. On the wall is Peacocks, one of her favorite prints.

Many of her wallpaper prints were printed on gold and silver Mylar.

Japanese Floral, one of her most well-known prints.
This print was used for Kate Spade’s Florence Broadhurst collection (below).

A modern take on classic Broadhurst (above).

While a lot of her designs were organic and featured scenes of nature, many her designs were also bold and geometric.

Today her work can be seen on more than just wallpaper. Signature Prints, which owns the rights to Broadhurst’s collection now reproduces them on rugs, pillows, furniture and or course, wallpaper.

It’s amazing to see patterns designed in the 60s/70s and almost forgotten now used in such modern ways 40 plus years later.

She seems like quite the powerhouse person to know at the time. If you want to know more, pick up her book here or check out Signature Prints website about their collection featuring images, bios and videos all about Florence Broadhurst. I hope you enjoy her work as much as I continue to do so!

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Singerad Textil

”Signed Textile” took its start in 1954 when the Swedish department store NK launched a new collection of fabrics for the expanding public sector in Sweden. The idea was to improve the status of textile design as an art form by letting the artists sign their work. The copy right regulations regarding art work at the time was still neglected. This collection consists of 21 different patterns, some of them famous Swedish design classics. Karl Axel Pehrson´s ”Delfinisk Rörelse” (”Dolphinian Movements”) is still part of Ljungbergs assortment. You can check out all the designers and see their work here.

Sven Markelius (1889-1972) was an advocate for Swedish Functionalism. Some of his most important commissions were the Students´ Union Building of the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm 1928 – 1930, the Swedish pavilion at the World Fair in New York in 1939. He was also a member of the distinguished committee of architects occupied with the creation of the UN-building in New York at the beginning of the 1960’ies. The pattern consists of a field of triangles in four different sizes. They are constantly repeated in a complex play between light and dark, big and small. The variation of the sizes gives the pattern depth and movement, an impression that is enhanced if you view it at a distance. Here it is printed on modal satin.

I’m in love with this design by Sven Markelius – read his bio here.

I saw the blue colorway at the National Museum in Sweden. Love it.

Theodor “The” Svedberg (1884-1971) was a scientist and was awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1926. Svedberg was an intellectual leader in culture and had a wide interest in literature. He had an extensive correspondence with August Strindberg and he was also a good amateur water-colour painter. The Svedberg participated with two patterns to ”Signed Textile”: ”Genetics” and ”Atomics”. If you know a bit about chemistry you will probably recognize the DNA of Drosophilia (the fruit fly) in the pattern ”Genetics”. ”Atomics” is a playful pattern where figures from the world of atom physics form decorative patterns in brilliant orange and rose on a black background. ”Atomics” is printed here on hardwearing pure linen.

Astrid Sampe (1909-2002) was born in Stockholm, but has her roots in Sjuhäradsbygden (Seven counties region). During the years 1928 – 32, when she attended the College of Applied Art in Stockholm, she was given the opportunity of pursuing parallel studies at the Royal College of Art in London. After having completed her education, Astrid made several journeys in Europe. It was she who set in motion the project ”Signed Textile” that was launched at NK in 1954. The aim of the project and the collection was to create materials with strict graphic patterns for public interiors, both for big theatre-curtains and for small windows in ships and trains. It was widely considered a great achievement that Sampe managed to rally so many well-known names for the collection and later on this contributed more than anything else to stress the importance of the designer behind the pattern. Earlier the designers of patterns were never given a prominent place in marketing.

 

Anders Beckman (1907-1967) was a pioneer in modern Swedish advertising art and a well-known poster artist. Beckman was in charge of prestigious commissions such as the marketing of the Swedish Pavilion at the world Fair in New York in 1939 and the graphic design of the Helsingborg Exhibition, H55, among other things. Anders Beckman contributed with two patterns to ”Signed Textile”: ”West Coast” and ”Smoke” (above). This was the first time that the advertising expert Anders Beckman drew patterns for textile prints. He was of the opinion that the same freedom existed when you composed a textile pattern as when you composed for advertising purposes and while the ever-present cigar in his hand sent its smoke upwards, the pattern ”Smoke” curled its way continually upwards.

Olle Eksell (1918 – 2007) made himself a name as an innovator of artistic graphic designs for utility goods during the 1950´ies. He became inspired by the American way of life, after having spent a short period at an art-school in Los Angeles. When he returned to Sweden, he started working as an illustrator, advertising expert and exhibition curator. Olle Eksell contributed with two patterns to ”Lena Horne”Signed Textile”Lena Horne”: ”Lena Horne”Lena Horne” and ”Margret Rose”. He has given both his patterns female names, because, it is said, he had two different types of women in mind: Lena Horne represents the sensuous, primitive woman and Margret Rose the romantic aristocratic. Both of these patterns are small in scale and are intended for various decorating details in public interiors.

Olle Bonniér (born 1925) belongs to a group of artists of concrete art, ”The Concretians” and he explored the principles of Concretism in theory as well as in his art. At the beginning of his career he used very bright and strong colours, but later he changed to contrasting colours, often black and white. Bonniér’s expression was non-figurative and he was interested in the dynamics of colours and forms. His sculptures in Plexi-glass and metal were produced as pure objects, concrete but non-representing. Olle Bonniér contributed with two patterns to ”Signed Textile”: ”Positive – Negative” and the pattern ”Raxt”, which has been described as follows: ”This composition sounds what it looks like: ”Raxt” – the sound of the jet-planes in black thunderbolts.” ”Raxt” is printed here on a strongly bleached cotton-canvas in black, grey and light beige.

 

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Day seven: Svenskt Tenn

Today brings us to the final 7 designers in 7 days post – though don’t be surprised if a few other designers pop up on my blog in the coming weeks. Today’s post is about Svenskt Tenn – an ANAZING furniture/interior design store in Sweden – and the home of Josef Frank’s textiles. According to their website, “Svenskt Tenn is an interior design shop located on Strandvägen in Stockholm, Sweden. It was founded in 1924 by Estrid Ericson, who recruited Josef Frank to the company 10 years later. Together they created the elegant and boldly patterned personal interior design style that continues to pervade the collection to this day” Josef Frank is the designer I talked about in my first “7 designers” post, so it’s fitting we start and end with him.

 

On their website, Svenskt Tenn talks about their design Philosophy, which I think is great and applicable to all types of designers:

Josef Frank’s vision of humane, soft modernism and Estrid Ericsson’s artistry are the foundations of Svenskt Tenn’s interior design philosophy. Together, the duo created a highly personal style with a combination of Viennese elegance and Swedish functionalism. Brightly coloured patterns went completely against the ideals of the day, as did unabashed borrowing from both high and low cultures and eras.

They called it “Accidentism” or “The Happy Chances Philosophy.” In 1958, Josef Frank wrote in the magazine Form: “There’s nothing wrong with mixing old and new, with combining different furniture styles, colours and patterns. Anything that is in your taste will automatically fuse to form an entire relaxing environment. A home does not need to be planned down to the smallest detail or contrived; it should be an amalgamation of the things that the owner loves and feels at home with.”

Always current.

That such a way of thinking is applicable even today is something that many can attest to. Josef Frank is held in great repute, not the least among today’s young designers. His National Museum Cabinet has received a number of design accolades and his textiles are a source of inspiration for many young textile designers today.  

Estrid Ericson and Josef Frank have succeeded in creating that timelessness which so many strive for but few manage to achieve.

While touring the store we saw all the beautiful Josef Frank couches, many were oversized (see above) and looked so comfortable, but we were afraid to sit on anything. Our tour guide told us to not be silly, and that anything they made was to be used and enjoyed. How great is that? And how untypical for a design store. I especially love how they mix all the different textiles together and don’t try to be matchy-matchy. Many of the combinations I would never dream of, but somehow they work together. One their website there is a great Inspiration section with decorating and design ideas. After printing textiles by hand and mixing colors for the last two weeks, I have a new found respect for all the work that goes into creating these textiles. It baffles my mind how beautiful and vivid their colors come out on such thick upholstery furniture.

Took this in their showroom – they’re building a new one, so their temporary space is an old movie theater.

Great example of how their patterns look together – applied on lampshades.

I’m obsessed with these plates!

Great right?

Love the green, glass, and golds in this picture, from their Inspiration page.

Pewter oddities.

I want to live in this world! One day I’ll have a Josef Frank chair to read in.

 

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Day one: Josef Frank

One of the first “new” textile designers I discovered on our trip was Josef Frank. I use the word new loosely as Josef Frank (1885-1967) is wildly popular in the textile design world, but his work was new to me! On Monday we visited the Svenskt Tenn store in Stockholm, which houses all Frank’s textiles today. Frank’s textile patterns span his entire career as an architect and designer, providing us with glimpses into his varied life; of Vienna in the 1920s; of his collaboration with Estrid Ericson at Svenskt Tenn in Stockholm; of his wartime exile in Manhattan; and of his last years in Stockholm after World War II. Of Frank’s approximately 170 patterns for printed fabrics, about 125 have been printed at least once. Roughly 40 of them are classics – most of them floral patterns – which, although more than fifty years old, have not lost their freshness. It was so inspiring to be in the Svenskt Tenn store and see all the modern applications of these classic fabrics. One could buy his textiles by the yard as one might expect, but they applied his patterns to everything from furniture, sketchbooks, serving trays, pillows, plates, and matchboxes. I took a bunch of photos in the store, and bought a book about him (pictured below).

I was lucky enough to grab one of the few copies in English!

A collage of several of Frank textiles.

The store carries a large variety of his textiles, all hand-printed I believe, for sale by the meter.

A close up – aren’t the colors beautiful?

They brought out any roll of frabric we wanted to see and we got to touch everything.

Frank’s Manhattan print! I bought a small serving tray with this design. LOVE!

Love the blues in this nautical print. So vivid!

Here’s an example of Frank’s pattern applied to a chair. The store carries a large variety of upholstered furniture with Frank’s textiles. I was particularly in love with this chair, but the picture doesn’t exactly do it justice. Their upholstered furniture is made to order so nothing is mass produced. In that way, everything you buy is unique and made especially for you, and therefore incredibly expensive, but you get what you pay for!

A thing of beauty is a joy forever.

I love a good thesis tie-in when I can find one. I wish I came across this quote before my thesis exhibition/defense … but I’m sure I’ll use this quote in the future. I’d love to redo that pillow with more beautiful type!   I think my good pal Betsy and I agree on the value of beauty in design, and why it’s so precious. Sadly, it’s not always valued in our field, especially in design education. While I agree beauty on it’s own isn’t always enough, there’s something to be said for the makers of beautiful things. It takes a special sensibility; an emotional awareness combined with the ability to design and communicate. Someone at my thesis show said my exhibition was beautiful, and honestly I think that’s one of the best compliments a designer can receive. I was so touched.

Just tell me something I design is beautiful and I’m yours.

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