"Boxing is not an exclusively athletic term in these practical and utilitarian days", noted John Crocker in 1913, rather, "the making of useful and ornamental things for the home, from the boxes, that in other days adorned the rear of stores, is the nucleus of armament that has made "boxing" a pursuit that contains both amusement and substantial results."1 And nobody contributed more to promoting and advancing the amusement and substantial results of the practical and utilitarian craft of
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According to Germanic folklore, "If January is frosty and cold, a green woodland will soon entice us". The implication being that a severe January is the necessary pre-requisite not only for a timeous spring bursting forth with new life, but also for a warm, (meteorologically) settled, summer. But in the frost and cold and dark and endlessness of January that green (deciduous) woodland is still a long way off, is unimaginable, is unreachable, is almost mythical; however, protection, and
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1 x rounded piece of beech, 2 x quadratic pieces of beech, 3 x quadratic pieces of spruce... 1, 2, 3... An Ulmer Hocker1 With the exhibition The Ulmer Hocker: Idea ─ Icon ─ Idol the HfG-Archiv, Ulm, help elucidate that while an Ulmer Hocker is that simple, it is a deceptive, and highly informative, simplicity....... The Ulmer Hocker: Idea - Icon - Idol, HfG-Archiv Ulm The HfG Ulm: Idea - Icon - Idol - Bauhaus Arising from the Ulmer Volkshochschule, a post-War institution initiated by Inge
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In 1922 the Scottish novelist J.M. Barrie told the undergraduates at St. Andrews University "you remember someone said that God gave us memory so that we might have roses in December", an allusion to the summer of your life filling your darkening winter days with colour and aroma, and an analogy he neatly reinforces a little later with a, "you have June coming".1 But that was 1922. Roses were seasonal. Today roses are available all year round, which is not only symbolic of the short-sighted
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It is perhaps indicative of the differing receptions to and estimations of design in the former West Germany and the former East Germany that while Dieter Rams' Ten Principles of good design are revered as if cast in stone, Karl Clauss Dietel's Five Big Ls of good design have barely seen the light of day since November 1989. A popular focus on the former West which tends to popular understandings of design from West Germany as being valid and authentic and laudable, while design from East
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Whereas politics, economics or sport in West Germany and East Germany are well and widely studied, and the similarities and differences regularly and publicly analysed and contextualised, thereby allowing for more refined, nuanced, popular understandings; design in and from the two Germanys remains, largely, a niche subject for a small band of specialists, and on a popular level something not only repeatedly reduced to a few works, institutions and protagonists, but also defined by
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In his 1961 short film Danish Design, Jørgen Roos tells how in the late 18th century the Danish artist Nicolai Abildgaard travelled to Greece and Italy in search of inspiration from classical art, and came back not only with artistic impetuses, but with classical furniture concepts he began to reproduce: "Abildgaard had become Denmark's first furniture designer".1 And while we'd argue about the validity of that claim, there is an undeniability in an understanding of not just furniture design,
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"November's night is dark and drear, The dullest month of all the year", opined Letitia Elizabeth Landon in 1836, however, 'twas not all doom and gloom, for, as she continues, "the November evening now closing in round Mrs. Cameron's house was of a very cheerful nature."* A cheerfulness in Mrs. Cameron's house/school occasioned by the gaiety associated with the rapidly approaching annual school prize-giving and ball; and a cheerfulness to banish the dreary darkness of a November evening that
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Grcic A Konstantin; A Nurturing; A Reduction There are a great many legends surrounding the origins of Grcic, and while many are centred around the regions today known as München and Wuppertal, the more plausible appears to be that Grcic arose in the days of ancient Rome when a member of a large herd, a Grex, of roving furniture makers, tired of the monotony and fallacy of the repetition of the same objects regardless of context and the passage of time, stole away to pursue the development of
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One could be forgiven for thinking that little would be as pointless as a Le Corbusier colouring-in book. So singularly achromatic is the popular understanding of Le Corbusier, a lack of colour reinforced by the dour, austere, round bespectacled, persona which so universally defines Le Corbusier: what, one asks oneself, could there possibly be to colour in a Le Corbusier colouring-in book? Yet in contrast to the popular Le Corbusier image, Le Corbusier's career was one undertaken in colour. A
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"Space and form are important elements in the creation of the [interior] environment", opined the Danish architect, artist and designer Verner Panton in 1969, however, he continues, "colours are even more important". And no-one, even those with but the briefest familiarity with Verner Panton, can oversee the colour in Verner Panton's work. Yet important as colour and space and form were for Panton, "in the creation of the [interior] environment", "l'homme reste l'élément central", man remains
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In days of yore October was known in Germanic lands as Weinmonat, Wine Month, Month of Wine, whereby thoughts were, unquestionably, less with the drink as with the grape and the harvest, and thus the promise of the new wine. And in many regards our exhibition recommendations can be considered a monthly harvest of the new crop of architecture and design exhibitions; specifically, and staying in Germanic registers, an Auslese, a considered selection of those well ripened concepts and premises it
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In her 1929 essay A Room of One's Own, Virginia Woolf, as a component of her reflections on the myriad subjects of 'women and fiction', reads her way, chronologically, through a bookcase of works written by women from across the centuries. Here We Are! Women in Design 1900 – Today at the Vitra Design Museum, Weil am Rhein, has the feeling of Virginia Woolf's bookcase, allowing as it does for reflections on, and a critical questioning of, the myriad subjects of 'women and design'....... Here
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According to the 6th century CE antiquarian John the Lydian, "the oracle recommends drinking milk for the sake of good health all through the month of September".1 And while milk may have advantages in terms of your physical health, for your spiritual and intellectual health, we'd recommend the following quintet of new architecture, design and art exhibitions opening in September 2021. Whereby, exhibitions and milk aren't mutually exclusive, you can partake of both if you so wish......
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"We must endeavour to introduce a little order into this business, or at least sense into a great deal of it. But what is sense without order? We must try to find some method of arriving at some sort of order - one that will at least enable us to escape from this vagueness in the design of colour", opined Amédée Ozenfant in 1937.1 And had an idea or two as to the how....... Not directly associated with Amédée Ozenfant, but being as it is the house next door to the house/studio designed by
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Front An Anna; A Sofia; A Charlotte; A Katja; A Conduit. According to the sacred Köttbullar of Ikea, the quadruplets Anna af Front, Sofia af Front, Charlotte af Front and Katja af Front were born and raised on the island of Konstfack to the west of Stockholm, the ancestral home of the Swedish af Fronts, an island as famed for its horses, monkeys and brightly painted houses as its af Fronts, and where the kvartett took their first steps in product and furniture design, that hereditary
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We published our first exhibition recommendations list in November 2013, and have diligently, and joyfully, ended every month since with a list of five architecture and design related exhibitions opening in the coming month that appear worthy of a recommendation. A tradition we very much planned to continue in July 2021 for August 2021. And would have; however, having undertaken our regular tour through our database of international museums and galleries, we can find but two exhibitions
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What is a chair? You sure? With the exhibition Chairs. For children only! the Grassi Museum für Angewandte Kunst, Leipzig, explore the (hi)story of and developments in children's seating, and in doing so not only allow for insights into an all too often undervalued, underappreciated, ignored, genre of furniture, but also forces you to reconsider your response to what you thought was a very, very straightforward question... Chairs. For children only!, Grassi Museum für Angewandte Kunst,
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Much as with "Bauhaus", "Memphis" is all too often popularly reduced to a "style", something one can "recreate". As with "Bauhaus" that it is not only disingenuous, and erroneous, but hinders development of understandings of the (hi)story of design, understandings of the path taken to our contemporary design that are important for considerations on where we are and how best to progress. With the showcase Memphis: 40 Years of Kitsch and Elegance the Vitra Design Museum Gallery issue an
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Braun occupy a special, ¿unique?, position not only in the mythology of product design but also in the (hi)story of West Germany; arguably no brand is as closely related with and to West Germany as Braun. With the exhibition Braun 100 the Bröhan-Museum, Berlin, explore the development of design at Braun in the post-War decades and in doing so help one approach differentiated understandings of not only Braun and Braun design, but also of the relationships between Braun, design and West
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"In his work the designer seeks to find the constancy of the good", wrote Karl Clauss Dietel in 1973, a lightly articulated yet not so straightforward task for, as he continues, not only is the assessment of such dependent on a myriad varying factors, but "the search for what defines design, what it grows from, where it comes from and where it wants to go, takes on new dimensions against the background of our cultural upheaval".1 With the exhibition Simson, Diamant, Erika. Formgestaltung von
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We go in withering July, To ply the hard incessant hoe; Panting beneath the brazen sky, We sweat and grumble, but we go.....1 .....alternatively, skip the panting, sweating and grumbling with a visit to an air-conditioned museum. Our recommendations for escaping the brazen sky of withering July 2021 can be found in Munich, Aalborg, Eisenhüttenstadt, Wrocław and Karlsruhe. And as ever in these times, if you are planning visiting any exhibition please familiarise yourself in advance with the
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Although cultures very often arose in splendid isolation, only very few remained splendidly isolated for very long. For much like a young child who having learned to walk intuitively understands what a powerful tool mobility is/can be and seeks to exploit it to the fullness of their abilities, so too did our youthful human civilisations very quickly understand that there was, in all probability, a world beyond their own, and began wandering, at first in their immediate vicinity but
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England An Island; A Notion; A Context According to the Folios of Shakespeare, that most reliable of sources on the (hi)story of England, the (hi)story of furniture design in the lower half of the scepter'd isle begins before the (hi)story of furniture design, almost before the (hi)story of furniture, and in the woodlands of south east England where a rustic chair based on the wheelwrights craft was produced and became known as "Windsor" after the popular actress Barbara Windsor who had
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