Whoever thinks of Switzerland thinks of Swiss clockwork, Swiss railways, Swiss chocolate, Swiss precision. It's therefore all the more surprising that Dada has its European origins in Switzerland, and for all in the legendary Cabaret Voltaire in Zürich. But would the 2018 Zürcher Hochschule der Künste graduates prove as anarchic, confrontational, spirited and revolutionary in their creativity........? Zürcher Hochschule der Künste, Toni-Areal, Zürich. Zürcher Hochschule der Künste As noted
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Anchored next to the Göta älv Bridge in Gothenburg is a decommissioned ferry. Repurposed as a car park. While in no way a substitute for an integrated urban transport concept that reduces our dependence on the car, it is a really nice example that recycling, reusing and reappropriating isn't just something for designers, is also a subject for architects and urban planners. And by extrapolation, us all. Suitably motivated we scaled and crossed the Göta älv Bridge and made our way the 2018 HDK
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In his Ron Arad monograph Restless Furniture Deyan Sudjic notes that the Sticks & Stones furniture crusher Arad developed for the exhibition Nouvelles Tendances staged by the Centre de Creation Industriel Paris in 1987 was itself only saved from the crusher through the post-exhibition "intervention of a friendly Swiss furniture manufacturer."1 While all Swiss furniture manufacturers are friendly, one particularly friendly Swiss furniture manufacturer springs to mind whenever the discussion
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"...this is also a sure sign for the development of our style that we gradually succeed in bringing the practical back in line with the ideal. It seems to me, this could now also apply to many aspects of our common aspirations."1 So wrote Peter Behrens in 1901 to the Kaiser Wilhelm Museum Krefeld's director Friedrich Deneken. With the exhibition The Practical and the Ideal the Kaiser Wilhelm Museum Krefeld explore not only how Peter Behrens' understood such and how he attempted to achieve just
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Rely too heavily on popular representations of design from Denmark and one could come to the conclusion that Danes only started designing objects in the late 1940s, so often is one presented with Danish design books, exhibitions and newspaper/magazine/blog articles that begin, self-evidently, post-War. With their exhibition Made in Denmark. Design since 1900, the Grassi Museum of Applied Arts Leipzig demonstrate that design in Denmark does have a pre-war, and pre-design, history. Made in
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While others spend their summers' holidaying with families, barbecuing with friends or pretending to read novels on the balcony, at the beach and/or in the local park, we travel Europe visiting design school summer exhibitions and subsisting exclusively from falafel. It's a curious, idiosyncratic, slightly tragic, way to spend your life, but it's the one we've chosen, is in many regards the only road we've ever known. And so, as May's warmth ceded to the heat of June, we made like
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"Memphis in June, A shady veranda under a Sunday blue sky, Memphis in June, And cousin Amanda's makin' a rhubarb pie" (Memphis in June, Hoagy Carmichael) Sounds lovely Hoagy, but we'll have to pass, because despite Memphis having some interesting museums, we can't find one opening a new architecture or design exhibition in June 2018. Consequently, and unlike Marc Cohn, we'll not be "Walking in Memphis" this June, but in Düsseldorf, Espoo, Andelsbuch, Rotterdam and San Francisco..... "Anni
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"Monsieur, with these Rocher you are really spoiling us!" Ever since Ferrero brought a touch of self-congratulatory kitsch to the savoir-faire of international diplomacy, we've felt a great empathy for the concept of the Embassy. And while the years since we first heard those words may not have seen us follow an illustrious, freely debonair, diplomatic career, we do have as a substitute the embassy design exhibition. 3daysofdesign Copenhagen 2018 offered such a wealth and variety of embassy
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"This exhibition intends to acknowledge the cultural achievements of Italian design in the last decade, to honor the accomplishments of its gifted designers and incisive critics, and to illustrate the diversity of their approaches to design by presenting a collection of the most interesting examples of their work."1 Thus announced the curators of the Museum of Modern Art's 1972 exhibition Italy: The New Domestic Landscape their intentions. The New Domestic Landscape portrayed by the gifted
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For the German architect, designer, artist Peter Behrens it was important that the exterior reflected a building's intended function, that the exterior provided information about the nature of the building and its occupants. We suspect therefore he would greatly approve of the title of the Museum für Angewandte Kunst Cologne's exhibition in honour of his 150th birthday, neatly encapsulating as it does the nature of its protagonist. #all-rounder Peter Behrens himself greets visitors to
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Established in 1897 as an institution for pure and applied arts the Kaiser Wilhelm Museum in Krefeld was, for all through the person of its founding director Friedrich Deneken, an important protagonist in the discourse concerning the relationships between art, craft and industry at the turn of the 20th century With the exhibition From Idea to Form. Domeau & Pérès: Design and Craftsmanship in Dialogue, the contemporary Kaiser Wilhelm Museum Krefeld continue this discourse. From Idea to Form.
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In the wonderful month of May, As all the buds bloomed, My heart became, With Love consumed In the wonderful month of May, As all the birds did sing, I confessed to her My desire and yearning. Heinrich Heine, Im wunderschönen Monat Mai, 1827 And then??? Heinrich, don't leave us hanging! It all started out so positive! It's an awkward month May, the vitality of blooming buds and oratorio of singing birds luring us into hopeful fantasies, utopian visions of what lies ahead: but what will
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Any anthology of 20th century design would by necessity feature a very, very long chapter on Italy. With Storie. Il Design Italiano the Triennale Design Museum Milan sketch out how the narrative of such a chapter could develop, highlight key moments in the plot development and introduce the most important protagonists. Storie. Il Design Italiano @ Triennale Design Museum, Milan Established in 2007 the Triennale Design Museum reorganises its permanent exhibition on an annual basis, each
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By way of celebrating designer Achille Castiglioni's centenary Italian lighting manufacturer Flos used Milan Design Week 2018 to launch re-editions of two Castiglioni designs: Ventosa and Nasa. Objects which in their own, small, ways allow for an insight into Achille Castiglioni's approach to, and understanding of, design. Flos present Achille Castiglioni - If you are not curious forget it, Milan Design Week 2018 Born in Milan on February 16th 1918 Achille Castiglioni studied architecture
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We're great believers in Fate, in the guiding principle that if it is meant to be, it will be: not least because it protects us from the expectations of achievement. Further proof of the veracity of Fate was provided by our meeting during Milan Design Week 2018 with the project Moorwerk by Jan Christian Schulz. Moorwerk by Jan Christian Schulz, as seen at ein&zwanzig, Milan Design Week 2018 If you compare our claim to have visited 27 design schools on our 2017 #campustour with the number
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Milan Furniture Fair 2018, at least amongst those more design led manufacturers, is/was largely about consolidation, largely about new materials, new colours, slight changes to existing objects, with one or the other family proudly presenting their latest members. Which is no complaint, far from it, Milan's speciality traditionally being the new for the sake of the new, that misguided belief that one has to present something new every year. You don't. Present something new when you've got
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Curated by Carwan Gallery Beirut co-founder Nicolas Bellavance-Lecompte, Unsighted presents projects by eight international designers; the title making reference to the fact that the designers weren't told for what they were being commissioned, had no external context; were working, as it were, Unsighted. During Milan Design Week 2018 all became clearer... Unsighted, Milan Design Week 2018 As we've oft noted in these pages, in terms of furniture and lighting design, context is important,
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"Shake of all the props - the props tradition and authority offer you - and go alone - crawl - stumble - stagger - but go alone", encouraged the Scottish architect, designer and artist Charles Rennie Mackintosh his audience during his 1902 lecture Seemliness.1 How Charles Rennie Mackintosh himself attempted to do just that can be explored in the exhibition Charles Rennie Mackintosh. Making the Glasgow Style. Charles Rennie Mackintosh. Making the Glasgow Style @ Kelvingrove Art Gallery and
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According to the German philologist, mythologist, folklorist and definer of the Germanic Umlaut, Jacob Grimm, an old belief states that the Cuckoo never sings before the 3rd of April; and, "should you have money in your pouch when you hear him sing the first time, you will be well off all that year, if not, you will be short the whole year" 1 Much like the cuckoo, our five new architecture & design exhibitions recommendations for April 2018 begin with their songs after April 3rd; and should
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Following on from the Collective in 2015, Movement in 2016 and Substance in 2017, the Stiftung Bauhaus Dessau's annual theme for 2018 is the Standard; a central component of the teaching at Bauhaus Dessau yet one which is and was freely open to artistic, technological and functional interpretation. And one the Bauhäusler freely interpreted artistically, technologically and functionally The first exhibition in context of the annual theme explores the work of the German architect Carl Fieger,
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1918 was a bad year for the Wiener Moderne, losing as it did with the deaths of Koloman Moser, Egon Schiele, Gustav Klimt and Otto Wagner four of its leading protagonists. To mark the centenary, and help underscore the important role Vienna played at the turn of the 19th/20th century in the development of art, architecture, music and literature, museums across Vienna are staging a wide range of specially themed exhibitions throughout 2018; the Hofmobiliendepot - Imperial Furniture Museum -
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Nightclubs and discos are not only about entertainment and sensory overload, but also provide a society with means of expression and reflection. With the exhibition Night Fever. Designing Club Culture 1960 - Today the Vitra Design Museum in Weil am Rhein explore five decades of club culture. Night Fever. Designing Club Culture 1960 - Today, Vitra Design Museum One of our worst ever disco experience's was in Weil am Rhein. And we weren't even there. It was a couple of years ago, we were in
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Following three years of renovations and redesign the principle house of the Museum für Gestaltung Zürich is once again open for visitors. Three years which have not only seen the physical structure renovated and redesigned, but also the presentation concept and foci. Museum für Gestaltung Zürich Established in 1875 as an applied arts and crafts museum, the contemporary Museum für Gestaltung initially served, and as with so many of the early applied arts and crafts museums, as a material
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In context of the renovation of the historic Falkenhütte alpine hut, Munich based StudioFaubel were commissioned to develop a formally appropriate, contemporary lighting solution. During Munich Creative Business Week 2018 the Alpines Museum Munich are presenting with Gentiana Alba - Tradition und Design, not only the result of that commission, but an insight into the development process. Gentiana Alba by StudioFaubel, as seen at Tradition und Design, Alpines Museum Munich Completed in 1923
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