Back in February we spoke with Richard Lampert and he told us he was planning exhibiting at Orgatec. Had a few ideas he said. Boy, did he have ideas......... Orgatec Cologne 2016: Richard Lampert Established in Stuttgart in 1993 the first product in the Richard Lampert portfolio was Eiermann table frame, and thus, in many respects, the company began as an "office furniture" manufacturer. If largely furniture for architects' offices. The great architect's table frame quickly establishing
read more
Among the more memorable moments in our long, if troublesome, tenure at and of (smow)blog is the day we took possession of our new 1m x 2m USM Haller table. Less on account of the object and more on account of the looks of fear and trepidation that crossed the faces of those forced to share an office space with us. "Given the chaos created on their Eiermann Table", their pained expressions screamed, "what will they achieve with 2 sqm of finest Swiss fabrication?" The answer was as swift as
read more
Luddites! Not a phrase normally associated with (smow) To the best of our knowledge no (smow)employee has ever smashed an iPad or capped a WiFi service in protest at the creeping and increasingly obsessive proliferation of technology into our lives. Despite that, the early summer weeks in the (smow)HQ were dominated by the preparation and production of the very first (smow)catalogue. That's print catalogue. So on paper. With ink. Luddites? Au contraire nos amis! Not only is the
read moreBack in October 2010 the design blog pixelgangster.de ran a competition with a Richard Lampert Egon Eiermann desk - supplied naturally by (smow) - as the first prize. Entrants were asked to say why they deserved the desk. In his winning entry Benjamin asked his friends why he deserved the desk - would your friends be so generous? Ours probably wouldn't. But then we already have an Eiermann Desk! Benjamin's winning video (in German with English
read more
Our preparations for the 2010 IMM in Cologne are advancing apace and one particular highlight looks like being the Richard Lampert stand which will be celebrating the 100th birthday of Herbert Hirche. Born in Görlitz Hirche is in many ways the "forgotten" Bauhaus student; and that despite his considerable contribution to post-war architecture and design in Germany. After completing his carpentry apprenticeship Hirche enrolled in Bauhaus Dessau in 1930 and moved with the school to Berlin
read more
We're just a touch late with this one, but since July 22nd the Martin Gropius Bau in Berlin has been showing the exhibition "Bauhaus. A Conceptual Model". For the first time, the three German Bauhaus institutions - Bauhaus-Archiv Berlin, Museum für Gestaltung, Stiftung Bauhaus Dessau and Klassik Stiftung Weimar - are uniting to present a comprehensive Bauhaus retrospective. “Bauhaus. A Conceptual Model” recounts the story of the Bauhaus in a comprehensive presentation of the works of its
read more
It's Dumfries Show on Saturday. That won't mean much to the most people, but for us it is a sure sign. Winter is coming. We know, we know. Barely have we got use to remembering to take our sunglasses to work, buying ice-creams for lunch or waking up at 5 am because we forgot to shut the curtains - again - than the Dumfries Agricultural Society hold their annual show. And after the Dumfries show the evenings get shorter with increasing rapidity and before you know it the ground will be brown
read more
As a Europe-wide active business we at smow take Europe very seriously. We must, it is our home. And naturally for us the European elections are an important event for which we are more than happy to sacrifice a couple of hours of our time in which to go voting. But don't you also agree that polling stations are frightfully dull locations? We're not snobs, but, you know, one could at least try to, you know, make a little effort. So smow spoke to the responsible authorities in Leipzig and
read more
Despite Lufthansa's best effort we made it back to Leipzig yesterday evening. We only hope our luggage will arrive this evening. And despite the joy at being back in our green oasis with our wonderful view over the romantic historical ruins of East Plagwitz, Milan remains very much in our thoughts and we will continue to intersperse the blog with news and updates. As we never tire of telling anyone who will listen to us, furniture needn't be complicated. The design process can be
read more
Over Easter we had hoped to hoped to get to Karlsruhe to have a look at the exhibition: Interface Desk, or against Thinking in Categories. Billed - quite rightly - as possibly the first exhibition in history solely devoted to desks, the exhibition examines the role and function of the "desk" and in doing so possess the question "what is a desk?" But we didn't. Instead we were in Bad Muskau- which was also fantastic. And now we are back at our desks.... and still thinking "what is a desk?"
read more
In a recent article wired magazine presented their own take on the evolution of office furnishing. From the introduction of the vast, cattle-shed like offices that characterised early office design through the cubicles and "virtual offices" of the 1980s and 90s and onwards the text makes one thing clear: Too many office workers have suffered through bad office design concepts. But one needn't work from home in order to benefit from the advantages of a convivial and stimulating office
read more
