Hasta La Ideas

On a hexagonal base, 5 steel wire elements rise up and form a open and intriguing object, but first off all a functional wardrobe. The Basket wardrobe..

Designer Mridu Sahai has created a collection of dresses that incorporate architectural fittings like this ventilation grate (above).

Called Fittings, the garments are made of jersey fabric and felt, and have different objects such as handles, bolts and latches affixed.

Photographs are courtesy of Herman Haye & Nikitas Almpanis.

Here’s some more information from Sahai:

In relation to the notion- to reveal the extraordinary in the ordinary – my collection -FITTINGS, celebrates OBJECTivity as it attempts to radically transform the context of simple objects like handles, bolts and latches used in architecture, which have not been applied in a design milieu.

This is done by re-inventing their functionality and using them in a fashion collection, so that they are appreciated clearly for the statement they make.

This is achieved by playing with the idea of stereotypical gender roles.

Fittings, which are usually considered masculine and are now being used in a women’s wear collection, thus displaying an obscure status which is shown by the usage of materials like felt with jersey in combination, thus representing the conventional characteristics of masculinity and feminity – the unrepentant male and yielding female.

I have tried to inculcate the element of humor and surprise by the strategic juxtaposition of fittings on garments.

Mridu Sahai

Despite being trained as a fashion apparel designer, and specializing in leather design, I will not call myself a fashion designer, as my work is adequately driven by architecture and product design.

I am constantly looking for inspirations further away from the realm of design, drawing comparisons, finding resemblances, questioning differences, excavating relationships, redefining their contexts and causing relocations in the roles and associations of entities.

See also:

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In No Time by Sandra Backlund	Shell by Julia Krantz	CLASH at FASHIONCLASH Maastricht

In this era of hand waving, mind maps, and design thinking, it is nice to remember a man of design doing. Eliot Noyes was a pioneer. He was an intellect who wasn’t afraid to get his hands dirty, a global advocate of design who was also a seasoned practitioner, and a visionary thinker who could also delve into the nooks and crannies of his craft. If your thinking I’m exaggerating, a brief timeline of Eliot’s career looks like this: upon earning a Masters in Architecture from the Harvard GSD he works for Walter Gropius and Marcel Breuer, then he became the first director of Industrial Design at MoMA where he curated shows that helped popularize the names of emerging talents like Charles Eames and Eero Saarinen, during WWII he worked with Norman Bell Geddes on military gliders, then built the first corporate design departments at little places like IBM and Mobile Oil.

I recently had the pleasure of having dinner with Eliot’s son, Eli Noyes, and it prompted me to brush up on my Noyes history. The pieces that Charles and Ray Eames developed for Noyes’ 1941 “Organic Design” show at MoMA went into production by Herman Miller after WWII. It was Noyes who hired Paul Rand to design the IBM logo. He commissioned Isamu Noguchi and Alexander Calder to create art installations in IBM buildings, and hired Eames help with the layouts of offices. While Mr. Noyes was lecturing to CEOs on the topic of good design is good business, he was still a designer, creating iconic products like the Selectric typewriter for IBM in 1961. This one design dominated 75% of the typewriter market in the 60’s… and if you watch Mad Men, you know they had a lot of typewriters in offices back then…

We owe much to this man, more than a brief blog post can do justice to. Check out a copy of Gordon Bruce’s excellent monograph aptly named: “Eliot Noyes: A Pioneer of Design and Architecture in the Age of American Modernism” and bask in the display of potential fulfilled. To change the world you need not only to believe you can do it, but also the ability. Solving today’s complex problems will require another Eliot Noyes or three.

Be sure to check out Robert Blinn’s review of the book for core77 here.

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In our latest video a revived Swiss watchmaker takes us behind the scenes to look at design and handcraft

We traveled to beautiful Neuchâtel, Switzerland to learn the history of Marvin Watches, a brand celebrating it’s 160th birthday and its re-introduction to consumers. Once one of the largest watchmakers in Switzerland the company suffered at the end of the last century, and was resurrected by husband and wife team Cécile and Jean-Daniel Maye eight years ago. Their hard work has paid off, and Marvin Watches was just launched in the U.S. and most European markets in October 2010.

Cécile shares Marvin’s story and walks us through the year-long process of making a watch. Celebrated watch designer Sébastian Perret has been instrumental in Marvin’s renaissance, and he shares his process for creating a watch from sketch to prototype.

While we were at Marvin we worked with Cécile and Sébastien to design our “>”Toujours Plus” Malton 160 Cushion, a Cool Hunting Edition collaboration.

Dooa Arquitecturas’ school in Spain was our most-clicked story this week so here’s a roundup of all the stories we’ve run on Dezeen about buildings for education. See all the stories »