Hasta La Ideas

Milan 2012: these stacking metal chairs were created by French architect Jean Nouvel for the restaurant of the RBC Design Centre that his studio have designed in Montpellier, due to open next month, and they’re now in production with Italian brand Emu.

Flat metal bars make up the legs, backrest and arms of chairs, which come in white, red, grey and black. They stack and are weighted so they can easily be hooked over the edge of tables when cleaning the floor.

Launched at the Salone Internazionale del Mobile in April, the collection shares the restaurant’s name, MIA, and comprises stacking chairs, armchairs, benches, high stools and two tables.

See all our stories about Jean Nouvel here.

The Salone Internazionale del Mobile took place from 17 to 22 April. See all our stories about Milan 2012 here, plus photos on Facebook and Pinterest.

Here’s some more information from Emu:

Jean Nouvel designs MIA, the new collection with a strong, happy character.

The new MIA collection, designed by Jean Nouvel, is a crystal-clear example of the spirit EMU brings to placing technological development at the top of its priority list, in an atmosphere buzzing with productive creativity. The whole concept stems from the RBC Design Centre in Montpellier, where three important elements were brought together: design, production and distribution. Frank Argentin, founder of RBC and a personal friend of Jean Nouvel, commissioned the Montpellier showroom to the French architect and designer with the aim of creating a venue that was to act as an authentic design manifesto, a showcase able to offer visitors a trip through the world of prestige furnishings. With this mission in mind, it was of the essence that the common areas be furnished with particular care; hence Frank Argentin’s decision to entrust the furnishing project for the Design Centre’s restaurant (also called MIA) to Jean Nouvel and to Emu, a company with years of sound experience in the contract sector, world leader in metalworking and trusted supplier of RBC. From the collaboration of these three outstanding names sprang the new MIA collection, with a design revolving around the concept of furnishings that make their mark and are so instantly recognisable the world over as to become true urban icons, thanks not only to the Emu brand name but to the efforts of the extraordinary work group the company is part of.

Simple, clean-cut lines are the hallmarks of these seats and tables, whose hard-wearing, practical qualities provide the perfect response to a wide range of requirements to suit all tastes. MIA is designed and certified as an outdoor product, but is also perfectly suitable for use indoors, not only in homes, but also in design or history museums, as well as the top-of-the-range hotel and street contract segment. Considering the needs of these different sectors, the new collection has been designed to guarantee maximum functionality: thanks to the lightweight frame and the shape of the seats and arms, the chairs can easily and practically be placed on top of the table, thus making tidying up and cleaning operations easier.

The collection will be composed of stackable seats featuring a distinctive, skilful combination of aluminium and metal, available with and without arms, as well as armchairs, a high stool, a bench and two tables, one round and one square, with fold-down metal and laminate tops and featuring a distinctive geometric base composed of four rectangular-shaped tubes. Made in Italy throughout, MIA is available in white, red, grey and black, and will be complemented with coordinated cushions suitable for both indoor and outdoor use.

Milan 2012: in this interview filmed at Dezeen Studio, Guardian critic Justin McGuirk gives us his take on the future of design criticism, as fast reactions on platforms like Twitter and Facebook are balanced by long-form analysis in e-books and online journals.

He goes on to discuss how the fetishisation of traditional crafts by mass-producers is pushing design in a new direction and agrees with previous guest journalist Joseph Grima that the arrival of hacking culture and open-source production is the big story in Milan this year, describing it as the antithesis to the luxury design industry that the city normally centres around.

We published an abridged version of this interview in our Thursday TV show (below).

Dezeen was filming and editing all week from Dezeen Studio powered by Jambox at MOST. See all our TV shows here.

Milan 2012: London designers 00:/ recently showed visitors to Milan’s most famous department store how to construct a wooden house from a downloaded kit of parts.

The self-assembly structure is one in a series from the WikiHouse open-source platform, which allows users to design, download and share templates that can then be printed using a CNC-mill or 3D printer.

The pieces then slot together without the need for bolts or screws.

If you fancy having a go and building this structure yourself, you can find the template here.

Hacked Lab program of workshops, talks and performances took place at La Rinascente from 17 to 22 April and included daily workshops and performances. See our earlier story about it here, or click here to watch our interview with curator Beatrice Galilee in our Wednesday TV show.

We also previously featured a set of open-source spectacle frames, which were made using the wooden offcuts of another WikiHouse project. See them here.

00:/ worked up the concept for WikiHouse at their offices in Shoreditch, where they were based for seven years before recently moving to a central London location.

Designed in Hackney is a Dezeen initiative to showcase world-class architecture and design created in the borough, which is one of the five host boroughs for the London 2012 Olympic Games as well as being home to Dezeen’s offices. We’ll publish buildings, interiors and objects that have been designed in Hackney each day until the games this summer.

More information and details of how to get involved can be found at www.designedinhackney.com.

Movie is by Alice Masters.

Hackney designer Philippe Malouin worked with traditional craftsmen from Beirut to create a series of bowls and plinths by shaping wooden blocks made of many smaller, tessellating batons.

Commissioned by Carwan Gallery, his Extrusion project combines the techniques used to make decorative wooden inlays with those of a lathe-worker.

The constructed block would normally be sliced into thin layers and used to decorate boxes but Malouin freezes the traditional process at this point and hands it over to be turned on a lathe.

The Extrusion collection was shown at Design Days Dubai in March, Milan in April and will travel back to Carwan Gallery in Beirut this summer.

Born in Canada and graduating from Design Academy Eindhoven in 2008, Malouin now has a studio in Homerton and you can read all our stories about his work here.

Here are some more details from Malouin:

Carwan Gallery was kind enough to invite me to visit Beirut last year. During my visit, I was taken around the city to visit the many inspiring landmarks, including the Oscar Niemeyer international fair (below). Construction stopped in 1975 at the outbreak of the Lebanese civil war and was never restarted. We also visited local craftsmen and manufacturers in order that we might produce the gallery’s next collection in Beirut.

One specific craft interested me, which was intarsia making. Intarsia makers produce amazing wood-inlayed and patterned boxes. These inlays are used only for decorative purposes on the outside of the boxes. I was especially interested in the way in which a thin patterned sliver comes to life from a bigger ‘wooden sushi roll,’ which will be sliced into wafer-thin pieces in order to be inlayed on the exteriors of the wood boxes.

The geometric patterns were very beautiful, but it’s the ‘wood-sushi’ block itself that inspired me the most. I was also interested in using more than one craft, or more than one craftsman in order to realize the final piece. I was introduced to a local lathe-worker and the idea came together: I wanted the intarsia worker to create intricately patterned wood logs to then give to the lathe-worker, who would transform them into objects.

Key:

Blue = designers
Red = architects
Yellow = brands

See a larger version of this map

Designed in Hackney is a Dezeen initiative to showcase world-class architecture and design created in the borough, which is one of the five host boroughs for the London 2012 Olympic Games as well as being home to Dezeen’s offices. We’ll publish buildings, interiors and objects that have been designed in Hackney each day until the games this summer.

More information and details of how to get involved can be found at www.designedinhackney.com.

Milan 2012: these little storage containers by Swedish designers TAF are made of silicone but coloured to look like clay.

They come in three sizes and rock gently on their bases, shaped to resemble three birds with slightly different characters.

The Figurine Containers for Hong Kong design brand Praxis were shown at Spazio Rossana Orlandi in Milan last week.

See more work by TAF here and more silicone products here.

The Salone Internazionale del Mobile took place from 17 to 22 April. See all our stories about Milan 2012 here, plus photos on Facebook and Pinterest.

Photographs are by Nicolas Genta.

Here’s some more information from TAF:

The Figurine Containers are made of silicone but coloured in three different colours referring to natural clay. They function as containers for small objects like coins, jewellery or keys.

You find them rocking when giving them a gentle push. The three friends own character is something in-between man and woman, human and animal, function and decoration.