Hasta La Ideas

by Zeva Bellel

Photos by Fabrice Fortin

The art-meets-fashion concept brand, Slow and Steady Wins the Race made “Presents,” a series of limited-edition nesting boxes for their holiday pop-up shop in Paris. Inhabiting the Brachfeld gallery for the month of the December, the event marks the first time the NYC brand has brought its deconstructionist design ethos overseas.

Rolling art and anticipation into one, the collection comprises an ephemeral range of eight artist-designed box sets that celebrate the experience and excitement of giving and receiving. What lies inside the boxes is an afterthought—the presentation is the present itself.

In keeping with the brand’s measured and meticulous maturation process, the idea for “Presents” has been brewing in the pot for a while, inspired originally by founder Mary Ping’s Vassar sculpture professor Harry Roseman who created a gift experience involving dollar store trinkets wrapped in boxes within boxes for his wife. Seizing on the idea of offering what Ping describes as a “lasting memory as a gift,” she paired off her creative buddies tasking them with coming up with a present-less present.

Tauba Auerbach and Hannes Hetta created a three-piece set of mirrored boxes with patterned bases, turning the tiny spaces into kaleidoscopic infinity rooms (€3,333).

Terence Koh and Garrick Gott (tongues firmly in cheeks) created a set of six white paper nesting boxes that spell x-a-n-a-x in hand cut paper letters, with a final pill in the end (€1,088).

Continue reading and see more images after the jump.