Hasta La Ideas

The Portland, OR-based
Official Manufacturing Company, made up of three creative types (Mathew Foster, Fritz Mesenbrink and Jeremy Pelley), come up with everything from signage and print materials to interior design for their clients. As the self-professed “thing makers” recently said in an e-mail, “If we come up with a great idea, we will find a way to make it happen.”

Like their tweaked acronym OMFGCO might suggest, the youthful trio has their finger on the pulse, embracing a holistic approach to re-branding and the du jour overall take on the marketing model that comes with it—ideally suited to smaller companies. The creative studio’s responsible for the clean, quirky look of prominent Portland businesses, such as popular charcuterie Olympic Provisions (recently featured in the New York Times) and re-imagining the local branch of the Ace Hotel as a city-specific, communal experience, complete with local art and a record player at the front desk. The latter client isn’t new to Pelley, who formerly worked as the lead art director for Atelier Ace, lending the group enviable chops—as do the backgrounds of the other two.

Mesenbrink and Foster both worked as designers for Wieden + Kennedy, where the group first connected in 2005 at the ad giant’s experimental school. But it wasn’t until finding themselves sharing studio space in downtown Portland in the summer of 2009 that the triumvirate began to work together and the company took off from there.

“We might work a little more these days than before,” they said (even answering e-mails en masse). “But the difference is that we’re working with each other, our friends and the businesses we believe in. We’ve got some upcoming projects that we’re very excited about, which will find us in more of a leadership role.”

In addition to their marketing work, OMFGCO also sells limited-edition merchandise. Check out more things by the thing-makers, and news about their upcoming projects,
on their site.

For the past decade NYC-based Bonetti/Kozerski Design Studio have been building an impressive portfolio of work centered on the relationship between the interior and the exterior as one fluid continuum.

Founded by Enrico Bonetti and Dominic Kozerski, the duo work together to develop effortless spaces, blending the fundamentals of architecture and design with distinct European flair. Kozerski, originally hailing from the U.K., and the Italian-born Bonetti apply their talents to a range of work from highly visible DKNY boutiques and a David Barton gym to intimate personal spaces, such as converted barns in upstate New York, André Balazs’ NYC pad, one for Rick Rubin, and Donna Karan’s intimate Parrot Cay getaway.

You can learn more about the pair in Columbia University’s current exhibition “2000-2010 in Architecture,” or read our interview below to get a deeper scope of their working methods.

What’s the philosophy of your studio?

Kozerski: We’re quite diverse in the projects we work on. We work on high-end residential and corporate spaces that involve re-branding and with retail companies to develop new concepts to reinvent or refresh brands. Our work is focused on the design from the conceptual level. We believe all disciplines are part of the craft of design. We’ve seen this cross over to other types of work—retail crosses over to residential for example.

Tell us about the new exhibition you’re a part of at Columbia University.

Bonetti: We are one of five New York-based architecture firms. One of our projects is a conceptual project that was never built—a house in an industrial area, working with quite difficult constraints to deal with local issues. We’re presenting it as a model and 3D walk-through.

We’re presenting a model and photography of [Donna Karan’s] residential project in Turks and Caicos on a private island of Parrot Cay, a project that started five years ago. It’s a very unique place, on the beach with both ocean views and views in the lagoon. We collaborated on a series of houses, working to achieve best view of the beach from the house.

What is your style like working together as partners?

Bonetti: We come to the same solutions and we have the same strategy. Yes, one works more on one project for practical purposes, but we make design decisions together. We’re very similar. It makes our projects more interesting with slightly different perspectives.

Kozerski: Between us the goal is always common and how we want it to end up in the end. The way we get there is very interesting.

What’s next?

Bonetti: We’re working on a large townhouse on the Upper East Side, some retail projects in Asia, a retail project in Vienna, and barn conversions in upstate New York.

Kozerski: We like to be engaged with interesting clients.

How did you meet?

Bonetti: We were both working for the same architect in the early ’90s. We found we worked well together. We started our own firm and it’s been almost ten years.