Dezeen Screen: Canadian designer Eric Cheung of studio AT.AW. presents his range of Orphans Plush toys in this movie we filmed at our micro-exhibition Dezeen Platform at Dezeen Space. Watch the movie »
A l’occasion du dernier jour de vote des Fubiz Awards 2012, nous vous proposons de retrouver les interviews des différents nominés. Découvrez les anecdotes et les réponses de ses artistes et retrouvez le nom des lauréats Fubiz Awards dès le lundi 13 février 2012.
Interview : Woodkid – Iron
Interview : Nabil Elderkin – Bon Iver – Holocene
Interview : Léo Verrier – Dripped Animation
Interview : Evan Owen Dennis – N.Y.Adorned – Tradition
Interview : Amid Moradganjeh – Rimino Concept Phone
Interview : Colin Rich – L.A. Light
Interview : Robert Majkut – Whaletone
Interview : Céline Desrumaux – Countdown Animation
Interview : Jonathan Brechignac – Carpet with Bic Pencils
Interview : Hideaki Hamada – Haru & Mina Photography
Interview : Jérémie Perin – DYE – Fantasy
Interview : David Wilson – Metronomy – The Bay
Interview : Edouard Salier – Justice – Civilization
Interview : FLA – The Loner
Interview : Keita Sagaki – Pen and Ink Drawings
Interview : Irina Werning – Back to the future series
Interview : Zecc Architects – Redisential Church XL
Interview : Alexander Gellner – One Minute Puberty
Interview : Physical Fiction – Lego Letterpress
Interview : Level Architects – House With Slide
Interview : Yves Marchand & Romain Meffre – Ruins of Detroit
Interview : Olivier Campagne & Vivien Balzi – Paris Underwater
Interview : Fleur & Manu – M83 – Midnight City
Interview : Benoît Paillé – Rainbow Gathering
Interview : Doriane Favre – Post-it Watches
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Dezeen Screen: in the second part of this discussion we filmed at the Victoria & Albert Museum in London, Milan designer Fabio Novembre talks about changes in the Italian design scene and compares his ethos to those of other Italian designers. Watch the movie »
The imaginative mind behind fantastical ink portraits and more
Smoking fish, gun-toting octopuses, cupcake-eating lizards—these are just a few of the anthropomorphic animals portrayed in the intricate ink drawings by the eccentric British artist Rory Dobner. His ingenuous penchant for animals and maximalist approach to art come together in a series of wildly imaginative characters easily adored by children and adults alike. The industrious artist, now represented by Opera Gallery, also lends his talents to sculpture, painting, tattoos, home furnishings and graphic design.
Liberty London began stocking a small amount of Dobner’s work 18 months ago, after seeing one of his hand-drawn portraits in the background of a photo of his wife Claire, who was featured in a news article. At the time, Claire tells us, Rory had been a stay-at-home dad who worked incessantly on his art, as her job with British Telecom moved the family to places like Amsterdam, Hong Kong, LA, India, Sydney and Taiwan. Since Liberty phoned the couple, his collection has become so widely appreciated by the creative community—and several celebrities—the 34-year-old artist can barely keep up with the requests for his work. In addition to Liberty, Dobner’s quirky animals and typographic initials can be found on ceramics and textiles at Bluebird in London, Via Bus Stop in Tokyo, Agent Provocateur shops and soon at Maison 24 in NYC.
We recently caught up with Dobner’s wife of 16 years—the artist himself seems to be almost constantly working—to learn a little bit more about her husband’s motivation and plans for the future, which currently include working with renowned neon artist Chris Bracey and preparing for a personal appearance at Liberty on 10 February 2012. To show his support for the company that catalyzed his career, Dobner will be in-store all day drawing personalized portraits for fans of his work, or those looking for a customized Valentine’s Day gift.
When they started, Liberty took about 10 of his ink portraits and hung them in all these Victorian frames. They starting selling well, too well actually, and since each one is done by hand he had to keep replacing them. They finally gave him a six-week break, and suggested he do a product so he wouldn’t have to keep drawing. So he came up with doing the alphabet because it’s very iconic, and he made drawings and printed them on the tiles, and people could still frame them or they could play with them and spell out words. He will frame them all together too if you want a word. For example, Robbie Williams bought “Fuck me, blow me”.
He started doing commissions for bespoke coat of arms that include very specific stuff like childrens’ names, marriage dates, etc. Kate Moss created one with Ray Bans and The Rolling Stones references for her husband. Making it personal is very important for Rory, he’s always drawn, it doesn’t sit well to sell his art so if he can personalize it that makes him feel better.
We’ve always sought out antique things, we’ve traveled extensively so our house is filled with loads of stuff we’ve picked up along the way or salvaged and given a new life in a current time. Rory also likes the invention of Victorian times—the materials are so amazing and there’s so much heritage and character.
Every single thing is hand-drawn, the only thing we’ve done print-wise is the products. Something like Ol’ Smokey takes about a day, but a new idea (like a bespoke idea) takes more like 2 days to think, design and draw. Rory just goes straight onto the paper without penciling it in first. Like his paintings on brushed steel, the fluid way he does them means he can only come off the painting at certain points and he can’t make a mistake or the paint will fuck up—he’s very intuitive, it’s very interesting to watch.
We have a piece of land out in the countryside, and there’s a sexy garden down the driveway. I would say Rory’s happiest when he’s there making his massive wire sculptures. They are really smooth on the inside—models have worn them in shows for Dior and McQueen—but they are really quite sharp on the outside so we have to put them in open spaces to keep from accidentally injuring the children. They take about six months to make and people appreciate them for their artistic merit. At Babington House (the Soho House in Somerset), he created a massive horse that is standing up on its hind legs and the front legs are above you.
He’s one of three boys, and he grew up on a tiny island off the UK which is more like a waiting area for old people to die. His parents sent him to an all-boys military boarding school at a young age, where he learned to march and shoot guns—it’s kind of a scary school system to be in, you’re expected to go to the military. He was always drawing, and rather than bash it, they encouraged him and allowed.
We have two children, Huxley and Louie, and he’s very good at playing and thinking like children. He’s really in it though, he’s making his characters come alive and gives them little personalities. He has a bit of taxidermy, and sometimes dresses the animals up in vintage Vivienne Westwood accessories. But he’s so humble, so gentle, and very knowledgeable about history. He mounts every picture himself, he does everything from start to finish. He’s very much an artist, just genuinely interested in what people are telling him, and I sometimes have to wrestle his work off him.
Dezeen Screen: in this movie we filmed with Australian designer Marc Newson, he talks about his latest project, the K01 camera for Japanese brand Pentax. Watch the movie »
Dezeen Screen: design graduate Ariane Prin uses an extruding machine to press pencils from waste materials she finds at the Royal College of Art workshops in her project From Here to Here, presented and filmed at our micro-exhibition Dezeen Platform. Watch the movie »
Getting a nutritious, warm meal on the table each night for dinner can be stressful. Even though I plan our meals each week, I still look for ways to make the process easier and run more smoothly. For advice on how to reduce the stress, I decided to interview large families to see how they manage the chaos and keep their families full.
The families: I interviewed 10 families with three or more children. Four of the families have three children, three of the families have four children, two have six children, and one has eight children. Ages range from two weeks old to seniors in high school, but all the families have at least one or more children in elementary school. In half the families, both parents work or are in school full time. In the other half, the father has a full-time job outside the home and the mother manages the business of the house. These families live all across the U.S. and they are all two-parent families.
The interviews were surprising in many ways, but what caught me off guard was how often I heard similar responses. I was not expecting there to be as many trends in the answers as there were. There seems to be an art to feeding large families, and all of the families I interviewed are accomplished artists. The biggest trend I found is that mealtime is a focus of the day for these families and dinner is not something these families just want to get through. Dinner is a valued destination and is the one time each day when these families come together as a unit.
The responder with eight children (her oldest is only 12) summed up her mealtime perspective with a nice catch phrase: “Keep the majors major and the minors minor.” For her, the major is sitting down to a meal with her family each night. The minors are missed ingredients and foods that didn’t turn out exactly right. I believe this perspective and the insights listed above can help all of us, regardless of family size, to reduce the stress surrounding mealtime.
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Dezeen Wire: design critic Alice Rawsthorn interviews Japanese designer Oki Sato of Nendo about how the company got its name, the humour and stories behind their work and his current preoccupation with glass-blowing – New York Times
Nendo presented two exhibitions of their work in Paris last week: furniture that’s only stable when objects are placed on it and another collection at Carpernters Workshop Gallery that includes containers made of agricultural netting, tables with glass tops that have been allowed to flow outside their frames and huge blown-glass bubbles trapped in steel coffee tables.
See all our stories about Nendo here and watch our interview with Oki Sato on Dezeen Screen.
A journalist checks in with eight influential designers to assess the future of the field in a new Kindle e-book
In the new e-book “Design Voices,” Dutch designer Maarten Baas points out that 20 years ago, “designing was quite anonymous as a profession.” Now, not only has the importance of design become more visible outside of the creative industries, but designers themselves have also gained distinction as innovative problem-solvers.
Curious about how some of the industry’s most notorious talents see the future and the “larger design arena today,” journalist—and Cool Hunting contributor—Anna Carnick asked Giulio Cappellini, Ross Loveg- rove, Massimo Vignelli, Stefan Sagmeister, Maarten Baas, Tokujin Yoshioka, Dror Benshetrit and Milton Glaser to offer insight into how the profession has changed, and where they think the industry is headed in the years to come.
The thoughtful and timely e-book sells from Amazon as a Kindle Edition ($3), and you can check out some highlights from the “Design Voices” interviews below.
A designer known for injecting technology and science into his materials-driven designs, Ross Lovegrove predicts that in the future people will stray from issues “purely centered on glamor and expression of personal wealth” and instead look to new industrial processes to shape things. “We will witness an explosion of sculptural forms in society based on the digital process and industrial economics,” he says.
The industrious, multi-platform Austrian designer Stefan Sagmeister offers his thoughts on the fate of photography and books, saying “The still image will continue to lose its importance. Everything that can be animated will be animated. The printed book will die.”
As the creator of the iconic “I Heart NY” logo and co-founder of Push Pin Studios and New York magazine, Milton Glaser lives as a graphic design legend. In “Design Voices,” he expertly sums up design as the “fundamental activity of the human species to achieve results,” adding that “the official guideline of design is effectiveness.”
One of today’s game-changing industrial designers, Dror Benshetrit sees today’s design “at a fascinating point”, and believes people are beginning to see it from a more holistic perspective. “Today, it seems that more and more, people need to compartmentalize others and put them in certain boxes,” he says. “I think that’s going to change. We are going to break that, and we’re going to say, ‘Well, I’m a designer, I’m an artist, I’m an inventor, I’m a machinist, and I’m a poet; I’m all of that.'”
All images courtesy of the designers.
Our tour of the ingredient-driven artisanal California distillery
The building that houses St. George Spirits in Alameda, CA may look like a naval air hangar on the outside, but inside lies a vast warren of copper pot stills and casks filled with artisanal spirits. St. George was founded in 1982 to make eau de vie fruit brandies, and the process of making handcrafted eau de vie continues to influence their development of other spirits. Since its inception, the distillery has evolved into a comprehensive operation making whiskey, gin, rum, Qi Tea Liqueurs, and is even developing an aged balsamic vinegar.
Master distiller Lance Winters has been on a 16-year journey to make magic at St. George, and he describes his work as if he were tinkering away in some kind of fantastical workshop. With no shortage of projects on hand, Winters is currently planning a move to a much larger laboratory and is working on the release of a single malt whisky with a special bottling from a single barrel later this year, in celebration of their 30th anniversary. In about two years, Winters’ organic corn rye whiskey and California bourbon will be ready for release. We caught up with Winters to get a tour and hear more about his successful passion.
This is where most of our projects start. I run individual botanicals through one of these small stills to be able to see how it is going to express itself. I have one friend who is growing organic rye up by Mt. Shasta. We have brought down some of that rye, mashed it in here, fermented it and distilled it in the stills and it’s lovely. I also decided to make bourbon. Bourbon is a lot of fun because you have so much latitude to play around with the grain bill. It’s like making chocolate or coffee—bringing out different characteristics when you roast the grain.
Dave Smith is responsible for putting together our whiskey for bottling. He goes through and smells and tastes everything we’ve got and determines what is going to go into a given bottling. He is so good at it, I thought, what if he had access to a bunch of bourbon barrels? What could he do? So we went to a bunch of different bourbon distilleries. We brought 320 barrels back with us. It took him about three months to taste from all of them. He made notes and decided how they would best be blended together to be able to make a “super bourbon”—a Compass Box style of American bourbon. I think Compass Box is fantastic. We bottled ours under the name Breaking & Entering. We were careful to let people know that we did not make this, but we blended it. We love it.
This balsamic vinegar has been aging for 14 years. It’s thick and syrupy. There is no way to short-circuit this process. I want to learn how to blow glass and make my own bottles.
Five years ago I started talking about how much in love I am with the parklands around here. My son was going to a day camp. I’d pick him up in the afternoons and the smell was pine trees and wild fennel, bay laurel, and dirt. I love that smell of the earth between the dry dusty component and the decomposing mulch of the woodlands. I thought that would be something really great to distill, but then I shelved the idea. A couple of years later, I started thinking about making a gin with the flavors and smells of the forest. They all have an affinity for some traditional part if the gin profile. If you’ve hiked Mt. Tamalpais you will recognize the profile. We bring in Douglas fir and infuse it in high proof alcohol. We have been drawing it off and taking that liquid and putting it in the stills. It tastes like a sweet Christmas tree.
We also make a gin called Botanivore, a very broad, beautiful refreshing style of gin designed for tropical climates that is great for gin and tonics. As soon as you throw a little tonic in there, the dill seed in it explodes making it very green and herbaceous. It’s really good in a martini too.
At the opposite end of the spectrum is the one we start with a pot-distilled rye. It’s like a rye whiskey that hasn’t touched a barrel yet. Rye already has a lovely peppery nature to it that helps bump up some of the juniper berry qualities. We use 50% more juniper berries and crack them open to get more surface area. We add black peppercorns, caraway seed, lime and grapefruit peel. It’s my favorite cocktail base for a Negroni or to treat is as a rye in an Old Fashioned.
Our customers don’t need to be experts, they just need to know what they like and what makes their palette tingle. We need to be experts at what we like and that’s basically where everything starts. We’ve been able to find enough people who think like us to keep us going.
This is site is run by Sascha Endlicher, M.A., during ungodly late night hours. Wanna know more about him? Connect via Social Media by jumping to about.me/sascha.endlicher.
