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Biodegradable materials are used to create these amazing pillows from Loolo. The dyes that are used for the Looolo Textile line are free of all toxic chemicals and still come in a full range of colors. The fabric is stretched and worked to create soft organic knitted forms.
Recap: So far we have covered the hip and chic:
Standard Miami
New Clinton Hotel
The Hotel Astor
Aqua Hotel
The final post for hot modern Miami Beach hotels will be (drum roll...):
The Sagamore. It is on the beach, in the heart of nightlife, is very luxurious and looks fabu. Rates are advertised at $290 and up, but I couldn't find a room for less than $450. All the rooms are suites.
King sized pillow top mattress in every room! Yippee!
Looks good...right!?! Various artists are featured throughout the hotel.
Where is James Bond and Goldfinger?
One of the coolest rugs I have seen this year and now available in the US. The handtufted X-Rug Collection from HZL is inspired by a variety of media, motion graphics, fashion and record covers.
I recently came across some beautiful, modern benches. These are likely more suitable for commercial space, but could easily find their way to a residential space.
These designs are from the Swedish manufacturer Nola.
Paxa with cast gray concrete frame and galvanized steel seat frame. Various wood finishes for seat.
Park Lane Cast Aluminum, Zinc plated steel and various woods.
Dyning steelpipes, flatsteel, oiled oak or teak.
People send me little trinkets of stuff via email all the time: jokes, crazy chain letters, pictures, videos of all sorts, etc.
I am sure you get these as well. Some go directly into the trash bin, others you might keep or forward to a few peeps.
The one I got today is worth putting up on this blog. It has nothing to do with Modern anything...just a very good story. Worth 3 minutes of your time.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UBYPaNc57Ik&search=autistic%20basketball%20player
This has become a popular link as the day went on, so please try again later if it is slow to load.
Have a nice weekend!
G
The Paper Table from Matt Gagnon is made of recycled newsprint boards cut and fused to create a coffee table to hold your current reading materials. With the addition of new magazines the form of the table is complete.
I am not sure how I turned into the Miami Beach travel agent all the sudden, but thank you for those who wanted some more suggestions.
The topic has been Modern Hotels in Miami Beach. So far, we have covered:
Standard Miami
New Clinton Hotel
The Hotel Astor
Another nice find (not luxury mind you), but hip and pet friendly for those on a road trip is:
The Aqua Hotel in Miami. There aren't tons of amenities, but it is close to the nightlife and tons of beach activity. It is well designed with modern design and tasteful accents. At $135+, it is a pretty sweet deal.
Zzzzzzz....
Fork out the $595 and you are living XXXL.
Getting near the end of the Modern Kitchen review. Quite honestly, I am now doing this for your information. I have made my decision (to be disclosed after the review). It may or may not be this post or a future one. Exciting! (at least to me...)
Reviewed so far:
Arclinea
bulthaup
MAISTRI La Cucina
Boffi
Poliform
Poggenpohl
Snaidero
Berloni
Rational
Today, we look at one of the biggest and most recognized (obviously not going in order here in terms of brand power or preference)...
Scavolini : they are perhaps the largest kitchen manufacturer in Italy and is represented in over 50 countries. They do both residential and commercial applications. In fact, I was at a friend's new apartment, which came standard with a Scavolini Brio kitchen.
Check out Atherton Appliance & Kitchens for a nice little Scavolini video overview...right on the home page.
Vega
Glam
Crystal
I was recently up in Portland, Oregon visiting some Mill Valley, CA transplants...(temporary, I know Andrea!).
Portland has always had the reputation of wilderness, rivers, logging, birkenstocks, flannels and beards. Don't hate the messenger! This is just the reputation. Every city has them.
Anyway, I was very impressed with my visit. Sure, it rained for like 30 days straight before I got there, but that didn't bother me much. I am from San Francisco and it has its share of moisture.
While I was there, I saw/did 3 things that I thought I should mention:
1. Ate at Clarklewis : a modern restaurant that had AWESOME FOOD! Do yourself a favor and get there when visiting. It had a nice atmosphere and a unique way of serving food. It was family style with various sized portions (appetizer size, portion size and share all size). We told the chef to send us whatever he wanted and it was a good choice.
The decor included some hanging lamps and artwork from jefdesigns
Legna Lamp
It is a part of the RIPE family of restaurants.
2. I am not a corporate guy at all, but was pretty amazed with the Nike campus. It is spacious, stylish and modern. I love sports also, so it was like the hall of fame for all sports. If you have a chance and know someone there (if they live in Portland, they probably work there:), go check it out. And go to the employee store, tons of goodies.
3. Check out the Doug Fir : an old motel that has been completely retrofitted to be a groovy little bar, concert venue and modern chill zone.
P.S. Should also mention that the talented Christopher Douglas from Material Furniture is also in Portland!
Angela Adams does it again with cool new patterns for Spring. Love the new Shag line, it is amazingly soft!
I am crazy for MuNiMulA's aluminum furniture. They have an amazing line of tables whose design allows for continuous rearrangement of its surface with seven interchangeable planks in five colors of anodized aluminum. The frame is welded aluminum in a satin anodized finish.
Back on track after a very stressful 3 weeks!
So far, we have had the pleasure of viewing:
Arclinea
bulthaup
MAISTRI La Cucina
Boffi
Poliform
Poggenpohl
Snaidero
Berloni
Today we see another international powerhouse: Rational
Rational is a top German kitchen manufacturer. They were founded in the 60's and since 1993, have been a part of the Snaidero Group (see Snaidero Post in Modern Kitchens).
Neos
Cult (love the name)
I really like the breadth of the line. Maitland-Ward in NY is a specialized dealer for Rational.
The Winter landscape is mostly monochromatic. Where I live, Mill Valley CA, everything is green. In Tahoe, white and gray. In Texas, tan and sand. It is not until spring where bursts of color come into the landscape - golden Daffodils start blooming, Blue Bonnets start popping up along with a rainbow of colored wildflowers.
Take inspiration from nature and add some bold bursts of color into your home. This seasons vibrant colors look wonderful against a neutral palette. We are seeing this in fashion as well, blasts of vibrant accessories against muted colors.
You can give a new look to a room by adding a few accessories in one of this seasons bright tones. Throw pillows are a great way to do this. Try:
AQUA (Agnes & Hoss : Cape Seaweed Pillow):
COTTON CANDY (Plush Living : Nook Intersect Pillow):
GRASS (Inhabit : Pollinate Pillow)
ORANGE: (Koko : Mandarin Pillow)
First it was the Standard Miami. Then it was the New Clinton Hotel.
Now what? Well, Miami Beach has no shortage of uber-cool places to eat, relax, drink and er...sleep?
Next up is The Hotel Astor
This classic building, first designed by T. Hunter Henderson in 1936, as gone under extensive renovations in 1997 and 2002. It is Art Deco at its finest and very well done.
Also make sure to eat and shmooze at the Metro Kitchen and Bar:
Rates are $175 and up...splurge for the Suite at a reasonable $285. You will be the Miami Beach Pimp Deluxe!
You have to love the designer who is so accomplished that people from all industries seek his design talent. Who says you have to stick to modern furniture, textiles, art or lighting?
Marc Newson, at 41, he has already worked across a wide range of disciplines to create everything from chairs, household objects, a bicycle and a concept car to restaurants, a recording studio and interiors of private and commercial jets, for clients based in Europe, North America, Asia and Australia.
Born in Sydney, Australia, Newson spent his childhood traveling in Europe and Asia, before studying jewelery and sculpture at Sydney College of the Arts. He started experimenting with furniture design as a student and, after graduating in 1984, was awarded a grant from the Australian Crafts Council, and staged an exhibition - featuring the Lockheed Lounge - at the Roslyn Oxley Gallery in Sydney.
When the Japanese entrepreneur, Teruo Kurosaki, offered to put his designs into production, Newson moved to Tokyo, where he lived and worked from 1987 to 1991. Kurosaki's company, Idée, manufactured such pieces as the Orgone Lounge, Black Hole Table and Felt Chair, which were widely exhibited in Asia and Europe.
Shoe for Nike
Newson set up a studio in Paris in 1991, and won commissions from prestigious European manufacturers including Flos for lighting, Cappellini and Moroso for furniture. He formed a joint venture, the Ikepod Watch Company, to manufacture the watches he designed, and produced limited editions of aluminium furniture including the Event Horizon Table and Orgone Chair. During the mid-1990s, Newson also designed a series of restaurants - Coast in London, Manchester's Mash & Air and Osman in Cologne and Canteen in Manhattan - the interior of Syn, a Tokyo recording studio and a retail system for Belgian designer, Walter Von Beirendonck's W.&L.T. streetwear label
In 1997, Newson moved to London, where he set up Marc Newson Ltd as a larger studio capable of tackling more ambitious industrial projects. He has since designed mass manufactured glassware for Iittala, kitchen and bathroom accessories for Alessi, furniture and household objects for Magis and B&B Italia, Idée and Dupont Corian. Newson has also designed vehicles such as a bicycles, the MN01, for Denmark's Biomega, a concept car, the 021C for Ford, and the interiors of a Falcon 900B private jet. In 2002-3 he designed the Lever House Restaurant in the famous Lever House Building in Manhattan, New York, a Business Class seat, Skybed for Qantas, a cookware range for Tefal and a bathroom range, The Newson Suite, for Ideal Standard. He opened a second studio in Paris.
Cell Phone for KDDI
In 2004, new works include Talby, a mobile telephone for Japan's KDDI, the uniforms worn by the Australian Olympic team designed in collaboration with Richard Allan and worn at the 2004 Athens Olympic Games, a shoe, Zvezdochka, for Nike, a range of clothing for G-Star, luggage for Samsonite, and aircraft interiors for the new A380 fleet for Qantas.
As well as winning numerous awards, including three Good Design Awards from the Chicago Atheneum, Newson has exhibited extensively. He created Bucky, a sculptural installation for the Fondation Cartier pour l'art contemporain in Paris in 1995, and a major retrospective of his work was held at the Powerhouse Museum in Sydney (August 2001 - February 2002).
Lever House Restaurant in New York (2003)
In 2003, Newson was commissioned by the Fondation Cartier to design a piece of his choosing, coinciding with his 40th birthday. The result was Kelvin40, a concept jet, exhibited at the Fondation Cartier in Paris (January - May 2004) and consequently at London's Design Museum (October 2004 - January 2005).
Newson's designs are present in most major permanent museum collections including the Museum of Modern Art in New York, London's Design Museum, Musée national d'Art moderne - Centre Georges Pompidou and the Vitra Design Museum. A book on Marc Newson's work was published by Booth-Clibborn Editions in 1999, and one by Thames and Hudson in 2003.
A DVD was released in January 2005, and a Phaidon monograph is to be published in 2006.
Marc Newson is Adjunct Professor in Design at Sydney College of the Arts.
The Standard Miami, was...well standard. The next hotel that I thought was really sweet, was the New Clinton Hotel.
It's got the decor, the spa, the pool and beautiful people. Now all you have to do is cough up the $400+ a night. It's Miami Beach baby, what did you expect?
Aigo restaurant. Mediterranean Seafood. Check out the celebs!
Wait...did I go swimming to my neighbor's room last night?
Minimalist design + very comfy beds.
More to come...
Argington's Baltic Birch modern kids furniture grows with your toddler. Legs for the table, chair and bench can be removed and replaced by longer legs for your growing tot. Finished with a non-toxic ecologically friendly clear coat, these pieces are the highest quality and can be handed down the generations.
I was just in Miami for 5 days. Not quite the longest trip in the world...but it enough for this trip. I am still recovering.
Previously, I had posted about the The Standard in Los Angeles. Well, The Standard is also the standard in Miami Beach, if you like modern. In future posts, I will describe a few other spots. Boutique modern hotels are cropping up everywhere, and in Miami Beach, it is a mecca for chic.
Sorry...no pics of the pool. It was very nice! $150 per night promo Sun-Thurs. Sweet deal.
ahhhh...
After the SWECO post, I had to elaborate a bit on the visionary behind the Turning Torso: Santiago Caltrava
Santiago Calatrava with his Turning Torso prototype.
Santiago Calatrava was born in Valencia, Spain on July 28, 1951.
He pursued undergraduate studies at the Architecture School and Arts and Crafts School. Following graduation in 1975, he enrolled in the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) in Zürich, Switzerland for graduate work in civil engineering. Calatrava was influenced by the French architect Le Corbusier, whose Notre Dame du Haut chapel caused Calatrava to examine how complex form could be understood and generated in architecture. In 1981 after completing his doctoral thesis, "On the Foldability of Space Frames", he started his architecture and engineering practice.
In 1981, Calatrava began his professional practice by opening an architectural and engineering office in Zurich. His first realized project was the Jakem Factory in 1983, in Munchwilen, Switzerland. His second office was opened in Paris in 1989.
In his almost 20 years of practice, he was won countless awards, including the 1992 "Gold Medal of the Institute of Structural Engineers," and the 1987 "Auguste Perret UIA Prize."
Athens Olympic Sports Complex (OAKA): Agora
Sometimes you wonder how one has enough time in a day to build buildings, bridges, sculptures and art...all at a internationally-praised level. Sigh...
Love the new silk and linen fabric lamps from Lights Up! Modern and affordable, and you can select your favorite silk patterned fabric for the shade. The silk fabric creates a soft glow. Their new lamps include: the Devo Oval with cool colored bases, the Deco Deluxe Pendant, and Salon.
You have to admire SWECO, an international consulting and architecture firm out of Sweden.
They provide the engineering and guts behind projects such as Turning Torso and Dania Park, but they also provide the vision and expertise to provide solutions for environmental/municipal endeavors such as Buffalo City, South Africa and clean water systems in Croatia.
Hard to picture those, so I'll provide some eye candy from some of their more visual projects.
Located in the Western Harbor in Malmo, Turning Torso is a 54-story structure that twists 90 degrees, from bottom to top. The architect, Santiago Calatrava, is often inspired by the natural movement of animals and people and in Turning Torso's case, the construction represents a human body in a twisting movement.
+...who else has a guy that runs a business with a name as cool as WIGON THURESSON? Wigon!
A piece of history for architecture & modern enthusiests is available for viewing when in L.A.
Whether you are a retro historian or just in the neighborhood, the Eames House a worthwhile visit. I have been there several times (I usually take visitors who have an interest in cultural history), and I get a kick out of it every time, especially when you know the history of how and why it was built.
Admission is free to student with current valid IDs, seniors (62+), and children under 12 years of age. As of November 1, 2004, there is a suggested contribution/donation of $5.00 per person.
(From eamesfoundation.org)...The Eames House, Case Study House #8, was one of 25 homes built as part of The Case Study House Program. The program came into being in the mid-1940s and continued through the early 1960s, largely through the efforts of John Entenza, publisher of Arts and Architecture magazine. The magazine announced that it would be the clients for a series of architect-design homes to be built and furnished using materials and techniques derived from the experiences of the second World War and best suited to express man's life in the modern world. Each home built would be for a real or hypothetical client taking into considerations their particular housing needs.
Charles and Ray proposed that the home they designed would be for a married couple who were basically apartment dwellers working in design and graphic arts, and who wanted a home that would make no demands for itself, but would, instead serve as a background for as Charles would say, "life in work" with nature as a "shock absorber."
The first plan of their home, known as the Bridge House, was designed by Charles Eames and Eero Saarinen in 1945. Because it used off-the-shelf parts ordered from catalogues, and the war had caused a shortage in materials delivery, the steel did not arrive until late 1948. By then, Charles and Ray had "fallen in love with the meadow," in Ray's words, and felt that the site required a different solution.
Charles and Ray then posed themselves a new problem: How to build a house with maximized volume with the same elements and not destroy the meadow. Using the same off-the-shelf parts, but ordering one extra steel beam, Charles and Ray re-configured the House. It is this design which was built and remains today.
Charles and Ray moved into the House on Christmas Eve, 1949, and lived here for the rest of their lives. The interior, its objects and its collections remain very much the way they were in Charles and Ray's lifetimes. The house they created offered them a space where work, play, life, and nature co-existed.
The House has now become something of an iconographic structure visited by people from around the world. The charm and appeal of the House is perhaps best explained in the words of Case Study House founder, John Entenza, who felt that the Eames House "represented an attempt to state an idea rather than a fixed architectural pattern."
I love my new Treo 700...I can blog anywhere.
I had a great time in NYC for the New York International Gift Fair. I am still here, actually at a Starbucks...blogging on my Treo...what has the world come to?
Accent on Design at the Javits was chalk-full of very good design. Some of it was posted the other day, some of it not (the camera in the Treo is not too saucy). I'll bring a digital camera next time, I promise.
The rest of the Javitz was a sprawl of random snow globes and assorted trinkets...with a diamond in the rough (who perhaps signed-up too late for the show) in the midst of chatchkyville.
The surprise of the show was New York's Newest on Pier 94. What would seem as a castoff, a shuttle ride from the Javits, turned out to have the highest concentration of innovative modern design.
Undeniably, the hottest trend of the show (at least for the modern realm), was Modern Baby/kid and Modern Pets.
Established designers are getting into it and several new companies are relying on it solely for their future success.
My thoughts on the trend? Two things:
1. People are having children at an older age. That means they are likely to have more money to spend on their children's (or pet's) décor. They are also more likely to own a home or have an established furniture theme in their home, so why break the theme for baby Huey or Fido?
2. Modern is hot. So why shouldn't that continue in all spaces (commercial and residential)?
Well...that is it for now. Till next time!
The minimalist, monolithic form of the Glow Box Cabinet from Iannone : Sanderson is transformed when a random pattern of light appears through its transparent bamboo veneer doors. Cavities are routed through the bamboo plywood substrate, filled with resin, and then veneered over with a thin layer of bamboo. When lit, the pattern shines through without drowning out the material's natural grain structure and color. When unlit, the cabinet becomes a warm solid form suspended on stainless steel legs.
