And now for some ridiculously old news: At Design Miami/Basel this past June, the three W Hotels Designers of the Future awardees included Tom Foulsham, Markus Kayser, and Philippe Malouin, each of whom were handed a commission with a very meta, very Sight Unseen-style brief — to devise a project that would somehow illuminate their creative process, like Foulsham’s merry-go-round propelled by balloons and hair-dryers, or Malouin and Kayser’s differing takes on daylight-mimicking lamps. Even if you weren’t in Basel yourself, you probably read all about it earlier this summer, whoop-de-doo. But what you might not have seen is the hefty catalog Design Miami’s organizers produce for every show, which was handed to us belatedly last week during a pow-wow with head curator Marianne Goebl, and which contained an article that was so up our alley we were surpised no one had shown it to us sooner: a photo essay wherein Kayser, Foulsham, and Malouin were asked to respond to questions like “A sketch” and “An object you find useful” by handing over the sketches and objects themselves. Malouin’s response to “Why London?”: A beat-up turntable. Foulsham’s: A nasty hunk of road pavement whose subtext we’re still not quite sure of. Check out the essay in its entirety in the slideshow at right, then bookmark the Design Miami blog to keep up with the fair’s newer news, like who’s going to be this year’s Designer of the Year, which is set to be announced this week.
A SKETCH. Markus Kayser.
A SKETCH. Tom Foulsham (top), Philippe Malouin (bottom).
WHY LONDON? Malouin: “To party.”
WHY LONDON? Kayser: “To study at the RCA.” Foulsham: “Tarmac.”
WHAT WOULD YOU BE? Malouin: “Plastic duck.” Foulsham: “Miniature chick.” Kayser: “Monkey.”
AN EVERYDAY OBJECT YOU WISH YOU’D DESIGNED. Kayser: “Paper clip.” Malouin: “Clothes peg.” Foulsham: “Spoon.”
TOP THREE BOOKS OR MAGAZINES. Foulsham: “Art Review, Coyte, Fangoria.” Kayser: “Modernism, Design Report, Domus.” Malouin: “Design Classics, Il Mobile Imbottito Moderno, Manufacturing Processes for Design Professionals.”
FOOD THAT DESCRIBES YOU. Malouin: “Spaghetti.” Kayser: “Dried yeast.” Foulsham: “Fish.”
OBJECT REPRESENTATIVE OF YOUR FAVORITE PLACE. Malouin: “Canadian 20-dollar bill.” Kayser: “Sand from the Sahara desert.” Foulsham: “Piece of turf.”
AN EXAMPLE OF GOOD DESIGN. Kayser: “Cylinder line by Arne Jacobsen, 1964.” Malouin: “THPG Bakelite switch.” Foulsham: “Spring.”
SOMETHING IN YOUR FAVORITE COLOR. Foulsham: “Unknown.” Kayser: “Pen.” Malouin: “Allen key.”
AN OBJECT THAT INFORMS YOUR PRACTICE. Malouin: “Stone.” Foulsham: “Lens.” Kayser: “Toy car made from cans and bottle tops.”
A SAMPLE OF YOUR TYPICAL OUTFIT. Foulsham: “Reebok classics.” Malouin: “Black t-shirt. I have 20 of the same. Boring, but true.” Kayser: “Black knitted tie.”
YOUR BUSINESS CARD. Foulsham: “I don’t have one.” Kayser (top). Malouin (bottom): “When I was asked to supply my business card I realized I didn’t like my old one anymore so I made a new one by hand… This will be printed on real card.”
AN OBJECT YOU FIND USEFUL. Foulsham: “Brake lever.” Kayser: “Arduino mega.” Malouin: “This is a calculator that Naoto Fukasawa personally gave me. I asked him to sign it. He is really nice — oh and I use it a lot, but keep it in the wrapper.”
A USELESS OBJECT. Malouin: “Perpetual drinking bird toy.” Foulsham: “Dice without numbers.” Kayser: “Globe cigarette holder.”
OBJECT THAT BEST DESCRIBES YOUR HOMETOWN. Foulsham: “Tarmac.”
OBJECT THAT BEST DESCRIBES YOUR HOMETOWN. Malouin: “Origami boat.” Kayser: “Postcard set of Hanover.”
On occasion, the editors of Sight Unseen spot a story about creativity told from a viewpoint that’s not unlike our own. This one, posted yesterday on the design blog Yatzer, peeks in on the studio of Québec-born, London-based designer Philippe Malouin. Malouin is known for taking his time with a project — after painstaking research, his recent chainmail-like Yachiyo rug for Beirut’s Carwan Gallery famously took 3,000 hours to produce — and in the article, writer Stefania Vourazeri probes the young designer about his thoughts on permanence as well as the influence of art on his designs. "Production for the sake of production is not that interesting to me,” he explains.
When Design Miami rolls around each winter, it’s hard to resist the siren’s song of sunshine in December, no matter how much you've decided you hate standing in line for parties or how high the hotel rates might balloon during that frenetic week. We’ve been known to pool resources with friends far and wide in order to hop on flights and hightail it out of New York on the promise of a stolen afternoon at the Standard’s pool, or even a press brunch at some Collins Avenue hotel du jour. But we’ve never made it to the event that started it all: Design Miami/Basel and its legendary accompanying art fair. Lucky for us, then, that we alighted this year on the perfect correspondent: Marco Tabasso, known in design circles as Rossana Orlandi’s right-hand man, who took advantage of a rare two-day break (the gallery sat this year out, after having debuted a massive Nacho Carbonell installation in 2011) to zip around the Swiss metropolis, capturing everything he saw for us on proverbial film.
Through April 15, Sight Unseen will be showcasing the work of half a dozen designers and design firms exhibiting together at the Milan Furniture Fair under the umbrella of the soon-to-launch Carwan Gallery in Beirut. First up is Montreal-born, London-based Philippe Malouin, whose projects merge a highly conceptual framework with a practical, process-based approach and visually pleasing geometries. His Gridlock series, for example, shrunk the construction of architectural cross-bracing down to a domestic scale, employing it to make lamps and mobiles, while his new Yachiyo rug uses an ancient Japanese chain-mail technique to create an indestructible floor covering that takes 3,000 hours and an army of interns to produce. Here, Malouin explains how — and why — he did it.
