Let There be Light

 


(Peled Soffitto by Viabizzuno)

This article was first published in Architecture Ireland #260

While the days have been shorter and the evenings darker, I can’t help but think about what might be some of my favourite designed objects: lights. A type of expression that can take its form in an industrial product, a decorative object, an almost intangible scheme or a quirky design, lighting – when done well – can constitute the best of industrial design, craft, art, architecture or the meeting points between them all. During Ireland’s Design Week at the beginning of November, Dublin-based lighting designers ShadowLight hosted an event exploring the philosophy of Mario Nanni, founder of Italian manufacturer Viabizzuno, and what he calls ‘The 8 Rules of Light’. Artificial light, according to Nanni, needs to inspire as well as illuminate. Viabizzuno’s range features a number of pieces that do both, as well as fittings you can believe blend seamlessly into an architectural setting. One more striking piece from the broad range Viabizzuno offer is their Peled Soffitto, designed by Antoni Arola. Light seems to burst from the ends of a cluster of slender aluminium rods hanging from a ceiling, creating an striking sculptural form, but one that doesn’t overpower its setting. Peled Soffitto seems to create a soft ambient light and functions equally as illuminant and focal point.
 
(Collection of Light by Humans Since 1982)

Currently showing at Phillips & de Pury in London, the latest work from Stockholm design studio Humans Since 1982 is a curious piece, far more focal point in itself than functional lamp to illuminate something else. Evoking a display case filled with an insect collection, Collection of Light shows the LED as a curiosity in itself. By collecting and arranging various LEDs in a display case-cum-lamp, the aim is to "expose each illuminant as a worthy industrial product". The collection of LEDs in different sizes, intensities and colour temperatures certainly makes for an interesting display, and serves as a great reminder of the technology going into today’s lighting, placing it centre-stage rather than hiding it within a fitting. The result is remarkable: a beautiful, intriguing object filled with a range of beautiful, intriguing objects: a collection of light more than worthy to be part of anyone’s collection of design.

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Designer's Drawings

This article was first published in Architecture Ireland #259

October saw the opening of the first major retrospective of the work of Ronan & Erwan Bouroullec, prolific and influential French product designers, in the Centre Pompidou-Metz in north-east France. The exhibition is entitled Bivouac, meaning a temporary encampment, and as such the gallery space will be inhabited by the Bouroullec’s work until July 2012. As much a testament to the brothers’ immensely accomplished designs, the exhibition is also an insight into the process employed by the designers, with finished products shown alongside prototypes, and mass-produced objects paired with those which have been hand-crafted.

Another interest element of the show which is further explored in an iPad app produced to accompany Bivouac is the display of the brothers’ drawings. More elusive than the ubiquitous architectural drawing, drawings by designers are often hidden away and forgotten about, or not considered for public consumption. In his manual Drawing for Designers author Alan Pipes says that though they are “more than mere instructions on how to make objects”, designer’s drawings can often be “a private and hidden art, the marks on paper treated merely as a means to an end”. In many ways, the various types of drawings made by designers are a means to an end, be they tools for communication of an idea to a client or manufacturer or technical illustrations to instruct the end user on the finished product, but drawings are also an incredibly important method of designing itself – formulating ideas, exploring forms or finding solutions to the problem at hand. In Understanding Design designer and writer Kees Dorst instructs the designer to embrace “...not so much the brilliant execution of complete images, but the production of ugly little sketches that will help you think about your design. The kind of images that only you will understand”.

 

Far from ugly though, the drawings of Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec are beautiful, charming and full of character, and their iPad app entitled Cercles is a fantastic way of exploring their drawings, using the iPad’s high resolution and touchscreen functionality to great effect. Concurrently, and perhaps coincidentally, a book of illustrations and drawings by another contemporary design icon, Karim Rashid, has recently been published by FRAME. Where the Bouroullec’s drawings are imbued with the same playful quirkiness of their products, Rashid’s drawings hold all the curvaceous confidence you would expect. Sketch shows an extensive collection of Rashid’s own concept drawings along with some digital artworks to give a real sense of the place drawing and illustrating holds in Rashid’s practice.



To see behind the veil of highly finished presention drawings to the rough and ready sketches of designers such as Rashid and the Bouroullecs provides a snapshot of the question-asking, the problem-solving and the playful creativity that goes into the design of an object. There is something raw and honest about the drawings presented in Rashid’s book and the Bouroullec’s app, and they are wonderfully expressive of the vigour and energy by which the creative process is driven.

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Here's the Heads Up #13

(Jim Field's apple from 50/50 Grow)

Ongoing:
50/50 Grow, a digital orchard
The boys over at Studio Aad decided to plant a digital orchard in aid of UNICEF's East Africa appeal. The idea is simple: designers, photographers and illustrators contribute an image of an apple, and you can 'water' one of them by giving a €5 donation. In return you get a high-res version of the image(s) you've chosen (the one I picked, above, is currently my desktop wallpaper).

Ongoing:
IAF Winter Sale, www.architecturefoundation.ie
The IAF has set up a virtual merch stand selling dvds, their publication for A Space for Learning (which recently won its printer Plus Print the 'Irish Small Printer of the Year' award) and maybe most notably the brick-book-bag designed by Conor & David for last year's Open House Dublin. And best of all, it's a brick-book-bargain :)

Until 20 January:
Surface Tension: The Future of Water, Science Gallery, TCD, Dublin 2
There's still a week to catch Science Gallery's investigation of The Future of Water through work by scientists, engineers, artists, designers and more. This exhibition is still on my 'to visit' list, particularly for the film by Still Films which follows artist Fergal McCarthy as he sees a new side of Dublin on a swim from one end of Dublin bay to another, not without also swimming the Liffey, the Grand Canal and a number of pools.

Until 21 January:
A la mesa! Design and Food, Instituto Cervantes, Foster Place, Dublin 2
The first of two back-to-back design exhibitions in the Instituto Cervantes, A la mesa! explores objects designed for the kitchen and dining room, showing the changes occuring in Spanish food and design in terms of shopping, preparing and serving. Just a few days later on the 26 January it will be followed up by Spanish Accent in Design, which maps Spain's extensive creative pool in terms of design, advertising and architecture.

Until 31 January:
OFFSET2012 Early Bird Tickets, www.iloveoffset.com
Ireland's premier creative festival returns to Grand Canal Theatre from 9 - 11 March 2011, featuring international speakers such as Pentagram's Michael Beirut and Stefan Sagmeister along with homegrown talent such as Rich Gilligan and Johnny Kelly (see Procrastination below, which might explain why this blog isn't updated more often). Though it's a little while to go for the event itself, you've only got until the end of the month to grab an early bird ticket. Don't say I didn't warn you...


(Procrastination via Johnny Kelly on Vimeo)

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A Council by Any Other Name...

The Crafts Council of Ireland, after having postponed voting on this issue at their last AGM, are proposing to change their name to include the word 'Design' somewhere. Though they do not intend to change or extend their remit, they feel amending the organisation's name will better reflect the part of their membership which works between craft and design. They're currently running an online survey for members of their Guilds, Associations, Networks and Societies as well as registered members of the Crafts Council to express whether they're for or against a name change and if they're for it, what the name should change to. Based on the results of the survey, this issue could be voted on by the Crafts Council's membership at the next AGM in June 2012 or at an EGM at another time.

Renaming the Crafts Council to include the word 'Design' may well better represent a small proportion of the Crafts Council's existing members, but this proposal has much wider, much more negative ramifications than that. Currently, Ireland's craft community has proper representation and support from the Crafts Council and Ireland's art community has the same (if not better) from the Arts Council. Ireland's design community, however, has no such government-level recognition, representation or support. There's no government body to go to for funding, there's no organisation engaging in the promotion of Irish design nationally and internationally, and nobody is pushing for the education of designers, nor for that matter the education of the public on the value of design. Ireland needs an actual Design Council, one that will represent all design disciplines: from fashion to graphics, interaction and app design to medical devices, furniture, products and lighting to interiors, landscapes and urban spaces. If, as proposed by the Crafts Council, we get an organisation with the words 'Design' and 'Council' in its title, Ireland will never get the actual Design Council it needs and deserves, and all of these creative disciplines will continue to go unrepresented and unsupported.

The Crafts Council's online survey closes today, so I would urge you - if you're a member or associate member of the Crafts Council, or if you have an affiliation with any of the Crafts Council's registered networks or societies (there's a list of them at the start of the survey) - to take a few minutes to fill it out and say NO to the proposed name change! Even if you feel the inclusion of the word 'Design' in the Crafts Council's name might better reflect what it is you do, think about all the other creatives who will be left without proper representation - our celebrated fashion designers, our talented web and graphic designers, our burgeoning community of game and interaction designers, our urban, landscape, interior, product, furniture and lighting designers....the list goes on...

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Dublin Design Retailers

This article was first published in Architecture Ireland #258

Perhaps it’s an unusual time to open up a design shop in Dublin. However, a number of people have taken the plunge and opened their own design stores in the city in the past eighteen months or so, each with a unique vision and individual range of stock. Design retail stalwarts such as Wild Child and more recent retailers like the Irish Design Shop are being joined by a new generation. I caught up with three such new kids on the block to find out their motivations for setting up and starting off on a new adventure.

First up was Vanessa MacInnes, owner of Industry (Smock Alley, Temple Bar), a shop dedicated to vintage and upcycled pieces as well as new design. Vanessa has a real passion for the industrial aesthetic, and during her years working as an interior designer had trouble finding anything of that style in Ireland. Industry now stocks an ever-changing range of vintage and one-off industrial furniture, from postal desks to metal shelving units. Paired with the harder edged furniture is a range of printed cushions, artworks and tabletop objects, illustrating how easy it can be to work something with an industrial feel into an interior.


(Image courtesy of Industry)

Next door to Industry you’ll find Gary Tiernan’s Ubode, a cafe-cum-design shop where you can have a coffee and then stock up on the necessary utensils to feed your caffeine addiction at home. With a growing range of Bodum products, along with products from Normann Copenhagen, Joseph Joseph and others, there’s plenty to look at while you sip your latte or eat your lunch. Gary began Ubode as an online design shop, but by cleverly combining his love of design and his experience in catering has made another great indie addition to Temple Bar’s west end.

If you head for the beautiful surroundings of the Powerscourt Centre you’ll find Article on the ground floor. Run by John Adams, Article stocks a small but perfectly formed range of tableware and home accessories. His selection of beautiful and quirky pieces are sourced both at home and abroad includes old favourites such as Seletti to more unusual ranges by London-based designer Rob Ryan and French company Reine Mere.


(Reine Mere coasters)

One thing that seems clear from each of these people is how now really is the opportune time to take a chance and start something new. Unlike before, it’s affordable to rent a city-centre retail space, it’s possible to get small orders from suppliers, and with few people offering you a job, why not make up your own? As for customers, each shop I visited was busy and everyone was making sales. Each location brings with it a mix of locals and tourists keen to pick up something attractive and useful, and each retailer can rely on a core base of returning customers who recognise that each offers good quality stock at a reasonable price.

A willingness to change and evolve is another thing that these retailers have in common. Each began their current business out of a need to find something new to do when work was running out. And from changes as small as adding more colourful stock or popping-up in alternative locations to bigger changes like moving from online-only sales to running a premises too (or vice versa), each of these people is keen to adapt to what is going on and what their customers look for. It’s a good trait to have at a time where a lot of people are learning the hard way that the old way of doing things isn’t always the best. Article is very much about the brighter things in life – patterned crockery, limited edition prints to hang on your walls, and useful objects with a decorative feel. As Ubode develops, so too will its range of fine foods and the fine utensils you’ll want and need to prepare them with. Industry loves all things industrial, but through careful selection of complimentary stock, shows you how you can live with edgy one-off pieces.


(Grafik Fabrik cushion)

If these three locations don’t satisfy your urge for objects, there are plenty of others to choose from. Head to North Circular Road to visit Malthouse Design Centre, an initiative of architects Greg Tisdall and Arthur Duff. Offering studio space and workshop facilities along with mentoring based on their extensive experience in furniture design, the Malthouse is a hub for emerging furniture designers. It is also an exhibition space and will open its doors for this year’s Open House Dublin. Designist on South Great George’s Street features a small range of objects with an urban feel and an affordable price-range. (I’m currently coveting the Royal VKB French Carafe Set). The Irish Design Shop at Bow Lane East offers a great range of homegrown products, my favourites on offer at the moment being the Grafik Fabrik textiles.

Each of these stores comes with its own unique take on things; different stock with a different feel. What will charm you about these shops most of all is that you’re not buying from companies, but you’re buying from people; people with an infectious passion for design.

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