Inspiration & s

2014 summer volume 2

Color: warm summer sun

idadesign.com 7/2014

We have been looking at HAY, the Danish

furniture and accessory company whose mission

is a renaissance of talent that produced the mid

20th century golden age of Danish design. We

have selected some recent introductions to anchor

our color trend analysis. These pieces tell the

evolving story of the soft palette that took the

market by storm this spring. Scholten & Baijings

above left and center, designed the pink dots

tablecloth and colored glass collection for HAY.

Transparency keeps the colors light-footed. Box

Box, lower left, is a personal storage system

designed internally at HAY. New colors just

launched to the line get a place on both our warm

and cool palettes for their increased saturation and

unconventional, highly sophisticated hue pairing.

And speaking of classic Danish design, PP

Møbler brought out this wonderful iteration of the

PP550 Peacock Chair, above, as part of their 100-

year anniversary of Hans J. Wegner’s birth. The

yellow is both retro and modern, just like the

chair, which was first produced in the late 1940’s.

idadesign.com 7/2014

Color: cool summer shade

A recent trip by Cara in our studio to Iceland and

Denmark has brought many inspirations. We took

special note of Norður & Co, whose sea salt,

above, is made from arctic fjörd waters.

Production is environmentally sensitive, being

heated geothermally from hot springs in a process

whose roots date back hundreds of years. Their

new package design uses no glue and allows you

to tilt open the front panel to access the salt

inside, so clever. We love the watery blues as an

authentic representation of the product.

Back to Denmark and HAY for the rest of our

cool palette exploration. Their products have

sparse, well considered materials and proportions,

in the Scandinavian tradition.

More of the Scholten & Baijings colored glass,

center right, whose ombre blue begs for a very

cold beverage. New colors of Box Box storage

have a full array of shades encompassing clear,

aquatic blue-greens, upper right, and softer, solid-

feeling blues stretching to violet, lower right.

Trend watch: comf

idadesign.com 7/2014

This trend is the next chapter in the investigation

that began in our spring volume with plump, the

furnishings trend that explored exaggerated forms.

Comf focuses in on a tactile quality that we see in

design. It also plays nice with the various

decorative treatments that we’re highlighting.

B&B Italia’s take on this trend, in the hands of

design duo Doshi Levien, above, takes the form of

an exaggerated shearling-covered headrest on

their Almora swivel chair. We quite like the

enveloping form of the chair, which contrasts the

rigid outer shell with a soft, comfortable interior.

The Bold armchair, near right, by Swiss design

firm, Big-Game, is added to their Bold chair from

2009, both for the French brand, Moustache. It

was launched this summer at the Villa Noailles

design festival. Judge the form for yourself, but

it’s a great example of a diamond quilted stitch

that seems ubiquitous. Eurotech showcased the

same at NeoCon in June, far right, but in an

executive task chair with integrated power and

technology access. Our friends at Place Textiles

have introduced a wonderful cotton corduroy.

Theo, lower right, that’s suitable for light contract

application. We are especially drawn to the warm

palette they’ve developed.

Technical décor materials

idadesign.com 7/2014

Josh Haywood’s Hayam Sun Temple, above and right, is

created from laser-cut plywood that’s stitched together.

Moorish patterning was digitized and applied to parametric

forms. The temple will be erected for the annual Burning Man

Festival in Nevada’s Black Rock Desert in late August.

Constructed garments, lower right, are inspired from stone

masonry technique from the Šibenik cathedral in Matija Cop’s

native Croatia. Cop takes individual segments of flexible EVA

plastic and hooks them together to create these lively forms.

BAUX, below, is a brand of building products made of wood-

wool insulation materials that typically aren’t put on display.

Baux Träullit acoustic tile is this Swedish design consortium’s

first product. Made of spruce wood, cement and water, it also

helps regulate heat and moisture.

Technical décor materials

idadesign.com 7/2014

We love watching how the creative use of technology changes

the material landscape. We are highlighting recent examples

of innovative material applications that deliver performance

while stimulating the senses, as a good material should.

Peugeot’s Exalt concept, upper right, from the Beijing Auto Show continues the trend of environmental high performance vehicle design with their 340 hp plug-in hybrid. Biomimicry guided development of a sharkskin textile applied to the rear for better aerodynamics. See our final word for more on the move toward mainstreaming non-combustion vehicles. Swiss brand Laufen, below, first introduced SaphirKeramikTM

in 2013. It’s unique properties allow super fine detail out of a

ceramic material without compromising performance.

Resulting products are lighter, which bring a host of other

benefits. New basins by Konstantin Grcic exploit the

technology with pattern and texture. Look for the full launch

of the collection at the ISH bathroom show to be held in

Frankfurt, March 2015.

Cartesian Chair, above, by

Alexander Purcell Rodrigues uses

complex algorithms to create

embellishments that are machine

milled and ombre anodized before

final hand polishing. The Neal Feay

Company was a great collaborator in

pushing the boundaries of

manufacturing. Samples, below, show

various pattern mapping trials.

Material focus: leather

idadesign.com 7/2014

We are inspired by the unconventional use of

leather that we see popping up with more

frequency. Here is a selection of some beautiful

and varied interpretations on that theme.

Bob Table, upper right, sports an upholstered

leather top (and note the dark chrome base too).

This table, designed by Jean Marie Massaud for

Poltrona Frau, is now in the Haworth family.

Detail, center right, of the Brogue Light by

Daniel Schofield for Deadgood. We love the use

of a traditional embellishment technique for shoe-

making, which is here achieved through the

decidedly modern process of laser cutting.

Speaking of shoes, these award-winning

Rectangle Shoes, lower right, by Maria Nina

Vaclavek of the Czech Republic, use wet molding

to create a completely unembellished contoured

profile and custom fit.

Design 406, below left, by Erwin Hauer, the

modernist sculptor of wall screens fame, uses yet

another unconventional method for manipulating

leather: vacuum-forming over medium density

fiberboard. Spinneybeck introduced it at NeoCon.

Technology: press pause

idadesign.com 7/2014

In this issue we are taking a look at some super cool technology breakthroughs that still need a bit of

work before they are ready for prime time.

Google’s autonomous vehicle, above, makes its early design debut. If you feel like you want to give it a

hug, that’s good. This technology will so rock our world, so we’re told, that it needs to look uber-

friendly. BTW, the FBI has already issued a report on the law enforcement impacts of self-driving cars.

Think quick criminal get-aways and stealth police stake-outs, to say nothing of how menacing this Love

Bug could be in the wrong hands.

MIT’s Tangible Media Group has made Transform, below right. The pixels respond with seeming

anticipation of the interacting object’s movement through a computer interface. An application under

discussion is furniture that adapts to the user. Disconcerting to think about your personal fanny map.

Frog Design’s mask concept, below left, provides pollution-free breathing and a multi-sensory virtual

reality retreat for the wearer. Something about experiencing the ideal environment from behind a

jockstrap that just doesn’t resonate.

The final word

idadesign.com 7/2014

We are excited to be getting an Alfa Romeo

dealership in our town this summer. This

touched a spot with us as enthusiasts of Italian

vehicles (we quite like Ducatis too). Jennifer

learned to drive on one of these, a 1974 GTV

2000, and hasn’t driven anything as nice since.

And speaking of amazing automobiles, we were

impressed by Elon Musk’s announcement in

June to place all his Tesla patent intellectual

property into the public domain. Score one for

the planet as this will boost innovation in the

electric vehicle space. Now if a Model S would

just show up in Jennifer’s garage…..

Inspiration & s

Thank you and stay tuned for our next installment

If you’d like to see more or have a need that you you’d like us to research, we’d love to talk. Contact our studio: jennifer@idadesign.com or 616.748.1572