Project by Norman Kelley (Carrie Norman and Thomas Kelley)

wrong I. a vagabondage of the imagination, of the mind that is not subject to any rule. [1]

The Wrong Chairs are an exercise in error. The collection consists of seven chairs that purposefully disrupt the notion of “correctness” by applying a medley of design mistakes to the iconic American Windsor chair. The Windsor chair, with its British roots, has become a symbol of colonial America—a chair that is unadorned and democratic in design. More importantly, however, it is also a forgettable chair. You might vaguely remember your grandmother having one in her kitchen. At first glance, the collection blends into the images we hold of domestic memories we’ve encountered at some point or another, but, at second glance, they’re more unreasonable. In using an object readily recognized and imbedded with nostalgia, the collection utilizes the Windsor chair as the control—a seemingly ordinary object— for the exploration of “wrongness.”

Read full article here.

How to Wake a Sleeping Modernist Architecture Giant/ Matt Shaw

Columbus, Indiana is a living architectural museum where you can see one of the largest collections of high- and late-modernist buildings in the country. There are 7 National Historic Landmarks and counting in a town of roughly 45,000 people. So this context — a town landscaped by Dan Kiley and home to over 100 buildings and sites, by architects and designers including both Saarinens, Robert Venturi, Kevin Roche, and John Johansen among others — is ripe for reinterpretation. Read full article here.

JONATHAN NESCI IN CONVERSATION WITH MATT OLSON OF RO/LU
10.14.14 — BY MONICA KHEMSUROV
PHOTOS BY JEFF BOND

When it comes to design, it’s easy to forget about Indiana. Easy, but unfair — just ask anyone familiar with the legacy of Columbus natives Irwin and Xenia Miller, whose Eero Saarinen house is one of many architectural landmarks the pair commissioned in and around their hometown. Or ask the editors of Sight Unseen, who included not one but two Indiana-based talents in our American Design Hot List last week. One of them, Jonathan Nesci, debuted a project over the weekend that underscored both arguments: Invited by curator Christopher West to create a site-specific installation on the grounds of Eliel Saarinen’s First Christian Church — also a Miller commission — Nesci conceived the stunning project 100 Variations, consisting of 100 unique, mirror-polished tables aligned in a grid in the church’s courtyard. He developed the tables using the Golden Ratio, an ongoing preoccupation in his work that similarly informed Saarinen’s. We snagged the first photos of the installation, which was on view for only three days, then invited Matt Olson of the Minneapolis studio RO/LU to discuss the project — and its oft-overlooked setting — with Nesci. Read their conversation here.

The Sight Unseen Hot List continue on today with another Volume Gallery collaborator – Leon Ransmeier. Follow the link here to read his thoughts on American Design.

The Sight Unseen Hot List today includes both Jonathan Muecke and Jonathan Nesci. Muecke quoting George Brecht:

Determine the limits of an object or event.
Determine the limits more precisely.
Repeat, until further precision is impossible.
GEORGE BRECHT, EXERCISE (1963)

See full list here.

The American Design Hotlist from Sight Unseen features a large portion of designers that we have worked with. Congratulations everyone!!

Click here for the full list.

Domus on Future Tropes
Aguiniga, Muecke, Olivares, Ransmeier, ROLU, and Ruhwald take part in an exhibition at Volume Gallerywas founded on a utopian correspondence initiated by Bruno Taut. Read full article here.

Jimenez Lai’s “Township of Domestic Parts” at the 2014 Venice Architecture Biennale investigates the basic components of residential typologies, isolating various purposes of the home into separate architectural structures. Read more here.

Design Miami/ has announced participants for this year’s Miami edition of the collectible furniture fair, which will run from December 3 through December 7 as part of Miami Art Week.

As in previous years, Design Miami/ has awarded a commission for the entrance pavilion to an emerging designer. This year’s entrance will be done by Jonathan Muecke. Explaining the choice of designer, Design Miami/ creative director Alexandra Cunningham Cameron said, “For our tenth anniversary, we wanted to pay homage to the type of young designer that Design Miami/ wishes to champion – one who experiments with materials, form and scale; who is as much a theorist as a maker; and who challenges us to consider how we relate to the world built around us.”

Read the full article here.

Fresh Prints: Interior Designer Kelly Behun curates a selection of striking colors and patterns for Modern Luxury Manhattan, including Jojo Chuang’s Graphic Utopia Folding Screen: