EGGS AND DESIGN

LAYING A GOLDEN EGG

Eggs have inspired designers with its perfect shape to embellish and replicate this extraordinary simplicity in all sorts of final products, although the perfection of nature is hard for any of us to improve upon. Here are a few designers who have tried.

Back in 1885 Czar Alexander III needed to up the ante for his twentieth wedding anniversary that coincided with Orthodox Easter.  Now here’s a good husband, he had heard his wife had discovered a little known young jeweler named Peter Carl Faberge. Czar Alex, under the cloak of secrecy, went out in search of the neophyte designer and commissioned him to whip up something unexpected that would turn his sweet Czarina into a pool of jelly. With little time to prepare Pete put his talents to work creating the first Faberge egg, a simple enameled egg with a surprise inside. Once opened it revealed a golden yolk and inside the yolk was a golden hen that concealed a miniature diamond replica of the royal crown and a ruby egg. The Czarina was pleased, very pleased. Faberge had a standing contract that went on for two generations until the royal family was snuffed out in 1917. The eggs are now in museums and private collections all over the world. One of the largest collections remained in the Forbes museum for years until recently when it was purchased by a Russian oil magnate with the intention of returning it to Russia. Eight eggs still remain unaccounted for so keep your eyes open at your local flea market or multi-dealer antique shops. Who knows?

From the beautifully overly ornate to the simplified contemporary, here is an example of how current technology can scramble the egg into design success.  In 1964 modPod took the egg, creatively cracked it open, and popped out a chair. They added speakers and an ottoman and now we have a design icon that is as functional as it is beautiful. Available through Inmood the chair and ottoman are available in an array of color combinations but our favorite is the one that really looks like an egg.

From the past to the present to the future, James Law Cybertecture has been working on creating a whole new way of protecting life in Mumbai, a city on the verge of being destroyed by it.  The egg building promotes every new piece of architectural ingenuity. From its green construction to its use of alternate energy sources the egg includes wind turbines, cooling rooftop gardens, greywater recycling, and takes up 20% less space than a conventionally shaped building would. Inhabitants of the building would have their blood pressure and weight monitored and recorded when they use the washroom (which is actually a little creepy) and if this isn’t enough if they don’t like their view they can customize it with a real time virtual reality of their favorite space. Now how’s that for a future to look forward to?


WORDS FOR THE WISE

Egg and Dart

noun

Both the Greeks and Romans used this decorative molding pattern in cornices and on Ionic order capitals. The term comes from the alternating rhythm of egg shaped ovals pierced by darts. This decorative motif was picked up by the craftsmen of the Renaissance, then by the Victorians, and we still use the motif as an historical reference in the moldings of new constructions built in the traditional genre.  


NATURALLY DYED EGGS

The “Marvin Stewart” of our household was at it again on Saturday night doling out tasks for our annual Easter egg dying event. Rick had Emmy donate a couple of pairs of old panty hose from her underwear drawer while I had to scavenger around for a pair of scissors. 

Earlier in the day we made our way to the grocery store and stocked up on organic eggs, some herbs chosen for the graphic possibilities of their leaves, and then our dying agents: beets, onions and black berries. We already had a gallon jug of white vinegar and a collection of rubber bands. Other than some big pots, all our needs were accounted in order to make some of the most beautiful eggs you’ll ever see.

Prep was pretty simple consisting of cutting panty hose into four inch squares, slicing up some beets, pinching some leaves off of our herbs and stripping the skins off of some yellow onions. In separate pots we dumped our onion skins, cut up beets and black berries with a mixture of water and vinegar in a ratio of three parts water to one part vinegar. Then it was on to the stove with our sloshing pots where we cranked up the heat to high until the mixtures came to a boil. While we were waiting for the water to boil we started placing some leaves on the squares of panty hose. We each had our own artistic touch but it was Emmy’s use of oregano spears that seemed to produce the best results. 

After the leaves were in place we gently laid the eggs down on the leaf and panty hose blankets, pulled the hose up tight around the eggs, and twisted and sealed the little Easter packages with a rubber band. 

Our next step in our egg bondage routine was to cut off the excess nylon leaving the eggs look a band of comic bank robbers. The last act was to drop the eggs into the pots and let them sit for a couple of minutes in the bubbling mixture. Once Rick was assured that the process had been complete he turned the heat off and covered the pots of the newly tattooed eggs. 

We left the eggs sit over night and when we woke in the morning we fished out the eggs, cut off the hose and blotted the eggs dry. 

The result was some of the most beautiful Easter eggs Madison had ever seen.

THE GALLERY

V. Tony Hauser

The Last Supper of Hiawatha, 1994

hauser@interlog.com

COLOR IS A FIVE LETTER WORD

THOSE WHO SHOW NO FEAR

Here are some designs done by designers unafraid of those five little letters: c-o-l-o-r or six letters if you’re British. In no particular order here are some designers who have splashed the world in a brighter hue.

Jamie Drake has become known as the “King of Color” which is a title I’d much rather claim than the “Prince of Chintz”. Jamie dares to go where others of a lesser reputation can only dream of directing their clients. 

It takes a powerful designer to convince most clients that living in pink can be a sign of power or that lavender can be so soothing no one will notice it’s not beige.

Mitchell Gold + Bob Williams have added a clever offering to the color selection process with their mix and match lighting options. They are offering five very different ceramic bases with fourteen wildly exciting glaze choices. I did say fourteen. If you need a hit of color to contrast or compliment a room, the seventy options MGBW have put out there are a great place to start and end your search.

The old Architectural Digest was never the bible of design I aspired to emulate in my own work. In the eighties it mostly represented an echelon of design where the designs and designers showcased were a combination of the Prince of Dubai meets Marie Antoinette. The air was too thin in the lofty offerings of AD in the late 1980’s, but there were some bright spots that forced me to keep my subscription. 

I have to give them credit for introducing me to Diamond-Baratta. It was in amongst a bevy of Louis this and Louis that mansions and castles that AD had sandwiched my first taste of the Diamond-Baratta color explosion. Diamond-Baratta took the staid traditional ho-hum and drizzled it with exuberant color and innovation. I’ve followed them ever since and never been disappointed in their ability to turn my design and color assumptions upside down.

CB2 just introduced the abuelo three-speed urban cruiser. Here is color done right on two wheels for either him or her. It just goes to show you color isn’t restricted to just fashion and interior design. I loved my Schwinn as a kid but the most powerful color statement you could make with a mid-century Schwinn was maybe a metallic royal blue. Now that the world has become comfortable with metro-sexuals and European man bags, I think I could get away with riding this to the farmer’s market without risking a black eye or an egg to the back of the head.

COLOR OUR WAY

I’ve always valued a sense of humor as long as the dialogue makes me laugh and I’m not the butt of the joke. That’s why our first phone conversation had me looking over my shoulder for the sneaky unidentified prankster.

“Shaver/Melahn Studios” We didn’t have any cute opening line or forced protocol like Jeff Lewis on Bravo’s Flipping Out where he mandated his staff to answer all incoming calls with, “Good ________. It’s a great day at Jeff Lewis’ office. This is _______. How may I help you? “

What I heard was, “Hallooow, can I tallck with Lee Melahn” in this gravely low baritone voice with a Long Island Jewish accent.

“Yes sir, this is Lee. How can I help you?”

“I may sound like a man but Honey, I’m no man. This is Linda Richman.” It was a voice identical to the one made famous by Mike Myers on SNL.

I almost said, “Yah got a voice that sounds just like buddar, now tell me who the hell you really are”, but I was too taken-a-back to come up with anything clever. I was sure someone with a grudge against me had sent my name into some local radio station and I was being punked.

The gravely voice went on to tell me how she had been in our store in Upstate New York and how she needed a designer to do some work on their country house. I did the phone equivalent of nodding my head, took down all her information and then called her contact number immediately after hanging up. Ready to hear, “You’ve reached the Howard Stern Show”, I was surprised to hear the receptionist say, “Linda Richman’s office, how can I help you”.

This is how my relationship with the Rich/Richmans’s began. Linda’s husband was as much a personality as Linda was. The two of them kept me rolling in laughter and affection through the work on their house in the country and their new apartment in New Jersey where they were trying to consolidate a life of collecting into spaces way too small to accommodate them. Linda and Manny had collected everything. Collecting wasn’t just an obsession it was way of life for them, that and bickering at a level unparalleled since the Archie and Edith did it back in the seventies. Antique telephones, 3000 illustrated children’s books, Mexican cookie jars, 500 vintage neckties, a hundred accordion rulers and the list goes on. The artifacts of their life were as colorful as they were.

So to celebrate the theme of this week’s post here’s a tribute to collecting and color thanks to what I initially thought was a hoax of flipping out proportions.

Like the midway at the county fair some rooms cry out for a burst of carnival color, a cacophonous calliope of color that makes your whole body squeal with delight and your mouth hunger for cotton candy. Inspired by the 50’s harlequin plates and the Mexican cookie jars, old wooden chairs were no longer sideshow freaks and the spring meadow green walls of the kitchen now have the feeling of those cool summer days just before the carnival comes to town.

THE GALLERY

Julian Faulhaber

Stairs, 2005

Hasted-Kraeutler, NYC

TRANSFORMING GREY

THE BEAUTY OF SPRING GREY

As each day begins with a dusty, indiscernible period of time when the eye has no idea the color about to burst forth so does each season and there is the excitement.  Blue? Rose? Tangerine?   What does the grey of spring hold for us?

Nature shows us a breadth of springtime greys. The cool greys of a spring rain on a bare branch waiting to burst forth with the color of a new season

or the warm greys of the over-dressed sheep waiting to be shorn of its warm winter coat.

The dawn of a new season, that early morning mist time before the sun gets high enough to burn off the fog. Everything is damp. It’s the time of year when depression can take over, even the air can weigh heavily on your shoulders. So we’ve decided to take the grey of winter into spring and celebrate its beauty. We want to pay homage to grey and point out how it can make us both calm and hopeful in a time when the world outside seems to be making that slurping sound a muck boot makes walking through the squishy ruts of a country dirt road after that first early spring rain. 


WARM VS. COOL

Not only is this room at an Ace Hotel warm in tone but the raw wood headboards and inviting wool blankets make getting out of bed a challenge on these early spring mornings when the temperature still says winter but the calendar says it should be spring.

Helen Green has taken warm grey almost to the point of brown in this bedroom of tone on tone. The wool of the winter sheep sleeps comfortably in this sophisticated boudoir.

The coolness of the greys in these two living rooms focuses on the calm quality of grey. Whether in the contemporary setting with the faux fur throw

or the lush transitional space by William Hefner where grey verges into blue the serenity of place is evident in both rooms. Grey has the ability to go casual or elegant, you can dress it down or hang it with crystals.
DEEP VS. PALE

Greys can also walk on the darkside or trot out into the light. The deep shades of grey whether cool or warm can tighten up a room making it feel cozy and inviting.  By contrasting the bold deep tones of grey with white neither of these rooms seem smothering but instead inviting places to sit and read a book or watch TV. A touch of blue over a chair adds the necessary cool moment to a seat by the fire.

By extending the curtains to the ceiling in the TV room it makes the room feel taller and draws your eye to the amazing pattern on the ceiling.

Pale grey works its lightness on the bedroom with a view. The mottled texture of the light grey walls forms a perfect picture frame around the shuttered window and its bucolic view to the outside. This is definitely a room I’d love to wake up in smelling the scents of an oncoming spring.

Frank Roop’s dining room takes the same pale approach creating a sea breeze with only a hint of blue. The beach can’t be far away from this gorgeous room if not literally then imaginatively. Grey has the power to be humble creating whispers of serenity where calm is the desired effect.

WORDS FOR THE WISE

Grisaille

noun

Grisaille is a term the French use to describe art created from layers of grey on grey teasing the viewer into thinking they are seeing something in three dimensions. The layers may travel from dark to light or from transparent to opaque. Or as seen on the walls of our Kips Bay show house room from flat to reflective. 

Using a palette of opaque Benjamin Moore greys in a venetian stucco technique and finishing it off with some translucent metallic paint we were able to create a wall that seemed to shimmer as if it were created from water. 

The room seems to float in a tranquil sea of grey from the driftwood cool greys of the cabinetry and the tone on tone, silk on wool rug to the warm grey of the tapestry table and the marble Roman sculpture standing sentry over the serenity of the room.
THE GALLERY

Sandy Skoglund

Radioactive Cats, 1981

3 SHOWS IN 3 DAYS - PART III OF III

AIPAD SHOW
(THE ASSOCIATION OF INTERNATIONAL PHOTOGRAPHY ART DEALERS)

Of the three events, this is the one that blew me away, and it blew my away on so many levels. First, even if you weren’t into photography and you didn’t want to plunk down twenty-five dollars for a one-day trip inside the show, you could still walk into the Park Avenue Armory and explore the building’s public spaces.

It’s like a walk through “The King’s Speech”, peeling wallpaper, and patched ceilings, walls hung with decaying taxidermy and military portraits, and Moorish details so beautiful they make your eyes sore. I’ve got to think dozens of set designers have used these rooms for any number of visually tantalizing films but I can’t remember one. Maybe it takes a British eye to distill the beauty out of the perfectly imperfect.

If you decided to pay the entry fee, and many did, the show was loaded with intrigue. I’ve heard comments that the show seemed a bit stuck in the past. The percentage of vintage to contemporary photography was weighted more toward the old than the new but the vintage images were frequently ones I hadn’t seen before. The world was represented with dealers from Europe and Asia showing their best along with North America.

It seemed as if many dealers had a premonition about the Japanese earthquake and tsunami. Every other booth had an image either made in Japan or referencing the effects of natural and emotional disasters. At the Amador Gallery booth, Ryuji Miyamoto’s images of twisted buildings (San-no-miya) following the Kobe earthquake in 1995 were particularly moving.

I went on Saturday afternoon when the aisles were teaming with attendees. By this time the show had a running start and as opposed to recent years the walls were filled with red dots. One dealer I spoke to said she had already replaced most of the images on her walls twice and the show still had a day and a half to go. If this show is any barometer of the economic climate it seems people are back out spending, at least for photography.

Here are some of my new find highlights:

Rachel Perry Welty

Lost in my Life (Price Tags), 2009

Represented by Yancey Richardson Gallery

Rachel’s work is Cindy Sherman without the face. Rachel hides behind constructed sets of repetitious props, her form only detectable by the lighting that hints at her curves and her blond hair. The crispness of the images adds to the mystery and like a game of finding Waldo you’re drawn in to hunt for the human masquerading as the inanimate object

Maggie Taylor

Woman with Bees, 2001

Represented by John Cleary Gallery

Maggie Taylor combines 19^th century portraiture adding her face to the image and then layering on the whimsy of Monty Python’s Flying Circus. The flatness of the images is countered with the suspicion that a head will open up and flowers will sprout from her cranium.

Michael Massaia

Deep in a Dream – Central Park 12

Represented by June Bateman Fine Art

Michael Massaia’s work is reminiscent of the early Pictorialists. The dreamy quality of his work is the height of romanticism and I’m a sucker for the romantic. His body of work is consistently anchored in this sea of idyllic spaces bathed in mist and mystery.

Sohei Nishino

The Diorama Map Series

Michael Hoppen Gallery

Nishimo’s work just doesn’t translate to the blogging world, but I had to include him in the group of images I spent a lot of time with during the show. Sohei makes intricately constructed collages composed of thousands of images of a city’s landmarks and streetscapes then rephotographs the collages into a single image. First you have to examine the prints to make sure they aren’t original collages, the definition of the cut marks is that deceiving and then you have to marvel at the shear ingenuity of how he could make his maps appear true and fantasy all at the same time.

Doug and Mark Starn

HackelBury Gallery, London

The Starn twins have created a series of leave images made from inkjet prints framed as pieces taped together or mounted with pushpins. The ragged and rich collection works in ways only Doug and Mark can pull off.

THE GALLERY

Robert Doisneau

Le Regard Oblique, Paris, 1948

Represented by Staley-Wise Gallery, NYC

3 SHOWS IN 3 DAYS - PART II

DINING BY DESIGN

Having had the honor of designing tables for NYDC in past year’s it was especially meaningful to be able to return to the DIFFA event to see this year’s addition of Dining by Design. For the past several years the New York installment of Dining by Design has occupied a significant amount of real estate adjacent to the Architectural Digest show at Pier 94. This year as in years past the design community has brought its best together to create a forest of dining delights. Spring came early to Pier 94. Alice would have felt at home in this Wonderland of toadstools, roses and marble chairs. I missed the architectural ingenuity of Lexus or the splashy entries of Disney and GE from years before but the intimacy of this year’s event was as mouth watering as ever. Here were a few of my favorite tables:

Jesgordon/Properfun is an event-planning firm and if their table is any indication you can see why they are so successful and worthy of a coffee table book. Their unique design is an eclectic mix of an antique table paired with 70’s spider bookcases and electric green Lucite placemats, surrounded by contemporary plastic chairs. But what makes the space is the lighting. Lit from above and below as well, everything seems to glow and sparkle as it illuminates the placemats and reflects off of the orange walls

The elegance of a New York supper club is re-imagined in Marc Blackwell’s dining experience. You can imagine Clark Gable leaning in to light Jean Harlow’s cigarette, her arm gently balanced in the soft crook of one of those sumptuous pillows. The marble backed chairs add a contemporary element. The stripes apparent in the wall treatment and on the top of the table repeat a theme drawn from his tabletop designs. Who wouldn’t want to lean back in one of those chairs and sip a martini while listening to Harry Conick Jr. crooning from the stage.

The dramatic quality of the “Angels in America” wings floating above Jeffery Brooks' elegant table were an iconic reminder of the real purpose of this event. The silver and white motif provides a richness to the space. The splash of purple is just enough color to make the space sing with sophistication. This was one of my favorite tables.

Vincent Wolfe’s over-the-top ode to spring was a so lush you couldn’t help but be impressed. It was like the Grand Marshall’s award winning float at the Rose Bowl parade. Vincent Wolfe is known for his polished surfaces and clean lines but here he shows how to do abundance, and do it well. The fiber lighting whips overhead in a swirl of cotton candy adding the right amount of whimsy to an already up-lifting space.

DIFFA Board of Trustees Chairman, David Rockwell, has ingeniously developed a way to float his tableware over a sea of red roses. Red permeates his table from the richness of the rug up through the chairs and onto the table with the delicate roses boldly supporting the red plates and crystal stemware. Only the green of the rose’s sepals provide any remembrance that the world might exist beyond the color red. 






THE GALLERY

Charles Ebbets

Eating Atop a Shyscraper, 1932

Ebbetsphoto-graphics.com

3 SHOWS IN 3 DAYS - PART I

THE ARCHITECTURAL DIGEST SHOW

New York is crammed from the first of January to the end of December with conventions and events promoting the design industry. From an abundance of designer show houses to the gift fairs to the showroom openings there is always something to attend and some source of new inspiration to absorb. That’s why I was so excited to find out my calendar had me in New York at the same time as the Architectural Digest Show. The show has grown since I first saw it ten years ago. It now consumes the entire Pier 94. The only problem with rapid growth is it frequently engenders a decline in intent and quality. This year the quality was there but the intent of the show seems to have shifted from introducing new ideas and talent to going where the big bucks are in the major, established big vendors. I know their presence insures a bigger purse but these are the guys I can see any time at their numerous showrooms and retail outlets. Still if you dug deep enough into the “made” section you could come away with some excellent finds. Here are a few of the artists who caught my eye.

Dan Levy’s ceramic tabletop and lamps have left me breathless for the past twenty years. His designs are timeless, simple and elegant. There has always been a hint of the Asian aesthetic in his work that references their classic understatement. His quadrille series has been around for a long time but it remains a perfect example of proportion and harmony both in its shapes and color palette. His new platinum and gold-rimmed tabletop are so finely elegant they remind me of perfectly cracked eggshells. It was Dan’s tabletop that guests ate off of at Oprah Winfrey’s fiftieth birthday party.

The delicate craftsmanship of Appelson Design Studios woodworking was perfection in technique and design. Each piece was like a perfectly woven basket made from walnut reeds. You could feel the love of materials in each bed and console. The American roots of the Arts and Crafts movement were a perfect inspiration for their work

Ergonomics, comfort and ingenuity all come together in the chairs and ottomans designed by Spinnaker. It was the use of vintage sails on the backs of their chairs that drew me into their booth. I was initially reticent to being coaxed into sitting down in one but once in the chair I didn’t want to get out. I just wanted a gin and tonic and the sea breeze gently blowing through my thinning hair. I have no idea of the cost of these chairs but I’ve got to think that whatever the price, it’s worth it.

Skatemoderne has developed a material that mimics shagreen but without having to kill any animals in the making. It’s an eco-friendly product that’s as durable as nails, or so they say. They are using it on their own furniture and in wallcovering but you can order it on your own custom designs. It had me fooled. I thought it was the real thing.

THE GALLERY

Julius Shulman

Case Study House #22, Los Angeles, CA, 1960

Represented by Yancey Richardson Gallery, NYC