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      Sky-blue cafe in Buffalo features “Alice in Wonderland” staircase

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      Canadian design duo Julia Jamrozik and Coryn Kempster have created a playful all-blue cafe in a century-old house in Buffalo, New York, with an optical illusion staircase.Named Tipico Coffee, the cafe’s identity was formed with the intention of designing a space that encourages social interactions and supports local craftsmanship.

      The cafe’s main bar is grafted from reclaimed furniture
      Reclaimed furniture and lighting made from construction-site string lights feature alongside an oversized staircase to nowhere which forms amphitheatre-style seating.
      The cafe’s main bar is made from ten reclaimed wooden tables sourced from classified advertisements website Craigslist.

      The main bar encourages social interactions

      The tables are grafted together and painted in sky-blue, forming a unified bar which runs along one wall of the cafe.
      “The process of designing the cafe really started with the idea of the social infrastructure of the grafted bar,” Jamrozik and Kempster told Dezeen.

      Drinks on ice are displayed between the bar’s table-tops
      The open bar has clusters of swivelling stools arranged around blue table-tops that jut out of the bar’s customer side, allowing easy socialising between customers and staff.
      “The different shapes of the tables come together to create opportunities for conversations,” continued the designers.
      “This is augmented with the use of swivelling bar stools that allow patrons the ability to turn their bodies to orient themselves to a new connection.”

      Swivelling stools encourage random encounters between customers and staff

      BLUE Architecture Studio adds U-shaped glass box to Shanghai coffee shop

      Groups of circular olive-green garden tables and chairs, as well as built-in blue benches, make up two intimate seating areas behind each side of the bar, which are separated by a wall.
      The tables and chairs used are purposefully outdoor furniture. This means that the seating can be moved onto an exterior patio in the summer months.

      Tipico’s atmosphere is a mix of indoors and outdoors
      Various scattered potted plants blend green and blue furniture together and continue the theme of bringing the outdoors inside.
      Jamrozik and Kempster explained their intentions for using sky-blue as the cafe’s dominant colour.

      Ménard Dworkind creates retro coffee bar in downtown Montreal

      “We wanted to use a vibrant colour to visually tie together the bar and benches to create continuity in the space and give visual emphasis to the bar as the main design gesture.”
      “We chose blue to both complement the olive green furniture and plants, but also to create moments of contrast with the bespoke yellow lights,” they continued.

      Potted plants are scattered around the space
      The bespoke lights designed for the cafe are composed of construction-site string lights, wound around sections of aluminium stock tubes. They hang above the bar and the seating areas.
      “We wanted to transform the string lights, while still making it clear what the source product was,” explained the designers.

      Lighting made from construction-site string lights
      Metal pegboard is another off-the-shelf material used in the space, making up a menu board behind the bar, a merchandise display board and a community message board.
      The bottom of the main bar and built-in-benches was also lined with wooden pegboard in order to “give them both a visual texture, taking advantage of the acoustic properties of the perforations,” said Jamrozik and Kempster

      A merchandise display board made from metal pegboard
      A sense of the building’s historic charm remains in the existing fireplace that is preserved, which is painted in a strip of the same sky-blue paint as the main bar.
      An over-scaled stairwell acts as an additional, cosy seating area fit for a couple of customers at a time.

      The building’s original fireplace and its playful stairwell
      Sealed off by a mirror and leading to nowhere, the stairwell is intended as an “Alice in Wonderland moment,” enhancing the cafe’s playfulness.
      “The stairway’s oversized steps effectively shrink the visitor and act as seats while the mirrored ceiling gives the impression that the space continues up,” explained Jamrozik and Kempster.
      “We imagine people will be drawn to the curious space and hope that they enjoy the tongue-in-cheek reference that plays on the domestic history of the original building,” continued the designers.

      Sealed off by a mirror, the stairwell is an optical illusion
      Jamrozik and Kempster note the importance of playful design in their work, which they believe connects people in public spaces.
      “We use the language of play to create social infrastructures: physical prompts which encourage contact between strangers.”
      “We believe that questioning the way people use and occupy space and their relationship to one another through playful encounters has enormous potential to speak across generations and cultural differences,” they continued.

      The importance of play is an influence in Jamrozik and Kempster’s design work
      Designers everywhere are acknowledging the importance of designing public spaces to maximise social interactions. In Montreal, Ménard Dworkind has created a cafe with a central standing bar, while Central Saint Martins graduates have created blocky outdoor furniture for a public square in Croydon, London.
      Julia Jamrozik and Coryn Kempster have collaborated on design projects since 2003. Their varied work spans temporary installations and permanent interior and architectural commissions.
      Photography is by Sara Schmidle.
      Project credits: 
      Architecture team: Abstract Architecture PC

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      Pablo Chiereghin violently destroys and rebuilds furniture for Riot Design exhibition

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      Italian visual artist Pablo Chiereghin has created a series of furniture pieces from the remains of items he destroyed “using a riot aesthetic” for an exhibition at Vienna’s Kunstforum.Named Riot Design, the exhibition consists of a series of reconstructed pieces of furniture and everyday items displayed alongside videos showing Chiereghin destroying the original items.
      “Riot Design is a process through consumerism, violence appeal, design and the market,” explained Chiereghin.
      “Un-personal everyday objects are destroyed and transformed using a riot aesthetic and then brought back to functionality through an invasive restoration,” he told Dezeen.

      The Riot Design exhibition is at Vienna’s Kunstforum.

      Each of the items, chosen for their normality, was destroyed on-site within the gallery, which is in the former vault of the bank that houses the Kunstforum.
      They were then reassembled using construction materials that are usually hidden within items to draw attention to the rebuilding.

      Riot Design consists of destroyed and rebuilt furniture
      “The act of destruction is part of the artwork, violence models and deconstructs the object, leaving left-over pieces which are then to be recomposed in a unique object,” Chiereghin said.
      “The exhibition is conceived as a whole installation which combines objects and videos, changing rhythm through rough sounds and flirty objects, between construction materials and pink moulded plastic.”

      The items were chosen for their normality
      Chiereghin destroyed the items while wearing a helmet or balaclava to make a visual connection to the act of rioting.
      “The combination of the objects and the riot tools was influenced by the destruction result I wanted to obtain and by visual references to the history of riots,” said Chiereghin.
      “The idea of applying violence to things is common, either in everyday life or in the art,” he continued. “Nevertheless, I was for a long time fascinated by the power of exercising violence and the appeal that violence has on human beings.”

      The furniture was destroyed within the exhibition space
      “With the passing of the time I realised I wanted to excerpt the idea of riot and its violence from a context and use it as a cultural, ready-made tool of design,” continued Chiereghin.
      “Destruction activates multilayer connections: damage, hedonistic liberation, loss of value and reaction against status quo.”

      Videos show the items being destroyed
      The exhibition was created after Chiereghin watched lots of footage of riots, including those at the WTO in Seattle in 1999 and the Genova G8 Summit in 2001. The artist also focused on anti-austerity riots in Greece between 2010-2015, along with the recent riots in Hong Kong and USA.

      “As a predominantly white profession, we recognise that we have contributed to this pain”

      He accepts that the subject matter and the title of the exhibition may prove controversial, but hopes that it challenges visitors to ask questions.

      Pablo Chiereghin violently destroyed the pieces
      “If somebody finds it inappropriate, contradictory or speculative they are right,” he said.
      “The project offers a multilayer approach, which goes from entertainment to speculative design and consumerism critics,” he continued.
      “Visitors have possibilities to stay on the level they want but I think I would be happy if some visitors go home with questions.”
      Riot Design is on at the Kunstforumin in Vienna from 15 October to 22 November 2020. See Dezeen Events Guide for an up-to-date list of architecture and design events taking place around the world.

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      Connected virtual exhibition sees nine designers craft carbon-negative furniture from hardwoods

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      Dezeen promotion: a range of carbon-negative furniture items created by designers including Ini Archibong and Thomas Heatherwick for London’s Design Museum can now be viewed as part of a permanent virtual exhibition.Jointly commissioned by the American Hardwood Export Council (AHEC), Benchmark Furniture and the Design Museum, the Connected exhibition tasked nine designers with creating a table and seating object for their own home offices.

      Top: Studiopepe’s geometric table and chair. Above: The Connected exhibition was on show at London’s Design Museum
      Designed for their personal use, each designer’s creation was made to suit their new ways of living and working from home as a result of the coronavirus pandemic.
      The exhibition aimed to explore how designers and craftspeople have adapted their working methods during lockdown.
      Designers were also invited to record video diaries documenting the process of creating their pieces, which have been compiled and made into a documentary.

      Ini Archibong’s design was informed by the rock formations of The Giant’s Causeway

      Participants included Archibong, who is based in Switzerland, London-based Heatherwick Studio, Jaime Hayon from Spain and Netherlands-based Sabine Marcelis.
      Other designers involved were Maria Bruun, Sebastian Herkner, Maria Jeglinska-Adamczewska, Studiopepe and Studio Swine.

      Ini Archibong designs rock-like furniture with its own drainage system

      While Archibong took cues from the undulating rock formations of Giant’s Causeway in Northern Ireland for his Kadamba Gate table and seating design, Heatherwick Studio created a modular desk with wooden planters for legs.
      The nine furniture pieces were displayed at London’s Design Museum from 11 September to 11 October. The show, which was digitally scanned by V21 Artspace, is now permanently available to view online as a virtual exhibition.

      Thomas Heatherwick designed a table with planters as legs for the Connected project
      Each design was made from a choice of three sustainable American hardwoods: red oak, maple or cherry. According to AHEC, the resulting collection of objects removed more carbon from the atmosphere than they generated.
      “When considered as a group, the Connected designs are better than carbon neutral,” said AHEC. “The total global warming potential (GWP) – often referred to as the ‘carbon footprint’ – of the nine Connected designs is minus 342 kilograms of CO2 equivalent.”

      Heatherwick Studio unveils modular desk with wooden planter legs

      “It takes a little over 10 seconds for the hardwood logs harvested to manufacture all the Connected designs to be replaced by new growth in the US forest,” it continued.
      “The full environmental Life Cycle Assessments on each of the nine projects prove that these pieces are environmentally sound, going beyond carbon neutrality and leaving a negative carbon footprint.”

      Sabine Marcelis designed a work-from-home cubicle with a bright yellow interior for the show
      Details on the exhibition can be found via the Design Museum website, while more information on the work AHEC does can be found on its webpage.

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      Renovated Montreal house by Atelier Barda contrasts black and white

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      Black furniture provides a stark contrast to the white interior of this Montreal residence, which has been overhauled by local architecture studio Atelier Barda.Atelier Barda’s Portland Residence project involved adding an extension to the rear of a historic stone house located in Montreal suburb Mount-Royal, and reconfiguring the floor plan to improve the flow between spaces.

      “This innovative redesign has freed the building’s spirit from its original constraints, giving it fresh expression in a setting that is both classic and resolutely contemporary,” the studio said.

      Architectural details like rounded walls and simple mouldings were preserved and then painted white to offer a contemporary update.
      The team then installed a box clad with black anthracite oak to span all three levels.

      The volume includes storage, a bathroom, kitchen appliances and a staircase, and forms a passageway between the main living space and the bedrooms.
      Its black hue stands out against the white backdrop and chevron-patterned oak parquet floor, defining the material palette throughout the interiors.

      Black steel mullions also frame the glass curtain wall of the extension, which the studio said it chose to protect the house from harsh climatic conditions.
      The windows wrap the kitchen, living and dining room, offering views of the garden and natural light.

      Atelier Barda renovates Montreal apartment with minimalist finishes and custom furniture

      In the living room, translucent white drapes cover the space’s large windows matching the colour of the walls. A circular, plush sofa from de Sede and a grand piano provide touches of black, while the fireplace is grey stone.
      Foraine par Atelier Barda, the firm’s design studio, designed a number of furnishings in the house.

      Many are built with solid black anthracite oak like the rectangular dining table and bench, which have wide legs detailed with thin grooves, and a circular coffee table.

      Smaller round tables for the bedrooms are wrapped in the oak panelling and fronted with drawers.
      The bedrooms and a private office are located on the upper levels of a house. A skylight is situated above the stairwell to bring natural light into the space.

      In the bathrooms, white vanities are finished with a lime and tadelakt plaster and topped with marble, which is used to cover the floors as well.

      Atelier Barda was founded by Antonio Di Bacco and Cécile Combelle, it has completed a number of renovations in Montreal including a loft apartment with black and white interiors and custom furniture and the conversion of a shop into a two-storey residence with pastel accents.
      Photography is by Alex Lesage.

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      Misha Kahn aims for “optimistic design show” at Friedman Benda New York

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      A colourful cashmere sofa, bronze chandeliers and stained-glass sculptures are among the mix of plush and sculptural objects American designer Misha Kahn is displaying at New York gallery Friedman Benda. Marking the Brooklyn artist’s third presentation in the Chelsea gallery, Soft Bodies, Hard Spaces is intended to offer a positive reflection on the relationship between humans […] More

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      Five hotels and holidays homes that double up as showrooms

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      Holiday homes and hotels that also function as shoppable furniture showrooms are growing in popularity. Here are five examples including a Copenhagen hotel, a Melbourne apartment and a Hamptons house. Stephen Kenn Loft, Los Angeles, by Stephen Kenn Studio Stephen Kenn Studio turned a Los Angeles apartment inside an old factory building into “part showroom, […] More

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      An Aesthetic Pursuit designs shoppable Airbnb in Maine

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      Brooklyn creative agency An Aesthetic Pursuit has designed a bold rental house in Maine with furniture and products that guests can purchase. Available to rent on Airbnb, Pieces Homes is a “shoppable stay” experience created by An Aesthetic Pursuit to launch and showcase designs from its Pieces collection. “The first Pieces Homes design-destination concept creates a […] More