market mode

shoppe object...

Queen of Hearts!

Happy Valentine's Day, lovelies!

Head over heels to be tapped for portrait photographer pal Sheila Barabad's newest series on creatives!

You know how everyone likes to hang out in the kitchen?
Et voila! 

Fashion is Love! 

xoxo

home sweet home...
photograph by Sheila Barabad
published with permission
http://www.sheilabarabad.com

calm, cool, collected

One of the season's highlights in class with design historian and tastemaker Daniella Ohad was our visit to the SOHO Studio of Miami born, New York based, artist and author Michele Oka Doner.

If you have traveled through the American Airlines terminal in Miami, you will be familiar with her large scale mosaic work A Walk on the Beach, or you may know Radiant Site in New York's own Herald Square or Celestial Objects at the Museum of Natural History.  

Perhaps you know of her recently published Intuitive Alphabet, or of her collaboration with Steuben Glass, or her furniture, sculpture or jewelry designs.  Her body of work is seamless and all encompassing.

A former educator and firm believer in embracing one's inherited knowledge and place in the universe, Michele spent time with us generously sharing the story of her life's journey to date. She invited us to explore her studio and library, explaining that from the beginning, she has made it her mission to craft her life, ceremoniously, making the things that she needed with the materials around her.  As it happened, she found that others wanted what she made, for enjoyment or for use in their own lives.... 

Raised at the beach, Michele possesses an innate reverence for the natural world and its primal wonders.  As a young student of design and art history in Michigan, she was influenced by Saarinen, Bauhaus and Cranbrook and acknowledged the "tools from masterful people," that helped her to discover a vocabulary and language with which she was comfortable and which defined her own way of life. 

In the light filled studio where she has resided since the early 1980's, work and life are integrated in a plan that she pointed out is not a grid but a series of circles and zones, "an open footprint" as she called it, like a piazza, in which space is differentiated by use, a space in which you are free to flow.

"Proceed as way opens," Michele quoted a Quaker saying at one point in the intimate narrative of her travels to other cultures and respect for her New York life, encouraging all of us to focus on and to foster a spirit of gratitude toward our surroundings and the possibilities revealed to us along our own paths.

Daniella's blog captures the essence of this magical studio visit and places it in the fuller context of New York and global design. I happily refer you to the link as it also exemplifies the passion, curiosity and sense of discovery she tirelessly shares throughout her program: http://www.daniellaondesign.com/blog/visiting-michele-oka-doner

Here's to a summer of infinite wonder! 

SOHO studio of Michele Oka Doner
www.micheleokadoner.com
www.daniellaondesign.com
(photos deborah bush) 

in a Chelsea garden...

Each week in Daniella Ohad's Design and Decorative Arts in NYC class series is a study in periods, styles and expressions of modern and contemporary design. On Wednesday, we were transported, literally, to a Chelsea garden to discover the work of Polish born, London based Marcin Rusak in his first U.S. solo show.

Here, the welcoming French gallery founder Renaud Vuaillat has staged the Flora furniture, decorative objects and lights in his residential studio setting.  As if stepping into a still life, we were met with a towering armoire installation of locally sourced flowers assembled by the artist/designer's sister that both introduces and accents the interior display and focus on floral imagery.

As Daniella highlighted, the strength of Rusak's designs is in their surface, infused resin over meticulously placed preserved flowers, leaves and grass collected by the artist and given form with materials such as aluminum, brass and steel.  

Each piece successfully merges art with design for dramatic effects, both solid and transparent, voluminous and sculptural. While contemporary pieces, they evoke a certain mood of ephemerality too, perhaps from the play of light and dark on flora and fauna within the subtly luminous forms.

Flora Noir is on exhibit at Twenty First Gallery through June 16th. 

Chelsea morning, outside Twenty First Gallery... 
https://21stgallery.com/pages/marcin-rusak
www.daniellaondesign.com 

vanity case(s)

and jeweled compacts, clocks, luxury cigarette boxes and more...

breathtaking, X one hundred ...

Jeweled Splendors, Cooper Hewitt Teak Room..
https://www.cooperhewitt.org/2017/01/25/cooper-hewitt-to-present-jeweled-splendors-of-the-art-deco-era-the-prince-and-princess-sadruddin-aga-khan-collection/

https://www.cooperhewitt.org/events/current-exhibitions/jeweled-splendors/

pretty things

www.johnderian.com

junk in the trunk

in brooklyn ...

Burma Bag

While in Miami this weekend, I stepped off the beach to have lunch in the shade of the garden patio at The Raleigh.

I was admiring the lush setting when a richly hued tote on the love seat opposite me caught my eye.

A while later, Cat from the Babalu lobby pop up shop joined me for a moment to have a quick coffee and also gasped at the beauty of the bag.

She did not hesitate to ask the reserved owner to tell us about it. Upon being questioned, the guest broke into a gentle smile and told us it was an item that always attracted attention.

We learned that she bought it and several others while in Myanmar.

It is known as a 'Burma Bag,' woven from recycled packing tape straps and used by local women to carry up to 50 lbs of market produce and wares.

"It is amazing how much the women can carry in these bags!" she shared.

The owner hailed from Venice and wore a simple chambray blue shirt dress, flat sandals and fabulous Prada shades.

She agreed to an official photo shoot of her bag before exiting the patio to catch the afternoon sun!