With sterile white cube exhibits now a memory of a bygone era, contextualized displays have become the norm across the design industry. Independent talents, established brands, and leading galleries are now primarily staging their wares in fully furnished, total-work-of-art domestic settings. The idea is to suggest – or clearly indicate – how their products and limited-run works might actually live in the spaces they’ll eventually inhabit. Few, however, fully respond to the existing conditions and histories already in place.

Cue téte-a-téte, a group exhibition mounted by emergent New York art and design platform Playinghouse at two vastly different locations during last month’s Milan Design Week. Curated by Margherita Dosi Delfini, assistant curator at the Design Museum, the emphatically site-responsive exhibition brought together artworks and furnishings imagined by a wide array of contemporary independent talents. The meticulously arranged selection accentuated the various material and formal qualities of each locale.

True to the relatively new platform’s mission of highlighting the intersection between function, familiarity, and invention, the works on view embodied the idea that playfulness can carry as much weight as practical rigor.

At Villa Pestarini, seminal Italian architect Franco Albini’s prototypically Rationalist residential project completed in 1939, works crafted in eggshell, glass, reflective metals, and other complementary materials played up the home’s distinctive proportions and pared-back yet still slightly ornamental detailing. The space was staged as a study transfixed in time, personalized for quiet contemplation.

Anna Dawson’s formally inventive fused-glass Calle Sconce diffused soft light upward and downward, while her Sun Pendant riffed on the cleverly transposing qualities of restraint and expression. The hexagonal, concave-edge ceiling mount emitted light through a gently bulging amber dome. The distinctive shape was repeated in Romain Basile Petrot’s Khemis Checkerboard Game table.

A similarly nuanced play on formal configuration defined Caleb Engstrom’s Dry Kiss Chair I & II concepts, produced in slightly sumptuous crushed eggshell and lacquer. The villa’s oh-so-subtle nods to Moderne and Art Deco ornamentation were translated through Liyang Zhang’s Florence Curtain Sconce. Spherical finials sat atop a patinated brass volume projecting light through movable silk drapes.

At Certosa District, the palette was starkly different and decidedly industrial, calling back the complex’s previous function. Semi-functional and non-functional sculptures rendered in rubber (Atelier Fomenta’s monumental yet elastic Rubber Tables), plastics (Maha Alavi’s somewhat architectonic cast-resin Frooot Bowl), and metals (Francesco Rosati’s Table For a Married Couple, composed of two perpendicularly positioned “téte-a-téte” chairs) reinforced the rawer spatial language of the site.

Photography by Elizabeth Carababas.

As the pageant queen of design weeks, Milan tends to go all out. And this year, the city-wide festivities were bigger and bolder than ever. The name of the game: balloons. From the most luxe brand-activations to emerging artist installations, giant inflated creatures and air-filled experiences emerged as a clear visual motif of the festival. Here, check out 5 standouts that rose above the crowd.

Courtesy of 10 Corso Como.

Courtesy of 10 Corso Como.

1. Moncler’s Octopus Invasion at 10 Corso Como

As if the celebrated creative hub, concept store and restaurant 10 Corso Como wasn’t iconic enough, this year’s pop-up took things to new heights—literally. Part of Moncler’s Puffy Summer campaign, the building’s facade was taken over by a giant, balloon octopus in a striking maroon hue. Bursting through windows and wrapping around walls, Moncler’s supersized mascot made for a thrilling observation from the street, and a fearsome presence for anyone who dared to dine (or shop) in the belly of the beast. And as far as fashion forecasts go, I’ve personally fallen for the puffy summer propaganda.

Photography by Giuseppe Miotto / Marco Cappelletti Studio. Courtesy of Sara Ricciardi Studio.

Photography by Giuseppe Miotto / Marco Cappelletti Studio. Courtesy of Sara Ricciardi Studio.

Photography by Sophie Sobol.

2. Serotonin: The Chemistry of Happiness by Sara Ricciardi Studio

Part of Brera Design District 2026, this colourful installation — titled Serotonin: The Chemistry of Happiness — by artist Sara Ricciardi for American Express explores the hormones that create human happiness. Made up of large, tie-dyed blue and pink balloon balls juxtaposed against the bones of the historic Loggia of the Pinacoteca di Brera, the installation is true to its name: a joyful surprise and a dynamic contrast. And for those who waited in line to walk within the installation, they’d find that the giant forms moved and breathed like living organisms.

Courtesy of Ulises.

Courtesy of Ulises.

Courtesy of Ulises.

Courtesy of Ulises.

3. Škoda Auto x Ulises Studio: Škoda Epiq

Located at the Palazzo Senato for a week-long takeover, this collaboration between Czech automobile manufacturer Škoda Auto and multidisciplinary design firm Ulises Studio looked like a video game brought to life. Led by Spanish architect, artist and studio-founder Ricardo Orts, the larger-than-life balloon installation was designed to promote the upcoming launch of new all-electric car, Škoda Epiq — plus a marketing campaign that would be heavily influenced by modelling clay. Drawing on this playful spirit, the result is a kind of adult fun house with slides, ball pits, relaxation zones, a mobile cafe and more. With over 60,000 visitors during its run, this installation was a crowd-favourite (it even received top prize for Fuorisalone 2026 as the top-rated installation.)

Photography by Giovanni Genzini. Courtesy of Sara Ricciardi Studio.

Photography by Giovanni Genzini. Courtesy of Sara Ricciardi Studio.

Photography by Giovanni Genzini. Courtesy of Sara Ricciardi Studio.

Photography by Giovanni Genzini. Courtesy of Sara Ricciardi Studio.

4. Dalfilo’s Dream Walkers

For anyone walking through Brera during Milan Design Week, you may have seen a troupe of ethereal wanderers dressed in all-white, carrying giant inflated pillows. These were the Dream Walkers—brought to life by Samira Cogliandro and Cult of Magic performers. Promoting a capsule collection of bed linens, dubbed Land of Dreamers, designed by Sara Ricciardi Studio for Dalfilo’s new flagship store on Corso Garibaldi 60, this dreamy performance and promotional stunt certainly turned heads. Plus, their jumbo balloon pillows surely stirred up some longing for tired tourists.

Photography by Sophie Sobol.

Photography by Sophie Sobol.

5. Marea / Tide by Habits

Inspired by the intersection of suspension, inflatable art and kinetic environments, Marea / Tide by Milan-based industrial design studio Habits spotlights a new, interactive aerial structure that explores how spatial thresholds shape social space. Created by a team of engineers, prototypists and software experts, these lightweight helium-filled modules react in real-time to user engagement, creating a responsive canopy that draws close and rebounds according to a robotic system of monitors, sensors and micro-fans. With a fluid choreography, the project name references the rise and fall of the tides.

Adrienna Matzeg’s work often recalls bright summer afternoons, her vibrant table scapes conjuring a lunchtime setting at an alfresco cafe. But her latest series, After Hours, departs from her previous work completely. The punch needle pieces on black linen depict nighttime moments as conjured by memory. The collection, on view at Toronto’s Abbozzo Gallery, is Matzeg’s first physical solo show (she also exhibits her tapestries online). And it draws inspiration from her experiences on a trip to Jeju Island, South Korea and Kyoto, Japan.

It was so hot and humid during the days that Matzeg and her partner could only sightsee in the morning and at night. “I had this crazy vertigo the whole trip. So that’s what defined the night portion of this project,” she explains. “We did more at night because of how uncomfortable it was to go outside during the day.” The two had also purchased a new camera that allowed them to use a film-like setting. The result: dreamy images of cities at night.

When she got home, Matzeg also bought a colour printer; she printed out her photographs, cut them out and pinned them up. Images of a 7-Eleven facade lit up from within, a lantern glowing against a wall and – of course – a portable fan lying prone on an inscrutable surface are just some of the textile depictions she crafted from these images. One of the most evocative is of a taxi heading out into the night. “In Kyoto, the cabs are all these vintage crown comfort Toyotas, and they all have different little emblems on the top for the different companies — like a flower clover. They’re so precious.”

Matzeg sources her cotton threads in France and Japan. The black linen was completely new to her. “What the black linen does is take these scenes from a crazy, busy part of the city and everything else just falls away.” The objects and architectural structures sometimes seem to be floating against the backdrop — Matzeg likes to play with how she positions them on the canvas — the way that “memory comes to the surface, and everything else is just empty space around it,” she explains. “And I think that’s very special.”

For Matzeg, nudging fibre art from the realm of hobby craft is a core consideration. “I intentionally try to elevate the medium in the way that I approach it — in the detail, in the colours that I choose, also how I think about it, which is more like painting.” She’s shaping her scenes by sculpting shapes and carving colours, rather than relying on line work. This means that her architectural themes are uncannily tangible, even if they also feel like flattened snapshots. She’s translating the chrome and plastic surfaces of a karaoke bar facade into thread; she’s blending her loops into smooth gradients. “I think about it more in terms of planes and materials,” Matzeg says.

At the After Hours show at Abbozzo Gallery, the works are installed in shou sugi ban frames (by Superframe) and mounted on an aubergine-painted wall. Together, they appear like a series of windows into vibrant remembered moments — the vivid hues and sharp forms of the scenes popping against their black backgrounds like vivid reliefs. Sometimes, they even gently wrap around the borders of the canvas, blurring the boundaries between object and frame. They’re on show to delight and inspire until May 30.

All photos courtesy Abbozzo Gallery.

“For Massimo, design was life and life was design,” New York–based designer Michael Bierut once said of his mentor Massimo Vignelli (1931–2014), with whom he worked early in his career. Bierut spent a decade in the 1980s under Vignelli’s watchful eye, absorbing the dos and don’ts of Swiss-centric graphic design.

“In those days,” Bierut recalled, “it seemed to me that the whole city of New York was a permanent Vignelli exhibition. To get to the office, I rode the subway with Vignelli-designed signage, passed people carrying Vignelli-designed Bloomingdale’s shopping bags, and walked by St. Peter’s Church, with its Vignelli-designed pipe organ visible through the window.”

Massimo, together with his wife and lifelong collaborator Lella Vignelli (1934–2016), is now the subject of A Language of Clarity, a retrospective exhibition at Triennale Milano co-curated by Francesca Picchi, Marco Sammicheli, Martin Kerschbaumer, and Thomas Kronbichler (Studio Mut). The show celebrates the couple’s enduring legacy, emphasizing their contributions to modernism, visual culture, and multidisciplinary design. Jasper Morrison’s Office for Design, with David Saik, shaped the exhibition as a coherent system—an environment that itself reflects the Vignelli mindset. Displays of printed ephemera are meticulously arranged in cases, framed, and hung with graphic precision, presenting an all-encompassing overview of their commercial print work.

“Clarity, for the Vignellis, is not an aesthetic preference; it is an ethical and methodological position. Their work is always rooted in a logical process, grounded in essentiality and reduction,” wrote Sammicheli, Director of the Museo del Design Italiano at Triennale Milano. The exhibition is a collaboration with the Vignelli Center for Design Studies at the Rochester Institute of Technology (USA), which has preserved more than 750,000 documents, objects, and artifacts spanning book design, visual identity, corporate systems, posters, exhibitions, products, furniture, and architectural photography.

From the outset, the couple operated in near-perfect harmony. Both grew up in Italy—Massimo in Milan, and Lella, born Elena Valle, in Udine. They first met at an architecture conference in 1949, then crossed paths again in Venice while studying at the Istituto Universitario di Architettura di Venezia (IUAV), where both their personal and professional partnership began to take shape. They married in 1957 and briefly moved to Chicago, with Lella going on to study architecture at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), before returning to Milan at the height of Italy’s postwar design renaissance. There, they built a practice that moved fluidly across disciplines—graphics, products, exhibitions, and interiors—for clients including Olivetti, Pirelli, Venini, La Rinascente, Poltrona Frau, and Xerox.

According to Picchi, the Max dinnerware was originally conceived for an Italian manufacturer of plastic figurines and toys. The Vignellis persuaded the company to produce their elegant, modular, stackable, and affordable tableware design; however, the set was never distributed. Though the project initially failed to reach the market, it was later revived through New Yorker Alan Heller and his connections to the American market. Today, it is considered a classic, having received Italy’s highest design honor, the Compasso d’Oro, in 1964.

When Massimo—co-founder and design director of Unimark International (1965–71)—was invited to lead its New York office, he and Lella relocated to the United States. There, they developed corporate identities for major clients including Ford Motor Company, Knoll, Alcoa, Bloomingdale’s, and American Airlines. In 1971, they founded Vignelli Associates, marking the beginning of a new chapter. As Sammicheli observes, “The move to New York is presented as a moment of expansion. It coincides with their rapid international recognition and with the testing of their language within a new economic and cultural system.”

Their output during this period reflects a deeply systematic approach to design—visible in typographic programs, signage systems, publications, posters, and the now-iconic New York City Subway map, all shaped by a precise graphic language. As Picchi notes, “One of the central ambitions of the exhibition is to restore visibility to Lella Vignelli, whose contribution has too often remained unjustly in the background. Lella was an architect of remarkable rigor and sensitivity.” Her work ranged from interiors for the Artemide showroom to furniture for Poltrona Frau, as well as the Handkerchief Chair for Knoll—projects that embody her enduring elegance and exactitude.

Looking back, it feels timely to reassess the Vignellis’ place in design history. While their work was at times underrecognized within the broader narrative of Italian design—particularly between the mid-1960s and 1980s—today they are understood not only as champions of Italian modernism, but as architects of a universal design language defined by discipline and a remarkable consistency that continues to resonate across generations.

The exhibition remains on view at Trienalle until September 6, 2026. To learn more or find tickets, visit tktktk.

Photography by Delfino Sisto Legnani of DSL studio © Triennale Milano

As Milan Design Week comes to a close, the Fuorisalone installation that lingers in my mind is once again that which puts a design spin on the familiar. MIT professor and architect Carlo Ratti partnered with Mutti to create House of Polpa, a temporary structure that turns one of the most ubiquitous pantry staples into an immersive architectural experience. Canned goods are rarely the subject of design discourse, yet their cultural presence is undeniable, as Andy Warhol underscored decades ago.

Here, that same basic can became the starting point for a different kind of exploration. Installed beneath the portico of the Università degli Studi di Milano, approximately twenty thousand cans of Mutti tomato pulp were supported by a steel substructure that allows them to be stacked and gradually removed without compromising their stability.

Visitors walked through the red volume spanning more than 25 meters. Inside, the experience move beyond the visual. Subtle cues of scent, texture, and sound created a sensorial environment referencing the tomato supply chain.

Circularity is also embedded throughout. The flooring, developed using a Mapei resin made from dried tomato peels recovered from processing waste, reinforces the project’s ethos. Nothing there was purely symbolic. Each element points back to cycles of production, use, and reuse. In essence, the project is designed to be ephemeral.

Visitors were invited to remove a can of Mutti Polpa as an example of participation through consumption. The dissolving structure will extend the exhibit’s life into many pasta dinners throughout the region. For the cans that remain, they will be donated. The dispersal of the project is what makes it so compelling. The installation’s destination will be someone’s kitchen, showing how design can minimize waste by thinking beyond single use.

Images by Saverio Lombardi Vallauri, courtesy of INTERNI Magazine.

How drab the palettes of today have become. We knew the moment grey was being advertised to children—who have yet to fully develop their rods and cones—that we were on a distinctly more boring path. Color reflects the brilliance of our natural world, and has even been shown to make us happier overall, certain hues lifting our mood simply by entering our field of vision. Memphis Milano, established in the eighties in Italy, signaled a release from Modernist conventions and was both revered and reviled by critics and the public. Memphis Style has been described as “a shotgun wedding between Bauhaus and Fisher-Price.”

Prism Stack Glasses

Prism Stack Glasses

Forever fans of nonconformity, the Cedric Mitchell x JOOPITER collaboration embodies the spirit of these trailblazers, yet filters it through a distinctly contemporary lens. Released as part of JOOPITER Marketplace—an always-on, buy-it-now platform offering direct access to the personal collections and archives of influential cultural figures—the collection situates Mitchell’s work within a broader ecosystem of cultural artifacts, where provenance and narrative carry equal weight to form. Texture, color, and transparency all play major roles here, with high-gloss and satin finishes lending a frozen, almost suspended quality to frosted surfaces. Ideals of contrast and constraint emerge to define a new Memphis, where color is not merely decorative, but declarative.

Modern Funk Jacket II

Each piece brings its own unique flavor. Mitchell’s practice—operating at the intersection of craft, utility, and visual culture—draws from a wide spectrum of references including ‘90s hip-hop and retro streetwear to graffiti and childhood iconography. Color, in this context, becomes emotional currency, triggering responses that feel at once nostalgic and immediate. Thick, hand-blown glass cylinders transition gracefully into seating and sculptural forms, emphasizing tactility and the push-pull of saturated tones. Totemic silhouettes emerge throughout, their stacked geometries lending the objects an almost anthropomorphic presence—creatures of color that mirror our enduring fascination with the natural and the constructed alike.

Modern Funk Jacket I

Continue reading to get a glimpse of Mitchell’s world as saccharine hues stack, bend, and spill into various forms. What you’ll see is a cast of colorful characters–playful, a little off-balance, and entirely alive—each one speaking fluently in the language of Modern Funk…

Primary Portal I

Primary Portal I
Primary Portal I opens a threshold. Bold geometric framing surrounds a mirrored center, pulling the surrounding space into the work itself. It’s furniture, object, and environment all at once—always shifting with light and reflection.

Playhaus Perch Chair

Playhaus Perch Chair
The Playhaus Perch Chair brings Mitchell’s language into the realm of sitting. Lacquered geometry meets soft lambskin upholstery, turning a chair into a sculptural experience. It invites use, but never loses its presence.

Art Deco Diaspora

Diaspora Deco Chair
Diaspora Deco Chair bridges eras. Glossy, architectural forms meet plush lambskin, reinterpreting Art Deco through a Modern Funk lens. It’s grounded yet expressive, where history and experimentation sit side by side.

Plonko

Plonko
A quiet detour, Plonko trades gloss for a fully sandblasted finish, letting form do the talking. Soft volumes intersect at subtle angles, holding motion in suspension like a paused gesture. It’s restrained, tactile, and just a little mysterious—a study in what happens when Mitchell turns the volume down.

Petal Stack

Petal Stack
Petal Stack rises like a bloom mid-thought, each hand-blown element stacking into a rhythmic ascent. A chartreuse base anchors the piece before lavender and deep pink nodes lead to a soft, petal-like bowl. Equal parts vessel and sculpture, it softens geometry with a floral exhale.

Play Loud

Play Loud
As the name suggests, Play Loud doesn’t whisper. A lapis dome, electric rings, and a saucer crown collide in a glossy, saturated stack that feels both retro and futuristic. It’s a totem of joy—bold, buoyant, and impossible to ignore.

Verdant Oracle

Verdant Oracle
Verdant Oracle reads like a prophecy in color. A striped green base grounds the piece while a violet sphere and magenta ring give way to an asymmetrical teal rise. Pattern, gloss, and proportion work together to create something that feels both ancient and electric.

Zestrel

Zestrel
Zestrel is a balancing act in full color. Teal, chartreuse, orange, and turquoise stack into a tower that feels both precise and playful. Its glossy surface sharpens every hue, turning structure into spectacle.

Groovy Sprout

Groovy Sprout
With its matte finish and pastel palette, Groovy Sprout softens the tempo. A chartreuse dome anchors frosted violet and translucent blue forms, punctuated by a ring with a circular void. It’s light, architectural, and just a little dreamy.

Bubble Funk

Bubble Funk
Bubble Funk leans into contrast—rigid meets fluid, polished meets playful. A lapis cylinder grounds a pink ring dotted with blue nubs, while a red twisting form rises like a gesture mid-dance. It’s kinetic, cheeky, and full of attitude.

Primary Assembly I

Primary Assembly I
A study in structure, Primary Assembly I builds from intersecting planes and rounded forms. Its lacquered yellow finish amplifies the clarity of composition, turning geometry into a bold spatial statement. It’s furniture, yes—but it behaves like sculpture.

Moonstruck

Moonstruck
Moonstruck tilts toward the unexpected. A lapis base and chartreuse sphere give way to a turquoise spiral and an off-axis blue vessel with a glowing amber interior. The imbalance is deliberate, lending the piece a quiet, cosmic energy.

Triovo

Triovo
Triovo plays with expectation. A flared teal base supports magenta forms and a vivid orange sphere before an angular wedge breaks symmetry at the top. It’s precise, but never rigid—always just slightly off.

Orbolo

Orbolo
Texture takes center stage in Orbolo. A cratered violet base, dotted sphere, and ribbed stem build into a tactile, matte composition that invites touch. Its totemic form feels grounded, even as it lifts visually.

Halo Study

Halo Study
Halo Study is a vertical meditation on form. A lapis cone rises into a spiral, sphere, and disc, each element articulating a clear progression. Balanced yet animated, it’s as crisp as it is playful.

Badu Bloom

Bada Bloom
Bada Bloom grows upward in a rhythmic burst of color. From a grounded teal base, dotted and ringed forms lead into a swelling pink column crowned with a dome. It’s symmetrical, but never static—always in bloom.

Counterweight

Counterweight
Counterweight finds equilibrium in contrast. A warm orange base meets a violet hinge and teal lift, culminating in a tilted chartreuse bowl. The off-axis top keeps the piece alive, always in gentle tension.

Bendrix

Bendrix
Bendrix curves with intention. An amber column arcs upward from a green base, punctuated by red rings and a translucent collar before opening into a flared cup. It’s fluid, off-center, and quietly dynamic.

Ettore’s Echo

Ettore’s Echo
A nod with a twist, Ettore’s Echo channels postmodern lineage through a slender, stacked form. A lapis shaft rises through a spiral and sphere before ending in a tilted violet vessel. It honors the past, but refuses to sit still.

Primary Pivot

Primary Pivot
Primary Pivot turns balance into a question. A chartreuse base, red joint, and blue cylinder stack into a composition that feels both stable and on the verge of motion. Functional as a vessel, it reads as something more sculptural—almost architectural.

To learn more about the Cedric Mitchell x JOOPITER collaboration or shop the drop, visit joopiter.com.

Photography by Julie Dickinson.

On Woodbine Beach it’s a bright, blisteringly windy day. Toronto is a maze of slushy pathways and salted sidewalks, but from this sandy boardwalk, Winter Stations emerges as a bright beacon of color, community and design talent.

Photo by Joel Gale

Celebrating its 12th anniversary this year, the Winter Stations international design competition invites artists, architects and designers to re-imagine an unusual typology, lifeguard stations, and transform them into dynamic works of public art. Set against the backdrop of Lake Ontario, the five winning proposals are then built, and remain on display for a 6-week exhibition that is free and open to all, attracting curious Torontonians from around the city. Today is no different: a constant stream of dog-walkers, young families, bundled toddlers, assistant editors (me) and beach-goers marvel at the eye-grabbing installations.

This year’s theme, Mirage, challenges entrants to explore the edges of reality, asking: what do we long to see? In the age of AI and digital echo chambers, where is the line between what is seen and what is real? Selected by a blind jury of leading art, design, architecture, and urbanism experts, the winning projects tap into this theme from a range of thoughtful angles and engaging materialities.

Photo by Joel Gale

Embrace

Two giant hands of thin, blackened wood emerging from the sand are already an unusual sight, but moving in closer reveals their rainbow-striped palms. Designed by Saskatoon-based art director and 3D artist Will Cuthbert, Embrace is an invitation to discover a new reality, to change your perspective and to be cocooned by the hands. And the people love it: hands reach out to touch, mirroring their giant neighbors.

Photo by Joel Gale

Photo by Joel Gale

Crest

Like the choppy water of Lake Ontario only a few steps away, Crest evokes a sweeping wave before it breaks offering onlookers a moment of pause within its enveloping form. Inside, the waffled plywood pattern—meant to look like driftwood from afar—dissapears and reappears based on the angle. And in the afternoon sun, Crest’s curving form produces a matching shadow of geometric lines on the sand. Designed by a band of talented students from the University of Waterloo School of Architecture and the Department of Architectural Engineering, the team includes Clay te Bokkel, Isabella Ieraci, Matthew Lam, Sasha Rao, Simon Huang, Oskar Peng, David Shen and Professor Fiona Lim Tung.

Photo by Joel Gale

Photo by Joel Gale

Specularia 

Designed by Maine-based interdisciplinary designer Andrew Clark of TORNADO SOUP, this interactive installation invites visitors to walk through a gauzy-curtained corridor and look through five framed openings to the lake. Each window offers a different perspective: one frames the lifeguard tower, one reveals the sky above, another reflects your own face back at you. Dubbed Specularia, the installation—built with MicroPro Sienna treated lumber—blends reality with dreamy portals untethered from context.

Photo by Joel Gale

Photo by Joel Gale

Glaciate

A small maze of vertical polycarbonate panels filled with water from the nearby lake, Glaciate’s frosted walls offer an ever-changing optical illusion as the water freezes and warms. These shifting forms—opaque, translucent,  or transparent—blur the outsider’s view of a central lifeguard tower in vibrant red while also clouding the insider’s view to the beach. Designed by a group from Toronto Metropolitan University Department of Architectural Science in collaboration with Ming Chuan University School of Design comprising Finn Ferrall, Nicholas Kisil, Marko Sikic, with faculty supervisor Yew-Thong Leong and Vincent Hui, Glaciate makes being on the beach feel a little like being inside a rain-filled cloud.

Photo by Joel Gale

Photo by Joel Gale

Chimera

Completely enveloping the lifeguard tower with circular mirrors, Chimera confronts viewers with echoing versions of themselves. Designed by Denys Horodnyak and Enzo Zak Lux of shared Berlin-based creative practice, the installation speaks to the fragmentation of physical and digital realities—and the lack of control individuals may have over the self. Created in partnership with the Mechanical Contractors Association of Ontario, the duo tapped pipe welder and metal artist Courtney Chard to fabricate the design from her Georgetown studio.

Don’t miss your chance to see these stunning installations in person! For more details, visit their website here.

With immersive, often transportative, displays standing out at major events like Design Miami, architecture studio and design producer ATRA has long championed that all-so-Mexican of propositions: harnessing a long-established, rich and diverse culture of craft—as well as an expansive suite of rare, natural materials—and translating it into precision-engineered spaces and furnishings. The results tend to be a cohesive meddling of ancient and otherworldly; concepts that seem to have been extracted from a different, more fantastical yet still somewhat familiar timeline.

When it came to opening its new gallery in New York City’s Hudson Square neighborhood, ATRA’s approach was the same. The subduedly cast, yet richly textured space unfolds as a series of open plan vignettes, unified by a single dark soil-toned toned carpet. There’s a mystical, certainly monastic, vibe here, far cry from the crowded, noise ridden street outside. The essentialized forms of the displayed designs tie everything together.

On view are distinctive ATRA FORM furnishings such as the fiber glass-cast Pyramid Chair designed in partnership with art world heavyweight Pedro Reyes, the celestially inspired Chronos Hanging Vertical Light Sculpture, and monumental Margot sofa (rendered in an especially tactile long-haired Mongolian sheep fur). The pared back concepts—a distillation of both intuition and structure, chaos and control—are meant to be spatial interventions; part of larger architectural systems. Brought together here in complementary stagings, the boutique producer is able to show its full range, and more intimately engage with collectors.

“This gallery allows us to explore where design, architecture, and holistic practice intersect,” says Alexander Díaz Andersson, founder and creative director of ATRA. “It provides a space to test ideas, observe how visitors engage with objects and space, and gather insights that will inform our future projects.”

As revealed during last December’s Design Miami fair, many of the sofas, armchairs, and lounge chairs can now be equipped with VLS technology tool Morphus. The embedded biohacking system monitors its user’s vitals, as well as their stress levels, and responds in kind with a carefully calibrated sequence of vibration, sound and light—filtering in through adjoining goggles—to bring them into and out of states of relaxation and meditation. The rear of the gallery has been set up to facilitate these sessions, allowing especially busy New Yorkers—visiting ATRA for a potential purchase—to also engage in a much needed therapy session. The wellness trend—mostly centered on an ever saturated landscape of urban sauna concepts—has expanded.

AEGIS MIRROR

HORIZONTAL CHANDELIER

BELUGA LOUNG CHAIR RUBELLI

CINTA CONSOLE

DUOMO FLOOR LAMP

FLOW CHAIR

GEOMETRIK CANTELIVER SET TRAVERTINE NAVONA

OBELISK FLOOR LAMP

To learn more about the studio, visit atraform.com.

Photography courtesy of Waylon Bone.

Transparency, in all of its vertices, is a beautiful thing. All of our favorite earthly delights––a babbling brook, a bubble in air, terms and conditions that actually make sense––give us a sense of clarity and honesty, nothing to hide. The Inchiostri exhibition by Ronan Bouroullec and Giorgio Mastinu, produced in collaboration with master glassblower Simone Cenedese, lingered in this elusive yet tender territory. In it, handcrafted glass blocks gave way to layered color, and light became as much material as the glass itself.

Each vase was composed of four elements: two cast glass blocks––produced in four sizes and two thicknesses, roughly 6 or 7 centimeters––a blown glass tube available in two heights, and a shallow blown glass dish that may be stacked on top. Every component carried its own hue, selected from an eleven-color palette, so that when assembled, colors overlaped and refracted, to produce subtle chromatic vibrations.

Plane surfaces were intentionally left unpolished to intensify this vibration, while edges were polished to allow light to pass cleanly through. The effect recalled Venetian glazing techniques: depth conjured through transparency, luminosity born from darkness—the exhibition’s title, Inchiostri (“inks”), nodded to this paradox.

Combination, of course, is a longstanding principle in Bouroullec’s practice. His 1997 Vases combinatoires—eight polyurethane elements, functionless alone yet abundant in possibility when interlocked—introduced a non-authoritarian relationship between object and user. That early investigation into combinatorics, influenced by figures from Giorgio Morandi to Sol LeWitt, resonated here.

From the near-infinite permutations these glass elements allowed, Bouroullec selected twenty compositions, each exploring assemblage without fasteners, balance between cast solidity and blown fragility, and elevation achieved through weight.

The project’s resonance extended beyond its formal elegance. During its run, the showcase received the fifth edition of the Premio Fondazione di Venezia for The Venice Glass Week. The jury cited the exhibition’s “reduced formal vocabulary” of light, color, and treated surfaces—“but, above all, poetry, enchantment, and magic”—recognizing the series as a compelling bridge between the global language of cast glass and Murano’s storied blown-glass tradition.

Positioned delicately between sculpture and vessel, Inchiostri occupied a conceptual threshold. A single stem—often gypsophila—was enough to tip the work from contemplative object to functional vase. Crafted from cotissi, irregular fragments reclaimed from the glassblowing process, the blocks anchored the pieces in centuries-old material culture even as they invited endless reassembly. Transparency here was not emptiness; it was collaboration—between color and light, artist and artisan, object and viewer.

To learn more about the Inchiostri Exhibition by Ronan Bouroullec and Giorgio Mastinu, visit bouroullec.com.

Photography by Enrico Fiorese and Giorgio Mastinu.

Giorgio Cecatto, an Italian architect turned Toronto-based artist, situates his practice within the legacy of Russian Constructivism by borrowing its principles for practice in this digital age. Initially known for sculptural concrete works, Cecatto now employs a pen plotter to create intricate geometric line drawings—an evolution that echoes an exploration of structure, logic, and precision.

His current pen-plotter works extend that lineage conceptually. The machine itself—historically tied to drafting and early computational design—aligns with Constructivist ideals of precision and mechanization. In removing the hand’s gestural dominance, Cecatto’s work favors dynamic geometric bursts that recall the spatial investigations of early computational design as they hover between engineering and illusion—structured, yet visually kinetic.

In bridging early 20th-century revolutionary abstraction with present-day digital tools, Cecatto reactivates Constructivism’s foundational premise: art as the disciplined organization of materials. Today, however, the materials are not only concrete and steel, but code, line, and machine precision.

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Learn more about Giorgio Cecatto and view his other words by visiting ilcekplots.com.

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Since Saudi Arabia’s comprehensive Vision 2030 development project launched in 2017, the quaint yet historically significant desert town of AlUla has emerged as an important cultural hub for the rapidly “opening-up” kingdom. Nestled amid soaring wind-formed limestone cliffs, the verdant date-palm oasis was once a stop-over for muslim pilgrims heading south toward the holy cities and before that, incense traders from southern Arabia traveling north to the Fertile Crescent. The well-preserved adobe-style settlement here dates back 900 years. The iconic Hegra tombs nearby—erected by the same civilizations as Petra—are at least 2100 years old.

While it might not be as glittering as other Vision 2030 projects—The Line, for one—the multifaceted AlUla project is significant in its own achievement, but perhaps also as a model for other similar civic initiatives in the kingdom, region, and beyond. The Royal Commission for AlUla (RCU)—branded as Arts AlUla for several incorporated projects—focuses its efforts in three areas: cultural preservation, ecological restoration, and new artistic endeavor.

The latter, in particular, centers on bringing international actors into the fold. “It’s very much about transferring knowledge but also showcasing what we have here and the unique ways we’re accomplishing our goals,” says Hamad Alhomiedan, RCU’s arts and creative industries director, “Everything we do should be accessible, not just across the kingdom or the region, but globally. We’re here to regenerate the area and that requires a lot of work. It’s essential to have help from a diverse group of cultural platforms and independent talents, even scientists. We’re developing a new playbook so to speak.”

And while the recent establishment of “artisanal” workshops/boutiques in the old city might seem slightly contrived, other projects like the AlUla Artist Residency program are impressive in both their international scope and experimental foundation; deeply rooted in the cultural and ecological heritage of place but universal in the proposed application of outcomes.

The 2025 edition focused on design and brought five up-and-coming to mid-career practices to AlUla for a three month intensive. Hailing from Saudi Arabia, Côte d’Ivoire, Tunisia, Belgium, and the Netherlands, these contemporary studios—all speculative and craft-led in ethos—conducted thorough ethnographic and material research. The resulting designs distill from investigations of local daily life, emergent industrial developments, and the clever harnessing of natural resources abundant here.

Curator Dominique Petite-Frère—founder of multivalent exhibition platform and creative incubator Limbo Accra—ensured that these concepts did not remain nebulous. Each proposal comprises actual furnishings, some that could easily be introduced into the immediate context with a bit more tooling.

Analysing the idiosyncratic intricacies of the limestone rock faces found here but also how local children interact with public infrastructure, Riyadh-based designer Aseel Alamoudi created 3D-printed, extruded sand benches. These non-prescriptive public structures are meant to be climbed on; hinting at Alamoudi’s larger ambition of constructing a massive playscape on the desert floor.

Brussels-based Ori Orisun Merhav redirected the local, age-old tradition of harvest palm leaves and, combined with hardening properties of shellac, developed a new formal vocabulary of naturalistic lamps, carpets, and stools. Palm as a material was also central to Abidjan-based talent Paul Moustapha Ledron’s collection of an almost ancient architectonic daybed, incense altar, and palm tree-like floor Tamaro Jar lamp. The designs take on ceremonial, even spiritual qualities; objects that facilitate a “slowing down” of sorts, allowing oneself to be fully immersed in the environment.

Unveiled as part of the Alula Arts Festival, which ran until February 14, the five collections join new design concepts presented at the French Ministry of Culture’s Villa Hegra complimentary residency program. The downtown AlUla institute is managed by AFALULA (French agency for development in AlUla).

For the repurposed estate’s five allocated studio spaces, French designer Paul Emilieu Marchesseau imagined a series of modular furniture pieces with materials sourced neraby—both natural and industrial. As evidenced in the curtain-enclosed lamp, these propositions are equal parts function and poetry; carrying the trace of local traditional ornamentation as a grounding element. The collection is site-responsive on both an aesthetic and practical level; the latter also becoming more universal in potential application.

Also on view, is the fourth biennial instalment of Desert X AlUla, the offshoot event of the California outdoor installation art exhibit. Like the two other showcases, the significantly larger works presented also respond to context.

“AlUla’s landscape is a living archive of stories, traditions and encounters that span centuries,” said Desert X co-curator Wejdan Reda. “For this edition, artists have engaged with its valleys and historic routes to create works that honor its landscape while opening new spaces for imagination.”

Of note was Mohammed AlSaleem’s series of metal totems, extracting the formal symbols—the geometry of the crescent shape—found in sacred spaces—mosques—across Saudi Arabia. Placed in the natural context of Desert X AlUla’s chosen Wadi valley, the works are de-contextualized from their primarily urban settings but suggestive of what lies beyond the horizon.

Comprising larger-than-life, cast foam Desert Hyacinths and their secondary leaves, Maria Magdalena Campos-Pon’s Imole Red installation comes together as a forum; another type of sacred space, and like Paul Ledron’s furnishings, inspiring visitors to take stock of its surroundings and engage their mystical qualities.

Many as international interlocutors, of sorts, the talents exhibiting across these showcases were able to introduce elements of their own cultural backgrounds as corresponding cues to those they uncovered here.

For the past few years, Simon Johns has been experimenting with a concept called Future Fossils. His pieces appear at once as relics ravaged by time and as sculptures made for this moment. The works, which the Quebec-based artist-designer says “loosely reference the sedimentary striations in million-year-old stone,” have included bookshelves, tables and seating crafted in gypsum cement and slip-cast stoneware.

This past January, Johns unveiled the latest additions to the line as part of “Pot-au-feu,” a DesignTO exhibition by Ensemble, a loose collection of vibrantly creative Quebec designers, artisans and artists. The show took place off the beaten path of the mostly-downtown Toronto design circuit, in a basement gallery called The Plumb. To stand out amongst such a talented bunch, which also includes well-known brands like Lambert & Fils and Darmes, is no small feat.

But one piece in particular – the FF Magma Lamp – had astonishing presence. With its stacked boulders of ceramic and glass wrapped in a slim walnut frame, the light fixture plays with the sense of the primordial and organic. It also feels like a spontaneous creation – an object iterated in the making of it, rather than as a drawing in a CAD program. And for Johns, that is, at least, partly true. “I work more as an artist than as an industrial designer,” he tells me. “I’m not drawing a complete coherent collection from A to Z and then that’s it. It all evolves.”

For the FF Magma Lamp, he hand-carved three similar moulds out of styrofoam, one for blowing glass into and the other two for pressing clay into. It took a few tries to get right. “In the first version, the clay shrunk and, because glass doesn’t shrink, the proportions were off. I also wanted to go warmer with the tones, so I ended up choosing the dark walnut and amber glass.” (The original version, which Johns still makes, has a frame in polished aluminum.) Weighing in at about 45 pounds, the lights stand 55 inches high and are 8.5 inches deep.

While the glass adds something altogether different – with its thick undulations, it seems molten, alive – Johns is primarily interested in sedimentary stone and linear diagonal textures. This comes through in another piece debuted at Pot-au-feu: the FF End Table. What at first glance appears as a voluptuously carved wood trunk topped in a thin glass top reveals itself to be, upon caressing its grooves, a base of cream clay with a reflective aluminum cap. The trompe l’oeil effect is part of the magic.

“From the beginning, I’ve always explored materials mimicking other materials – wood mimicking stone, for instance – and how to be less and less literal, more surrealist. I like that you can’t tell what it is. It’s about real materials, but mixing them.”

While he continues to coax new guises out of familiar, often organic looking materials, Johns is also experimenting with glazes. In this vein, he also debuted two vases at Pot-au-feu. “I’m testing glazes and languages: things that look like fungus, lichen, things that grow on rocks.” Every piece is different, with its own imperfections, which positions them well in the collectable design realm. They also continue a theme that has endless possibilities, especially in Johns’ capable hands.

To see more from the artist, visit Simon Johns’ website.

Photography courtesy of Simon Johns.