As technology surges ahead, our ability to adapt it to our lives and living spaces often lags behind. For us, enamored with our new gadget, what it is often takes precedent over where it goes. A good example of this incongruity is the proliferation of personal computers in contemporary kitchens.
In many homes, the kitchen has become the social hub, and since computers support every facet of our daily lives, the overlap is inevitable. So what can a kitchen computer do? For starters: Online cookbooks replace their printed ancestors; video conferencing with family and friends reinforces and enhances the social nature of the space; music software eliminates the need for audio players; and web browsers provide access to information and entertainment, making TVs superfluous. The kitchen and the computer are an ideal match, but their pairing remains as awkward as sushi and milk.
Attempts at integrating the computer into the kitchen have yet to produce sophisticated results. In 1969, Honeywell offered a kitchen computer with a binary interface for $10,000 from Neiman Marcus. It’s unclear if any were ever sold. More recently, specialized kitchen computers built onto refrigerator doors may allow you to keep track of your grocery list, but they have little regard for spatial planning. Their only reason for appearing on appliances is because appliance companies developed them. The niche market for a kitchen-specific computer may never justify the research and development that a desktop computer does, so the latter will remain a better choice. The immediate problem is that kitchens are poorly designed to accommodate our regular computers.
Last June I attended a plastics trade fair in Chicago. Walking through a stadium-sized hall filled with the wares of mould manufacturers, I became lost in a maze of production tools and as a result it took me two hours to find the plastics companies I had come there to see. In a second hall I found hundreds of booths selling a host of bizarre metal gadgets and tubes, which I learned are the components that make the moulds themselves. Many of today’s products are created with the help of hundreds of other inter-dependent manufacturing products. I left the fair with the dizzying realisation that the metal-gadget industry is built around the mould industry, which is built around the plastics industry, which is built around other industries like the automotive or furniture industry, which are built around real people’s needs.
Ciclo is a three-sided revolving shelf made of ebonized teak. In nineteenth century libraries revolving bookcases provided compact storage, and Ciclo reintroduces the archetype for today’s homes, offices and shops. A new structural approach, which merges three ample cases and aligns each with the center of the whole unit, optimizes access and rotation for the user. The core of the design is left open for additional storage space, transparency and the passage of light.
Abitare puts to trial new icons of furniture and product design. In a virtual court, a prosecutor and a defense attorney (played by two renowned design critics) analyze and discuss the merits and defects of the design piece and interrogate the designer and the producer, who are called to the witness stand, in order to give detailed insight to contemporary design leaving the final verdict to the audience.
In the case of the 360° office chair by Magis, please step forward, Jonathan Olivares, for the prosecution, Paola Antonelli, the defense attorney, and the two witnesses, designer Konstantin Grcic and producer Eugenio Perazza. The court is in session.
Smith Pro is a portable storage unit for the culture of function in today’s home and office. The design responds to a lack of adequate furniture for desktop printers, video game consoles, DVD players and flat screen televisions, by providing space for these items and the accessories that surround them. If left empty the upper platform provides an ample makeshift surface. At home the largest storage area fits video games or DVDs and next to a desk it can host folders or pocket books and bags, which often end up on the floor. A total height of sixty centimeters allows Smith Pro to roll under tables and desks. Smith Pro extends the Smith family of versatile storage units in Danese’s catalogue.
As part of SAIC’s Industry Partners Studio led by Dr. Bruce M. Tharp, fourteen students from the Designed Objects program worked under a theme set by Jonathan Olivares to explore contemporary contexts of education and make a series of accessories for Danese Milano. SAIC’s philosophy of a critical and re-imagined approach to design resonated perfectly as Olivares set the premise that established desk accessories have lost their relevance, and urged the class to explore unsolved problems surrounding today’s work activities. During two meetings at SAIC the participants discussed Danese’s particular culture, the products that JODR designed for the brand, the students’ research and their initial prototypes. Danese’s president, Carlotta de Bevilacqua, Olivares and SAIC faculty gave the students feedback on their work as they developed their projects in preparation for this exhibit. The results are surprising, relevant and humorous; a pillow for laptop naps, a tray that saves our keyboards and laptops from destructive coffee spills, and a backpack station, that converts a bag into a piece of furniture. The strength of the students’ prototypes can be assessed in this exhibit by JODR, where they are displayed in a mock dorm room alongside Danese furniture.
April, 2009 Nitzan Cohen called to ask if I would write a text for the catalogue of his new collection of wooden furniture for the Italian producer Mattiazzi. I spent a few days considering the work, and replied with this email.
NC,
I find several points of interest in your project for Mattiazzi.
The masculine-feminine variation between HE SAID and SHE SAID reminds me of Mickey and Minnie Mouse. Aside from their clothing, the differences between them are subtle - Mickey’s nose is slightly bigger and Minnie has eyelashes, HE SAID has protruding, aggressive armrests, while SHE SAID’s curve down gently. It’s strange that chairs haven’t always had masculine and feminine variations, when so many other products do. In Freudian analysis, knifes are male and spoons are female. The best sets of cutlery have great tension between the knife and spoon and I can see a similar tension between HE SAID and SHE SAID. Distinguishing chairs in this way re-imagines their role, introduces a new dynamic between chairs, and a new form of product development for them.
