Writing about the ideas behind design. Think about it.
This Sydney home, located in a Heritage Conservation Area in Malvern Hill in the Inner-West suburb of Croydon, has been updated with an extension and new interiors, while also making the most of its heritage features.
Owner Caitlin Parker-Brown of interior design studio Parker Studio appointed Sydney architecture studio Potter and Wilson to work together on the heritage restoration, new interiors and a contemporary addition at the back of the site.
Read moreThis year, timing aligned perfectly for the Studio Prineas team to spend seven days together in Copenhagen during 3 Days of Design. It was a first for every one of us, and experiencing the city with fresh eyes made every discovery feel that much more significant.
What makes 3 Days of Design so remarkable is that it unfolds not within the walls of an exhibition centre, but across the city itself. Private homes, workshops, showrooms, museums and public spaces open their doors, inviting visitors into the places where design is imagined, made and lived. There is an extraordinary generosity to the festival – not only in the access it provides, but in the time people are willing to share.
Read moreAlthough I wasn’t able to make it to Melbourne for this one, I feel that I have gotten to know Australian designer Elliot Bastianon’s work over the years and am excited to share information and images of his new exhibition “Analogue and Alchemy”, currently at C Gallery. Furthering his previous explorations of electroplating and patination, Elliot’s new series is made in collaboration with Punjabi master coppersmith Hari Krishan.
Elliot visited North India from his current home base in New Delhi in order to learn about the metalwork techniques of the Thathera community, who are renowned for their hand-forming copper and brass vessels, a skill passed down through the generations and recognised by UNESCO as an endangered form of intangible cultural heritage.
Read moreMelbourne-based designer Ruby Shields launched her new design house Studio Shields during Melbourne Design Week this year with an exhibition entitled Synthesis, including the work of over 40 artists, makers and designers in an immersive exhibition at the Bishop’s Parlour at Abbotsford Convent.
With this new show, Ruby has taken her background as an Art Director in advertising and mixed it with a love for rich colours and textures to create a show with real impact.
Read moreThere is something wonderfully warm and organic to the feel of a wooden table, but they can also easily be scratched or stained by day-to-day living. Matt Sherwen of Sydney-based design studio Mat & Kin has come up with a solution in the form of the Revolve table.
The key to the table’s success is a rotating tabletop, which allows the scratched or stained surface to be rotated when guests arrive, revealing a pristine underside, now able to be used as a fresh table surface.
Read moreThis redesign of a Federation semi on a long block in the leafy suburb of Ripponlea, Melbourne, focuses on reconfiguring internal rooms and a new living zone out the back that looks out onto a lush garden.
The owners, a family of three, told local architects Austin Maynard Architects that the home needed to be set up “for the next 100 years”, and that it should be warm, welcoming and friendly with environmental design at its core. Their passion for music, reading, art and plants/gardening was also key to the brief.
Read moreA Sydney architecture studio spent nearly a year developing a new oyster shell terrazzo for a pavilion in Sydney’s Barangaroo, designed as a public place of gathering right on the harbour.
Founded by Peter Besley and Jessica Spresser, Besley & Spresser found historical precedents in “tabby concrete”, which is made from crushed or burnt oyster. However, tabby concrete does not express the shape of the oyster: “Using whole oysters and expressing this in the material is rare and much harder to do,” says Peter Besley. “It took us over a year of experimenting and testing to get it working as we wanted, and we had to certify it uniquely ourselves.”
Read moreI’m excited to announce that my new book Design: Art Deco: Design Inspiration from Paris to New York will be published on 7 April by Hardie Grant North America. This is a richly illustrated sourcebook that traces the movement from the Paris salons of the 1920s to the skylines of Manhattan and the first great streamlined vehicles of the industrial age.
Art Deco was the antithesis to all that came before it. Where Art Nouveau sprawled out in arabesques, art deco’s lines were clean and strong; where the arts and crafts movement embraced natural forms, art deco forged an industrial aesthetic.
Read more“A room of my own” is a cabinet designed by London designer Nipa Doshi of studio Doshi Levien that is accessible from two sides, acting as a dressing table and a writing desk to encourage quiet moments of contemplation and self-expression.
The work is reminiscent of her work Le Cabinet for French porcelain factory Sèvres, which she described to me during an interview in Sydney in 2023 as being inspired by the shapes and silhouettes of modernist architect Le Corbusier’s work in Chandigarh.
Read moreThe Radical Yes store in North Melbourne has had a redesign thanks to Molecule Architecture and Interior Design’s Richard Fleming and Anja de Spa, who describe themselves as longtime customers and fellow locals of the dynamic shoe, bag and accessory brand.
Radical Yes began when Kerryn Moscicki decided to start making shoes in a new, radical way – in small batches, with considered materials and with a focus on flat shoes. Their slogan “hasten slowly” resonated with a lot of people and the brand has gone from strength to strength.
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