There was a great little interview with Mary Featherston in the SMH Essential supplement today (The joy of a comfy seat, Andrea Jones SMH July 31), the late Australian designer Grant Featherston’s wife and collaborator. Featherston chairs have become iconic Australian designs of the 1950’s as their prices today reflect. I was interested to see Mary Featherston speak about how she and Grant intended to design affordable furniture for the masses, even equating the ikea mentality more akin to what they were trying to achieve… “useful bits of furniture that people can afford. When [furniture] gets beyond that it becomes art and sculpture”. You cannot help but draw comparisons as the article does, with Charles and Ray Eames, another successful husband and wife team who also intended to design for the masses, not for an elite few. The irony is of course that both Eames and Featherston furniture is now often treated as a sculpture-like piece in many an interior and design magazine. Do you think todays crop of designers share the same democratic ideals as Eames and Featherston, or has something shifted? A complex question to answer no doubt, but we would love to hear your thoughts… designers speak up!
D*Hub, the Powerhouse Museum website has a good article on Grant and Mary Featherston here and the desire to inspire blog has some great examples of Featherston furniture here.
(above) Grant & Mary Featherston
(above) The Featherston R152 Contour Chair
(above) The R152 chair in a contemporary interior (from Vogue Living)
Have a look at the image below. Would you guess that it is constructed by a truck driving on sand, is 4.8km wide and holds the record as the world’s largest freehand drawing? I’m not sure what exactly inspires Californian artist (and chef?) Jim Denevan, but I love the graphic. Read more about it at the designboom blog.
Filed under: Children | Tags: Alexander Girard Alphabet blocks, babyology, designer childrens toys, Kubrick Eames Toy, Modernist ABC poster, morenist Dolls House, Stylish childrens toys
Anyone with children will know it can be difficult to sift through the plethora of plastic and dreadful graphics and find some quality products. Acquaint yourself with Babyology and look no more. I think Mum and Dad could be accused of indulging themselves but I’m sure the kids will enjoy it too (more than the plastic is debatable, but at least you can leave it out on display). Here are my picks…
E is for EAMES… teach them their ABC and some design classics whilst you’re at it ( Babyology link here)
Build with style – Alexander Girard blocks (link here)
A modernist dolls house, complete with lap pool and island bench! (link here)
And finally, a wooden Kubrick action figure decorated with the Eames dot pattern (link here)
Your toy box is complete. Make sure the kids get a turn now…
Filed under: Australian Design, Textiles | Tags: Australian fabric, Duckcloth, Online fabric store, Printed fabric, printed textiles
Duckcloth is a Melbourne based online store that sells fabric with a focus on print and pattern. Their website is a joy to browse with fabrics grouped by collection, style, colour or weight and then within those groups by country of origin, designers name, spots, florals etc. They are happy to send swatch samples and they sell in .25 metre increments. They also sell patterns for clothing, bags and toys for all those sewers out there. Below are a few fabrics from their Australian collection.
So much fabric, so little time…
Filed under: Events, Exhibitions | Tags: Eames Office, Eames Photography, The Gifted Eye of Charles Eames
This weekend is your last chance to see the photography exhibition The Gifted Eye of Charles Eames, it ends this Sunday 27th July. Click here for more details.
(Below) A portrait of Charles and his wife & business partner Ray Eames.
Filed under: Australian Design, Graphic design, Homewares | Tags: Decorette, Vinyl Decals, Wall graphics
Posted by Lauren Evans
I have a bit of a penchant for good vinyl decals and these ones by Australian company Decorette took my eye. The tree below is well complimented by the Emeco Navy stool!
Filed under: Australian Design, Chairs, Events, Exhibitions, Sustainable design | Tags: Before and After, Exhibitions, Reworked objects, State of Design Festival
The State of Design Festival in Victoria is drawing to a close, but there are still a few great events happening this week (check calender here). Some of you may have visited the Before & After project. It aimed to provide new perspectives on unwanted objects, reinterpreting these objects into pieces of value. The Before and After team have set up a blog that will highlight the results of the project (preview below), but also documents the references that inspired the project and includes some great pieces, proving the idea of reworking existing objects has well and truly been taken up across the design world.
(After)
(Before)
Filed under: Art, Australian Design | Tags: Illustrations, Prints, Yellow Monday
Posted by Lauren Evans
I love Sydney Artist Yellow Monday’s prints – the colour palette is beautiful and you can guess 1950’s design is an influence. Here are a few of my favourites, you can find more over at the Etsy shop.
Filed under: Environment, Sustainable design | Tags: green lawnmowers, modified bicycle/mower, mowercycle
Anyone have to mow the lawn this weekend? Here’s a little bit of inspiration – the mowercycle. Get fit and mow the lawn whilst being kind to the environment. Nobody knows the genius behind the mowercycle or exactly when it was conceived, but what an invention it is and all the more poignant in the current climate of greening our homes and the obesity epidemic. We found it over at inhabitat.
Filed under: Architecture, Australian Design, Exhibitions | Tags: Architecture, Australian Architectural Exhibition, Gallery of Modern Art Brisbane, Placemakers, Queensland Architects
The Gallery of Modern Art in Brisbane is soon to host the exhibition ‘Place Makers‘ featuring the work of 22 Queensland architects. Significantly it will be the largest exhibition of contemporary architecture ever staged in an Australian museum and will include residential, public and institutional projects from the past 15 years. Below is the Sunrise Beach House by Wilson Architects which will feature in the exhibition. It runs from 2 August – 23 November 2008 – well worth a look.
