The Working Space
TWS - Orgatec 2022 Photo/Video Album

A quick walk thru of Orgatec 2022.

TWS - Orgatec 2022 Photo/Video Album
Manufacturer, NeoCon 2021
Source: CFN News Desk
Hightower wins multiple NeoCon awards including ...

Contract furnishings provider, Hightower received multiple awards at NeoCon 2021, including IIDA's 'Best Small Showroom' (under 4,000 sf) and 'Best of Competition' for its newly designed Chicago showroom.

Hightower wins multiple NeoCon awards including ‘Best Showroom’
Manufacturer, People
Source: CFN News Desk
Humanscale Announces Elizabeth Margles as Chief ...

Humanscale welcomes Elizabeth Margles to its Marketing Division in the role of Chief Marketing Officer. Margles comes to Humanscale with twenty years of experience in design, fashion and retail and a background in public relations and advertising.

Humanscale Announces Elizabeth Margles as Chief Marketing Officer
Manufacturer
Source: CFN News Desk
Steelcase teams up with Kontrol Technologies to ...

The exclusive relationship with Kontrol's BioCloud® Technology will provide real-time detection of airborne pathogens such as SARS-CoV-2 to help make workplaces safer as organizations return to the office.

Steelcase teams up with Kontrol Technologies to provide air quality monitoring and viral detection technology
Manufacturer, People
Source: CFN News Desk
Alan Jay Heller dies at 81

For over 50 years, Heller offered leading designers the opportunity to work with new technologies to create innovative products. Those were great partnerships and they resulted in great products.

Alan Jay Heller dies at 81

Design

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Hot Seats: How Furniture Makers are Catering to Millennials

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Hot Seats: How Furniture Makers are Catering to Millennials

In a studio apartment in downtown Philadelphia, off Rittenhouse Square, I stood awaiting a product demonstration. Stephen Kuhl, a founder of the start-up Burrow, apologized that he had only a beta version to show me — the actual production model would feature some minor aesthetic tweaks. The other founder, Kabeer Chopra, motioned for me to give it a try. I sat down. It was definitely a couch.

Burrow is on an enviable trajectory right now. The company is a graduate of the prestigious Bay Area tech accelerator Y Combinator; it also has a healthy list of pre-orders for its product’s planned debut in January. But given that pedigree, the product is an unusual one: couches. Not cloud-connected couches or remote-controlled couches — just couches. Technically, the company makes a couch, singular, available in a few different colors and configurations. The one I was sitting on belonged to Jess Goodman, a friend of the founders and an early supporter. Its design was midcentury modern unexceptional, and it was perfectly nice. But the couch is not Burrow’s main attraction. Burrow is selling a couch experience.

Via nytimes.com >

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The Favorite Office Chairs Of 28 Creative Companies, From Etsy To Microsoft

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The Favorite Office Chairs Of 28 Creative Companies, From Etsy To Microsoft

Twenty years ago, a "nice" office chair was a moderately priced, if objectively hideous, task chair that didn't crush your lumbar spine. Today, as companies eschew cubicles for workplaces that feel more like living rooms, you'll find classic Eames lounge chairs, hot pink Fabio Novembre Nemo chairs, and everything in between. Chairs have become showpieces, embodying both new workplace ideals and how a company wants to be perceived. You are what you sit on.

At the 2016 Fast Company Innovation Festival, we got to peek inside the offices of more than two dozen creative companies and organizations in New York City, from Etsy and Squarespace to Microsoft and The Onion. Click through the slideshow to see each company's favorite chair.

Via fastcodesign.com >

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Dieter Rams's Lesser-Known Genius As A Furniture Designer

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Dieter Rams's Lesser-Known Genius As A Furniture Designer

In the 1970s, Dieter Rams began formulating his 10 principles of good design, which designers today still interpret as gospel—a testament to Rams's unquestionable foresight and greatness. If you were to quantify his impact, you need only look at the millions of Apple products in our pockets and on our desks; Jonathan Ive and Steve Jobs were disciples of Rams and incorporated his industrial design philosophy—as demonstrated through his work at the German electronics company Braun—into their own work.

Yet it was furniture, not electronics, that was most emblematic of Rams's 10 principles, according to the designer himself.

"Perhaps even more directly than with the Braun appliances, my furniture arose from a belief in how the world should be 'outfitted' and how people should live in this artificial environment," Rams once said. "In this respect, each piece of furniture is also a design for a certain kind of world and way of living."

Via fastcodesign.com >

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Frog's 5 Steps To Predicting The Future

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Frog's 5 Steps To Predicting The Future

People everywhere wish they could look into a crystal ball and see their future—or at the very least, the future of their investments, business, and career. Frog, the global design consultancy, has developed a technique that’s probably about as close as we’ll get to prophecies told via glass orb.

It’s called "futurecasting." And Frog’s clients hire the design firm to spend weeks or months evaluating how the world may change, and what new products and services may be needed as a result. It’s essentially a disruption simulator. The system involves lots of research as to where things are headed, envisioning worlds that may embody such trends, and even writing fictional headlines that flesh out the possibilities.

Via fastcodesign.com >

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Dieter Rams' Exhibition at Vitra Design Museum focuses on his Furniture

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Dieter Rams' Exhibition at Vitra Design Museum focuses on his Furniture

Beginning November 18th and running through March 12, 2017, the VITRA Design Museum is presenting an exhibition called ‘dieter rams: modular world’, showcasing the works of Dieter Rams, one of the most influential German designers. The show features a selection of the furnishings and electrical appliances designed by Rams, whose designs for the Braun company are legendary and his design principles are more relevant today than ever.

Via designboom.com >

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Tom Deacon Interview

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Tom Deacon Interview

Tom Deacon has been missing for a decade, as in gone, no more work, no website or instagram, just gone. After a string of iconic and mega successful product launches, he dropped out of the design world to get lost in the backwoods, creating land art, making gardens, and experimenting in his woodshop. Deacon has recently shifted back to the city, sold his gorgeous condo, made another hit chair, and is wondering where design has been while he’s been away. We had the wonderful opportunity to check in this week, to talk about design life, and learn what motivates and moves one of Canada’s top design talents.

Via canadiandesignresource.ca >

Is Design Thinking the New Liberal Arts?

Is Design Thinking the New Liberal Arts?

Design is no longer just for physical objects. Design thinking is now being applied to abstract entities, such as systems and services, as well as to devise strategies, manage change and solve complex problems.

The application of design thinking beyond products isn’t new. Nobel laureate Herbert Simon discussed the concept in his 1969 classic The Sciences of the Artificial. IDEO, a firm best known for pioneering this expanded view of design, traces its roots back to 1978. The School of Design in London’s Royal College of Art has long been expanding the boundaries of industrial design. Stanford’s Institute of Design, better known as the d.school, was launched in 2004 as a graduate program that integrates business, the social sciences, the humanities and other disciplines into more traditional engineering and product design.

Via wsj.com >

Why a design mindset matters

Why a design mindset matters

Engineers become engineers because they like to figure out how things fit together, literally and figuratively. This is not always entirely true, but usually. The lines are blurring between traditional engineers who make designs real and the designers who can now “engineer.” Technology is now allowing anyone with a design mindset to engineer a solution.

Organizations are trying to embrace design thinking, or some version of it, as they look to solve problems. Stanford’s d.school draws a continuously evolving circle that starts with empathy: empathize, define, ideate, prototype and test (and keep iterating, moving around that circle).

Via techcrunch.com >

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Is It Possible to Build a Quality $199 Ergonomic Office Chair?

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Is It Possible to Build a Quality $199 Ergonomic Office Chair?

Every night, Manhattan's sidewalks are lined with garbage waiting for pick-up. The most common piece of furniture you'll see curbside are adjustable office chairs, the cheapie kind you get at a Staples or an Office Maxx for $100 or less. (This isn't limited to my neighborhood; I overheard Jimmy DiResta, who lives further east, say he sees the same and often harvests the gas shocks from them.)

One thing I've never seen is an Aeron or a Steelcase Gesture sitting by the curb. If you buy one of those, you're keeping it for life, or selling it if you no longer need it. They retain their function and value, and cost closer to $1,000 than $100.

Which begs the question: Is it possible to create an enduring office chair with sophisticated ergonomic mechanisms at Staples/Office Maxx prices? The cynic in me thinks it is not. But one company is trying—and intriguingly, it's a robotics company.

Via core77.com >

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Plex Modular from Herman Miller

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Plex Modular from Herman Miller

Sam Hecht and Kim Colin presented Plex Modular Lounge Seating for Herman Miller. Designed to support Home, Office, Education and Healthcare settings, Plex allows the ease of flexible arrangement with a compact seat that’s designed for individual comfort.

Plex consists of a series of units that each provide comfort and usefulness and can be combined with other units to make additional settings – a simple hook allows the flexibility to re-arrange the modules. It is engineered using Herman Miller’s extensive knowledge of ergonomics, anthropometrics and comfort, and uses super-seat technology in its webbing – a stretched rubber membrane that adjusts to whatever posture you may take.

Via domusweb.it >

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INTERVIEW: Getting to Comfortable

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INTERVIEW: Getting to Comfortable

Inspired by the structure and materiality of a ski boot, the Striad Lounge Chair is one of the latest entries into the Herman Miller Collection. We sat down with Jehs and Laub to discuss the chair in detail.

“Our hearts belong to furniture,” says Markus Jehs, who along with Jürgen Laub comprises Stuttgart-based design studio Jehs + Laub. Since founding the studio in 1994 following their studies in industrial design at the Schwabisch Gmund University, the duo has pursued furniture projects. “When we were young we went to Italy to work with the famous Italian furniture companies,” says Jehs. “It wasn’t easy in the beginning, but we tried hard and long and one day we had a breakthrough.” Influenced by the now numerous relationships they’ve established with clients around the world, the two describe their approach as a European one.

Via hermanmiller.com >

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How To Personalize Products Customers Actually Want

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How To Personalize Products Customers Actually Want

In the future, all your clothes will be custom-made. So will your car. So, most likely, will the computer you work on, the sunglasses you wear, the cup of tea you drink in the morning, and the bed you crawl into at night. Personalization is the next decade’s inevitable trend in consumer goods and services, in part because new technology, from flexible robotic systems to 3D scanning and modeling, is making mass customization cheaper. Brands are realizing the opportunity to leverage a wealth of newly accessible consumer information and preferences. It’s never been easier for a company to learn what you’d like to fine-tune; acting on it effectively, however, is another story.

Via fastcodesign.com >

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Jonas van Put's Buzzijungle pushes the Traditional Boundaries of Workspaces

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Jonas van Put's Buzzijungle pushes the Traditional Boundaries of Workspaces

Created by Belgian designer Jonas van Put and presented at Orgatec, ‘buzzijungle’ for buzzispace is a project that presents a reflection of the designer’s vision on social offices, further pushing the traditional boundaries of the workplace. Its aim is it to elevate meetings and social interactions into a vertical office by encouraging users to interact with the structure and with one another. they can climb it, relax and meet in the elevated work-lounge space made from lacquered steel.

Via designboom.com >

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Time to Re-Think Design Thinking

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Time to Re-Think Design Thinking

Faced by growing competition and nimbler start-ups, many organizations are struggling. They suffer from a crisis of innovation. Unable to differentiate their brands, their products and their services in a digitally disruptive world, organizations’ future success depends on better managing and responding to change. Their very existence hinges on their ability to continuously and rapidly innovate. In order to do so successfully, they must place people at the heart of everything they do. They must harness the power of design.

Via huffingtonpost.com >

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Designing for Resilience in Boston

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Designing for Resilience in Boston

As the frequency of major weather events increases, from Hurricane Katrina in 2005 to Hurricane Sandy in 2012—and now Hurricane Matthew—coastal cities are increasingly exposed to the risk of flooding. The concept of the 100-year storm—a storm that presents severe weather with a 1 percent likelihood of happening each year—is no longer an accurate measure of time when faced with rising coastal tides.

Via interiorarchitects.com >

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INTERVIEW: A Meeting Place Filled With Noted Designers - Knoll

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INTERVIEW: A Meeting Place Filled With Noted Designers - Knoll

‘Mad Men’ and MoMA

We have the first four floors in a building at the corner of 53rd and 54th on Sixth Avenue in Manhattan. The first floor is our store. Our showroom is on the second floor, and our offices are on the other two. The area has a “Mad Men,” ’60s aesthetic. We’re around the corner from the Museum of Modern Art. Knoll has 40 or 50 pieces in the permanent collection there, so it has a lot of meaning for us related to the development of modernism.

Via nytimes.com >

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Design what you like, but people may have different ideas about it

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Design what you like, but people may have different ideas about it

The story goes that, when Rem Koolhaas was appointed to design the McCormick Tribune Campus Center at the Illinois Institute of Technology in 2003, the legendary architect noticed how students had created their own pathways between the buildings as they had made their way around the site. The site of the new building included a field on which their footprints had worn down the grass to such an extent that distinct grooves had been carved out that reflected their movements. Given that his brief was to create a new building that serves as a central hub for student life and that he had already been offered an organic design blueprint for the way students used the campus, he decided to reflect this in the layout of the new building. The result is an irregular floor plan with diagonal corridors of differing widths linking the parts of the interior in a way that reflects the number of students who use the paths they create.

Via workplaceinsight.net >

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The Strange Habits of Top Architects

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The Strange Habits of Top Architects

Well-known architects are easy to admire or dismiss from afar, but up close, oddly humanizing habits often come to light. However, while we all have our quirks, most people's humanizing habits don't give an insight into how they became one of the most notable figures in their field of work. The following habits of several top architects reveal parts of their creative process, how they relax, or simply parts of their identity. Some are inspiring and some are surprising, but all give a small insight into the mental qualities that are required to be reach the peak of the architectural profession—from an exceptional work drive to an embrace of eccentricity (and a few more interesting qualities besides).

Via archdaily.com >

Two decades of Design: charting the finest design innovations of 1996-2016

Two decades of Design: charting the finest design innovations of 1996-2016

History has its calm spots, long stretches where nothing much happens and the lives of men remain fundamentally unchanged. The last two decades were not such a time. Such has been the dizzying, disruptive advance of digital technology – creating seismic behavioural shifts and tech companies of vast wealth and power – it is easy to imagine the material world, the world beyond the screen, stuck in slow motion, an analogue also-ran with the wrong sort of engine.

Via wallpaper.com >

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