The New Makers

What’s trending with the next generation

← It would likely surprise the United Society of Believers in Christ’s Second Appearing to know that their stripped-down furniture has inspired yet another wave of devoted followers, this time urban-dwelling millennials. Better known as Shaker style, the pragmatic approach to crafting tables, chairs, tabletop objects and toys using the simplest of tools and materials has turned into a full-blown trend, in New York and elsewhere. Fifty objects by 14 design studios were on view at Design Within Reach’s Greene Street flagship during Nycxdesign, under the banner Furnishing Utopia: Shaker Design Influence Now. While Shaker design was born out of need over want, its current appropriation is more about the want. (After all, Anderssen & Voll’s Step Stool, for one, probably won’t come cheap.) The results are elegant, refined and surprisingly fresh.

OPPOSITE, CLOCKWISE FROM CENTRE LEFT: Etched aluminum and lucite measuring tools by Ladies & Gentlemen Studio; Step Stool by Anderssen & Voll; Plain Weave Tape Carpet by Bertjan Pot; carpet beaters by Vera + Kyte.

↑ Hanging from the rafters like giant drops of water,

Martens & Visser’s Holon lights look like glass, though they are actually strips of transparent foil assembled into orbs. As the shapes spin in rapid rotation, they morph into new forms, rising and falling like elastic bubbles. The kinetic display was a highlight at Wanteddesign Manhattan, where an exhibit called Human Nature showed off various types of objectmaking by 17 Dutch designers. The aim of the show was to have participants express their individual identity by experimenting with materials, craft and technologies. Among other notable curiosities, there were chairs made from the repurposed innards of refrigerators (by Dirk Vander Kooij), and an Alessi Juicy Salif coated in resin as if petrified (by Isaac Monté).