Dwell May-12

This issue began to take shape the day we discussed our ideals, asking ourselves what principles resonate with us as we select and report. Essentially we started from this question: “Why do we care about design?” In the microcosm of our conference room we reveal ourselves to be very different people with varying experiences that lead us to find meaning in all kinds of places. I like our mix of opinions, because if we all shared precisely the same style we’d be producing a magazine for each other and not for you. Healthy debate and active listening is good for us all, because it challenges us to reexamine the ground on which we stand. So that day, as we engaged in a rousing conversation about what moved us, we began…

My son and I discovered the Burnett house (Off the Grid, February 2012) during a walk. We have always loved mid-century architecture, but the energy-efficient ideas incorporated here are above and beyond. Why do we not see more smart, uncluttered design like this? Carmel cottages are nice but are usually expensive to build and not always energy-efficient. Judith Harkness Posted on dwell.com Love the magazine and appreciate the need to design and redesign the pages; however, for the sake of my husband’s and my eyes, can you keep the typeface a dark color, unlike the print in light gray on page 81 (“Paint It Black,” February 2012)? I had to find the brightest light in the house to read this interesting information. Perhaps at my age, 58, I am not…

João Canziani New York–based photographer João Canziani shot designer Søren Rose for “Mining Modernism” (p. 36). “Søren reminded me of a charming and perhaps more photogenic version of actor Michael Fassbender. He was disarming, and I could tell why he had had such success in New York City. The more I took his picture, the more I developed a sort of man-crush,” Canziani says. “We went to the stone yard where Søren sources his marble and one slab became the perfect backdrop for a portrait. Its pattern made it it look as if he had angel’s wings.” Tiffany Chu Boston-based writer Tiffany Chu has a background in architecture and comparative media studies. Besides writing and designing, her passions include photography, cartography, bicycling, and all things Scandinavian. Interviewing emerging designers from…

1 Pier 41 Brooklyn, NY redhookwaterfront.com A Civil War–era waterfront warehouse in Red Hook, Brooklyn, known as Pier 41, is a loose case study in the co-working movement. Partially converted in 2008 into a residential set for cast members on MTV’s The Real World, it’s since become a mecca for design studios large and small, from a furniture maker specializing in Japanese joinery to a variety of ceramicists and industrial designers—even a storefront selling Key lime pie. “I was working from home and realized that wasn’t going to fly. Here, I like the vibrant energy and opportunities for collaboration,” says florist Liza Lubell (below, left). A set designer friend had extra space in her Pier 41 workshop, so Lubell moved in, turning to a pair of carpenters next door for…

When it came time to partake in rituals like lighting the Shabbat candles or setting the seder plate, designer Stanley Saitowitz of Natoma Architects, Inc., saw nothing but a sea of Star of David–bedecked kitsch. Unable to find the goods that suited both his aesthetic and his practice, he set about designing a spare, modern suite of Jewish objects—on view in the exhibit Stanley Saitowitz: Judaica at the Contemporary Jewish Museum in San Francisco through October 16 2012—that runs the gamut from menorahs to kiddush cups. We asked Saitowitz why he had to make what he couldn’t find. Why did you make this collection of religious and ceremonial objects? I saw a disconnect between the purity of the spiritual pursuits and the ideas that we as Jews value and the…

After creating the Blur sofa for Moroso in 2010, New York–based designer Marc Thorpe collaborated with Jos Pelders, of the Dutch textile manufacturer Innofa, to conceive a fabric capable of pulling off a disappearing act. To do this, the duo developed software to translate a 2-D design into a 3-D piece of material. The process, which took nearly two years to perfect, begins at the top of a complex sewing machine that resembles a miniature vertically oriented Large Hadron Collider. There sits a ring of needles containing an assortment of colored threads. When the software calls for a hue, a needle drops into the piece and the resulting stitch becomes a square “pixel” in the design. While this is occurring, the fabric is simultaneously knit (not woven) into layers, creating…