Archives For furniture

Living in the Balto/D.C. metro area and looking for something to do this weekend? Well then head down to D.C. this Saturday (19 Dec) for the fourth annual Holiday Booty Market! Featuring the work of twenty regional artists and crafters, the market is a great chance to find last-minute holiday treasures for your loved ones all while browsing among the beautiful furniture available at Design Within Reach. A few of the vendors featured Saturday include:

60 bugs

60 bugs

de*nada

de*nada

Mary Ellen Doran

Mary Ellen Doran

Goshdarnknit

Goshdarnknit

Red Prairie

Red Prairie

Jaime Zollars

Jaime Zollars

The event will be held in Washington D.C. from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. at the Adams Morgan Design Within Reach showroom. Checkout the event Web site for more details.
4thAnHBM

Images: 60 bugs, De*Nada Design, Mary Ellen Doran, Goshdarnknit, Red Prairie Press, Jaime Zollars

Marbelous

28/10/2009 — Leave a comment

I have another confession to make, Internet. I am terrible at picking out tables– I put it off as long as I can, I will buy a couch before picking out a table, and even then it takes me six months to commit to a couch.

When I lived in Denver, I went months and months without a table, not even a desk! I had kitchen counters and a side table, that was as flat as it got in my home.

But lo! I have found a table that I would gladly welcome into my home; behold:

I swear my fascination with this table has nothing to do with the year I spent living across from a ball bearing factory. Ok, maybe just a little bit.

What’s your idea of the perfect table? And are there any items of furniture you find it difficult to select?

Building on an earlier theme of friends and former classmates, today I thought I’d share the fabulous work of another buddy from my college days at Carnegie Mellon. When I think about it, the CMU connection theme could easily become a feature unto itself on AmandaMuses, but we’ll just see, I guess…

Anyway, Josh Urso, another product of the Carnegie Mellon Design program, produces stunning furniture in his New Jersey studio. Since the opening of his design studio in 2002, Josh continues to produce items that explore the limitations of material and structure. His work, inspired by mechanical processes and new materials, inspires curiosity and a playful enjoyment of daily life.

I love his Ant Farm lights and Knoop tables, and of course the incredible Specter chair– I remember Josh’s prototype senior year in college watching the evolution of this amazing object come to life. He took limp cloth and made it live with resin and sheer inventive brilliance.

It has been many years since I have been in touch with Josh, but from the look of his Web site, he is doing splendidly.

Images: Josh Urso Design

Good Design

21/05/2009 — Leave a comment

“Really good design is an object that makes you think about how we behave and our social conventions but still really works”

Ellen Lupton is quoted as having said that during a visit to the International Contemporary Furniture Fair last week in an article yesterday by Penelope Green in the NYTimes.

I can’t help but agree with her. I also liked Penelope’s summary of another of Ellen’s thoughts, that design is “critical thinking married to action.”

And conveniently, yesterday’s article included a nod to the new book Ellen wrote with her sister, Julia, Design your Life: The Pleasures and Perils of Everyday Things.