Aluminum, plywood, tile, and erstwhile media empires
Oh my
Oaxaca. Teased in my last newsletter missive and glancingly referenced in Instagram Stories: If you’re going to buy a rug in Teotitlan de Valle, spend a lot of time with the person who makes it. If you’re going to tile a whole bathroom, incorporate the ceramic tiles made at a factory revived by a local arts hero. If you’re planning a trip, consider staying at Pocoapoco to support their work hosting artist residencies and running community programs. If you’re eager to feel like an ant on the plane of existence, visit the ruins of Monte Albán. If you’re frivolous, purchase a bathing suit the color of Cor-Ten steel. And if you’re extra, extra frivolous, buy the hand soap at Criollo as a souvenir of your trip and face the absolute puzzlement of every security person examining your carry-on.
Plywood on the brain
Plywood is a coy specimen. It’s derived from the most natural of materials, aka wood, aka from a tree, but fabricated through a series of industrial processes. (Everything you ever wanted to know about rotary veneer cutters: summarized in this handy little video from the Victoria & Albert Museum.) But what’s been made ‘easy’ via manufacturing is in fact, still a raw material, one that is best deployed with skill and precision. Even the most casually styled plywood, such as a series of tables in Georgia O’Keeffe’s residence in New Mexico, is carefully considered: Hers were finished in a lime wash to take out the natural tone of the wood, and paired with American antiques and modernist furniture. Then you’ve got architectural plywood, a beautiful contradiction if there ever was one: economically priced but reaching toward luxury given the time and detailing required to elevate it into a designed object. (Where am I going with this…? Stay tuned.)
Three’s a trend:
I’ve been ogling various lighting devices made of aluminum, or, atomic number 13 if you’re nasty. Of course, a lot of lamps employ aluminum as a basic material, but these are all brashly aluminum: silver, but softer than the brute strength of a stainless steel. Here are three exemplars, from anodized and highly technical to polished and jewelry-like.
Reading
Alexandra Lange summarized the retro home decorating (and anti-decor, AHEM) books we all love to read and evangelize for the New York Times.
I literally subscribed to Harper’s to read the new John Jeremiah Sullivan, a writer whom I cannot quit. (Even though I’ve been waiting a decade for his book on a 19th century German immigrant who attempted to build a utopian community* in South Carolina—that mystery examined in detail here.)
One of four books I read on vacation, and one I won’t soon forget: a long-researched biography of an obscure proto-folk singer named Connie Converse
“Absolute Powerpoint,” from a 2001 issue of the New Yorker, an article that manages to be both quaint and, somehow, totally relevant
A quietly revolutionary book on color palettes published from Wada Sanzo’s six-volume works in the 1930s, as well as a bootleg digital version that collates the color palettes and make it searchable by individual hue
For work, but also general edification, the Design Quarterly 98/99, aka the Walker Art Center publication coinciding with the museum’s 1975 exhibition on the designers who informed Herman Miller’s M.O. Esther McCoy, Jack Larsen, George Nelson, Mickey Friedman, Ralph Caplan all contributed… WOW.
Listening
I am relishing the Print is Dead podcast, which came to my attention when longtime design editor Anne Quito joined as editor-at-large. I shall not describe the depths of rabbit-holing I went down following the David Granger episode, but let’s just say: my hometown of Knoxville, Tennessee, features heavily; I really miss a print spread; and I could not agree more with the following statement.
“Content” is a word that I try not to use. I think it’s the dirtiest word in the English language… It’s like the great leveler. Anything that fills up the space is of equal value. It’s like, “We’re going to get some content and put it on this website.” What the fuck?
On that note! Ta-ta for now.
Kelsey
Subscribed recently and catching up on back editions!
Came here to say I’m from Murfreesboro and always love a Tennessean with good taste & humor!
That J. Hannah lamp….for about 15 seconds I was like, “am I about to spend $880 on a lamp?”