The Wallpaper* USA 400 celebrates Creative America in all its dazzling breadth and diversity. Our snapshot of the people who are shaping the country’s creative landscape in 2025 spans community builders, tastemakers, business leaders and more. It’s all a testament to the abundance of stellar talent that’s defining the discourse here in the United States – and the world more broadly.

Here are the names to know in America now.

Wallpaper* USA 400: a guide to Creative America in 2025

Creatives working in fashion, architecture, visual arts and more: the rising stars getting us excited for the future.

ADAM CHARLAP HYMAN AND ANDRE HERRERO
Principals, Charlap Hyman & Herrero

AIDEN BOWMAN AND JOSH METERSKY
Self-taught designers and founders of lighting studio Trueing, which takes inspiration from their art history and engineering backgrounds

ASTRAEUS CLARKE
Furniture and lighting designers, based in Brooklyn

AUGUSTA HOFFMAN
Interior designer

CASEY KENYON
Interior designer

CATHERINE HOLSTEIN
Founder of womenswear label Khaite, known for its balance of masculinity and femininity, strength and softness, structure and fluidity

CHASE HALL
Artist who applies coffee to cotton canvas (both inextricably linked to Africa and slavery) to explore ‘the impossible absolute of biracial identity’

CHRIS MAGGIO
Photographer, his work playfully reinvents the genre of Americana and subverts internet culture

CHRIS WOLSTON
Artist and designer who has collaborated with with the likes of Fendi, Phillip Lim and Dior

DANIEL PATRICK GILES
Founder of Perfumehead, an olfactory label that challenges traditional perceptions of fragrance

DAVID FARRUGIA
Founder, Uniform Object

DEAN LEVIN
Artist-designer and architect

DEVIN WILDE
Ceramic artist creating geometric works in clay

DONNI DAVY
Make-up artist, founder Half Magic

ENY LEE PARKER
Ceramic designer and artist

ETHAN HIDALGO
Furniture designer, founder of Studio Hidalgo

FREDERICK TANG
The founder of the eponymous architecture studio creates contemporary chic that’s not afraid of colour

HEATH WAGONER
Designer

IDO YOSHIMOTO
Artist and arborist whose work focuses on forms and objects from the natural world

ISABEL ROWER
Ceramic artist

JAYE KIM
Ceramic Artist

JEAN AND OLIVER PELLE
Founders of design studio Pelle, which merges art and engineering to create expressive lighting, furniture and design objects

JEREMY ANDERSON
Visionary ceramic artist, taking the material to unexplored creative expressions

JOHN MAY & ZEINA KOREITEM
Founders of architecture studio Millions

JOMO TARIKU
Ethiopian-American artist and industrial designer defining a new design language of modern African-themed furniture (featured in the Black Panther: Wakanda Forever movie set)

KATIE STOUT
Artist and designer who creates furniture and objects that use traditional craft techniques and materials, but which are shaped by an urge to subvert utilitarian forms with unexpected results

LEAH RING
Designer/founder of Another Human

LIAM LEE
Creates biophilic furniture using colour-saturated felt

MARQUEL RASHAAD WILLIAMS
Designer

MARTINE GUTIERREZ
Artist and performer

MAX WORRELL AND JEJON YEUNG
Founders of architecture studio Worrell Yeung, creating architecture that looks effortless and transforms the lives of its users (see Worrell Yeung’s refresh of a Charles Gwathmey home)

MILES GREENBERG
Performance artist

MINJAE KIM
Korean-born designer whose work explores ideas of identity and belonging (Kim has previously shown alongside his artist mother, at Matter Projects)

MISHA KAHN
Blurs boundaries between sculpture and design with a wildly imaginative approach (as seen in our interview ahead of Kahn’s 2020 Friedman Benda show)

NATALIE SHOOK
Designer

NICHOLAS OBEID
Furniture and lighting designer

NOAM DVIR AND DANIEL RAUCHWERGER
Partners, BOND

NOEL HERNANDEZ & VIKTORIA BARBO
Co-Founders, Ollin

OLALEKAN JEYIFOUS
Nigerian-born, New York-based visual artist and designer whose work reimagines social spaces that examine the relationships between architecture, community and the environment

PETER B STAPLES
Founder of lighting design studio Blue Green Works, known for its sensual yet masculine approach to form

RIFF STUDIO
Thoughtful, young, research-based architecture and design studio

RYAN LEIDNER
Founder of young and dynamic eponymous architecture office with a flair for creating residential spaces that commune with nature

RYAN TWARDZIK
Founder and designer of Unform Studio

SAM KLEMICK
Founder of Studio Sam Klemick, furniture design practice that utilises salvaged materials and deadstock/vintage textiles

SARAH BURNS
Furniture Designer and founder of Old Jewelry Store in New York City

SOPHIE LOU JACOBSEN
French-American designer whose focus is on simple objects and rituals that elevate the user experience

STUDIO S II
Erica Sellers & Jeremy Silberberg’s Brooklyn studio crafting interiors, furniture and lighting

TASKA CLEVELAND
Interior designer

UTHARAA ZACHARIAS AND PALAASH CHAUDHARY
Indian-born founders of studio Soft-Geometry

ZACK NESTEL-PATT
Founder, Ah Um Design Studio

Entrepreneurs and CEOs at the helm of the country’s leading design companies, from globally renowned furniture giants to small brands making waves in the design world.

BEN SOLEIMANI
Founder, Ben Soleimani

BEN WATSON
Chief creative officer, MillerKnoll

DAVID CALLIGEROS
Founder, Remains Lighting Company

GABRIEL HENDIFAR
Artistic director and CEO, Apparatus

GARY FRIEDMAN
CEO and chairman, RH

GREGG BUCHBINDER
Owner and CEO, Emeco

HOLLY HUNT
Founder, House of Hunt

JANICE FELDMAN
Founder, Janus et Cie

JERRY HELLING
President and creative director, Bernhardt Design

JON SHERMAN
Founder, Flavor Paper

LINDSEY ADELMAN
Founder, Lindsey Adelman Studio

NARGIS AND NASIR KASSAMALI
Founders, Luminaire

NICK AND RACHEL COPE
Co-Founders, Calico Wallpaper

SIAMAK HAKAKIAN
Partner, DDC

TONY MANZARI
President, Edelman, Knoll Textiles and Maharam

TYLER HAYS
Founder, BDDW

The creatives who have infiltrated the world of show business: architects and designers contributing to the aesthetics of popular culture, from cinema and theatre to museums.

DAVID ROCKWELL
Architect and designer, creator of sets for Oscars ceremonies and Broadway shows

FRANK OCEAN
Artist, founder of Homer

HERON PRESTON
Artist, fashion designer, DJ

RAMISHA SATTAR
Chappell Roan's creative director

TERRENCE O'CONNOR
Photographer and creative director

VICTORIA BRYNNER
Founder, Stardust Brands

WILLO PERRON
Canada-born designer known for his collaborations with Rihanna

Hailing from the realms of music and cinema, these stars’ creative excellence and entrepreneurship capably stretches to jewellery, fashion, art and more.

COLE ESCOLA
Comedian, actor and playwright

DONALD GLOVER
Actor, comedian, rapper, singer, writer, director, and producer known as Childish Gambino

MARY-KATE AND ASHLEY OLSEN
Founders of fashion label The Row

MEGAN STALTER
Comedian and actor

PALOMA ELSESSER
Model

PHARRELL WILLIAMS
Record producer, rapper, singer, with fashion and design collaborations with Louis Vuitton, Moncler, Adidas and Pentatonic

RYAN MURPHY
Television writer, director, producer, design enthusiast, owner of many architectural gems

SETH ROGEN
Actor, ceramicist, co-founder of cannabis lifestyle brand Houseplant

SOFIA COPPOLA
Film director and screenwriter, serial creative collaborator, including a collection with knitwear brand Barrie and a range of lip balms with Augustinus Bader

TYLER THE CREATOR
Rapper, singer, record producer, and fashion designer

The curators preserving and promoting creative culture, from heirs enthusiastically promoting the family’s artistic legacy to new-generation curators of the country’s leading institutions.

ALEISHALL GIRARD MAXON AND KORI GIRARD
Co-directors, Girard Studio

ALEXANDER MAY
Creative consultant and curator, founder of Sized

ALEXANDRA CUNNINGHAM CAMERON
Curator of contemporary design, Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

AMANDA HUNT
Head of Public Engagement, Walker Art Center

ANDREA GLIMCHER
Art advisor

ANDREW BOLTON
Head curator, Anna Wintour Costume Center, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

ANTWAUN SARGENT
Director, Gagosian New York

BEATRICE GALILEE
Co-founder and executive director, The World Around

CARLOS VALLADARES
Filmmaker and critic

EAMES DEMETRIOS
Board chairman, Charles & Ray Eames Foundation

FLORENCIA RODRIGUEZ
Curator, Chicago Architecture Biennal

HOLLAND DENVIR
Founder of LA Design Weekend

JEFFREY DEITCH
Art dealer and curator

JOE SHEFTEL
Art advisor

JOHN MCILWEE
Architectural preservationist; founder, J McILwee & Associates, Inc

JONATHAN OLIVARES
SVP of design, Knoll

MARIAH NIELSON
Director, JB Blunk Estate and Blunk Space

NICOLA LEES
CEO and artistic director, Aspen Art Museum

PAOLA ANTONELLI
Senior curator of architecture and design, Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), New York, and a Wallpaper* October 2020 Guest Editor

RICHARD VILLANI
Creative director, Tom of Finland Foundation

SONYA TAMADDON
Curator

SUZANNE DEMISCH
Gallerist

THELMA GOLDEN
Ford Foundation director and chief curator, The Studio Museum in Harlem, New York

WAVA CARPENTER AND ANNA CARNICK
Co-founders of Anava Projects, a creative agency driven by a strong belief that good design can and should make a positive social impact

The ‘no introduction needed’ of creative America: the artists, architects and designers who have helped shape the landscape.

ANNABELLE SELLDORF
Founder of Selldorf Architects

ELIZABETH DILLER AND CHARLES RENFRO
Architects, partners at Diller Scofidio + Renfro

FRANK GEHRY
Architect

FRITZ HAEG
Artist, owner of Salmon Creek Farm

INEZ & VINOODH
Photographers, behind Wallpaper’s portfolio of 50 of America's top creatives driving the current discourse on American culture and its dynamic evolution

JASPER JOHNS
Artist

JENNY HOLZER
Artist

JIM OLSON AND TOM KUNDIG
Founders of architecture firm Olson Kundig

JOHN WATERS
Filmmaker, writer, actor, artist

JOHNNY ROZSA
Photographer and artist

JUDY CHICAGO
Artist, feminist icon

JULIE BARGMANN
Landscape architect, educator, founder of DIRT (Dump It Right There)

KEN LEWIS
Managing Partner, SOM

MARC JACOBS
Fashion designer

MARILYN MINTER
Artist

MURRAY MOSS
Founder of design gallery Moss and design consultancy Moss Bureau

NICK CAVE
Artist known for his fantastical Soundsuits and works that create space for the marginalised

PAUL THOMAS ANDERSON
Filmmaker

RALPH LAUREN
Fashion designer

RALPH PUCCI
Founder of Ralph Pucci

RICK OWENS
Fashion designer

ROBIN STANDEFER AND STEPHEN ALESCH
Founders of interior design studio Roman and Williams

SHEILA BRIDGES
Interior designer, founder of Sheila Bridges Design Inc

SHOHEI SHIGEMATSU
Partner, OMA New York

SONIA ERAM
Owner, Mameg

STEVEN HOLL
Architect

THOM BROWNE
Fashion designer, founder of Thom Browne

THOM MAYNE
Architect, founder of Morphosis

TOD WILLIAMS AND BILLIE TSIEN
Architects

TOM FORD
Fashion designer

TORY BURCH
Fashion designer

Setting the creative agenda, from interior design and architecture to fashion and jewellery, these are the influencers behind some of the country’s most noteworthy projects, from buildings to jewellery.

ADA TOLLA AND GIUSEPPE LIGNANO
Founders of architecture studio Lot-Ek, whose client list includes the Guggenheim and Google

ADAM SILVERMAN
Sculptor

ALEX PROBA
Founder, Studio Proba

ALEXANDRA AND MICHAEL MISCZYNSKI
Founders of interior design studio Atelier

ALEXIS TOMPKINS AND LEANN CONQUER
Partners, Chroma

ANDRE MELLONE
Founder of Studio Mellone, whose work includes interiors for the likes of Jason Wu and Thom Browne

ANNA KARLIN
Designer

ATHENA CALDERONE
Founder, EyeSwoon and Studio Athena Calderone

BEN MEDANSKY
Ceramic artist

BENJAMIN BLOOMSTEIN AND AARON AUJLA
Artists, designers, founders of design studio Green River Project, whose work includes meticulously crafted furniture and interiors for fashion label Bode

BRETT WOODS AND JOSEPH DANGARAN
Founders of architecture firm Woods + Dangaran and devotees of midcentury modernism (their Desert Palisades house won Best Private House in the Wallpaper* Design Awards 2023)

BRIAN SAWYER AND JOHN BERSON
Founders of interdisciplinary firm Sawyer Berson

BRIGETTE ROMANEK
Interior designer

BROOKS WALKER
Principal, Walker Warner Architects

CATHERINE BAILEY & ROBIN PETRAVIC
Owners of Heath Ceramics, the tableware and tile company

CHARLIE FERRER
Interior designer

CHRISTIE WARD AND STAVER GRAY
Founders, Ward & Gray

CHRISTINE & JOHN GACHOT
Interior designers behind projects such as Jac's on Bond and Pebble Bar in New York, and high-profile residential projects, like this stunning Montana retreat.

CLIVE LONSTEIN
Interior designer

COLIN KING
Stylist, Artistic Director at Beni Rugs

CRAIG BASSAM AND SCOTT FELLOWS
Founders of lifestyle brand Bassam Fellows

DAVID BERS
Architect

DAVID BUCOVY
Architect

DAVID CAFIERO
Interior designer

DAVID SETH MOLTZ AND KAVI AHUJA MOLTZ
Founders, DS & Durga

DAVID, SUZIE AND RACHEL LUCAS
Co-founders, Lucas Design

DENISE WILLIAMSON
Founder, 180 the Store

DOUGLAS FRIEDMAN
Photographer

DYLAN DAVIS & JEAN LEE
Designers, founders L&G Studio

ELENI PETALOTI AND LEONIDAS TRAMPOUKIS
Founders of design studio Objects of Common Interest (former Wallpaper* Design Awards winners and judges)

ELIZABETH ROBERTS
Architect

ELLIOTT BARNES
Interior designer who honed his craft with Andrée Putman before setting up on his own

ENRICO BONETTI AND DOMINIC KOZERSKI
Co-Founders, Bonetti/Kozerski Architecture

ERIC HOFFMAN
Founder of Hoffman Creative, creating designs for Pamela Shamshiri, Steven Volpe and more

FERNANDA DOVIGI
Interior designer, founder FMD Design

FERNANDO SANTANGELO
Uruguayan-born, New York-based designer; contributed to the design of NYC’s Nine Orchard hotel

GABRIEL ABRAHAM
Founder, Atelier de Troupe

GABRIELLE SHELTON
Sculptor and designer, co-founder of Shelton Studios metal fabrication studio

GIANCARLO VALLE & JANE KELTNER DE VALLE
Founders Studio Valle de Valle

HARRY NURIEV
Founder of Crosby Studios, creating immersive design installations

HUMBERTO LEON
Fashion designer and restaurateur

INI ARCHIBONG
American-Nigerian designer whose furniture and lighting work is guided by heritage and spirituality

JACQUELINE AND DAMIEN HARRISON
Founders of landscape design studio Harrison Green

JAMES CHERRY
Sculptor, lighting designer

JANE MAYLE
Fashion designer, founder of Maison Mayle

JOHN DERIAN
Designer, founder of Decoupage

JOHN SHARP
Landscape designer

JONATHAN CROSS
Ceramicist whose work is created using ancient wood-firing techniques

KELLEY PERUMBETI & MICHAEL YARINSKY
Founders of Office of Tangible Space

KELLY BEHUN
Interior designer behind California home of Alicia Keys and Swizz Beatz

KELLY WEARSTLER
Interior designer for the hotel industry, residential, commercial, retail and hospitality spaces

KIMBERLY VON KOONTZ
Landscape designer

KULAPAT YANTRASAST
Founder and creative director of Why Architects, the go-to design studio for museums

LEO MARMOL AND RON RADZINER
Founders of architecture firm Marmol Radziner

LEONG LEONG
Architect brothers Dominic and Chris Leong

LISA EISNER
Photographer-turned-jewellery designer

LITTLE WING LEE
Interior designer, founder of Studio & Projects

LUCIEN REES ROBERTS
Interior and landscape designer

MALLERY ROBERTS MORGAN
Interior designer

MATT MURPHY
Designer

MATTHEW FISHER
Stone artist

MATTHEW LEVERONE
Interior designer

MICHAEL MALTZAN
Architect whose work spans everything from housing for the homeless to glitzy museums

MIRANDA BROOKS
Landscape designer

NANCY PEARCE
Designer

NICOLE HOLLIS
Interior designer behind Hawaii’s Kailua-Kona resort

OLIVER HASLEGRAVE
Founder of interior architecture and design firm Home Studios

OLIVER M FURTH
Interior designer

PALI AND JEJO CORNELSEN
Designers

PAMELA SHAMSHIRI
Founder of Studio Shamshiri, has designed homes for musician Paul McCartney and actor Anne Hathaway, and was a Wallpaper* Design Awards 2023 judge

PETER MARINO
Interior designer for high-end fashion boutiques

RAFAEL DE CÁRDENAS
Designer who has concocted visions of modern elegance for clients such as Cartier, Nike and Glossier

ROBERT HIGHSMITH, RYAN MAHONEY AND STEFANIE BRECHBUEHLER
Founders of design studio Workstead

ROBERT STILIN
Interior designer who mixes contemporary architecture with textured materials and vintage furniture

ROGAN GREGORY
Designer of sculptural pieces, represented by R & Company

ROMAN ALONSO AND STEVEN JOHANKNECHT
Founders of multidisciplinary studio Commune Design

RUBEN CALDWELL, JOU-YIE CHOU AND LEIGH SALEM
Founders of interior design studio Post Company, whose projects include Catskills wellness resort Inness and New York restaurant Raf’s

SANDRA NUNNERLEY
Interior designer

SARAH ZAMES AND COLIN STIEF
Founders, General Assembly Studio

SCOTT NEWLIN
Designer

SEAN ANDERSON
Interior designer

SHARON JOHNSTON AND MARK LEE
Founders of architecture firm Johnston Marklee

SONIA BOYAJIAN
Jewellery designer

STEFAN BECKMAN
The fashion industry’s favourite set designer

STEPHANIE BEAMER, CRYSTAL ELLIS AND HILLARY PETRIE
Founders of furniture design studio Egg Collective

STEPHEN BURKS MAN MADE
A global practice uniting craft, community and industry through its hands-on workshop-based approach while always advocating for greater diversity in design

STEPHEN KENT JOHNSON
Photographer

STEVEN HARRIS
Architect

STEVEN VOLPE
Founder of Studio Volpe, whose work includes elegant residences from Manhattan to LA, as well as Gwyneth Paltrow’s Goop Mrkt in San Francisco

SUCHI REDDY
Founder of architecture and design firm Reddymade

TED MUEHLING
Industrial designer who creates jewellery and decorative objects inspired by organic forms

TESSA WATSON
Creative director and stylist

THOMAS WRIGHT AND JOSEPH FRATESI
Founders of multidisciplinary design and manufacturing firm Atlas Industries

TODD NICKEY AND AMY KEHOE
Co-Founders, Nickey Kehoe

VANESSA ALEXANDER
Founder, Alexander Design

VICTORIA SAMBUNARIS
Landscape photographer

VICTORIA SASS
Interior Designer; Design Director, Prospect Refuge

VIRGINIA SIN
Founder, SIN ceramics

Leaders of design research, start-uppers and business leaders whose creative brilliance is paired with a strong focus on technology and sustainability.

ANDREW KUDLESS
Principal, Matsys Design

BRADLEY BOWERS
Designer using technology and advanced material research to create furniture, lighting and objects

GERMANE BARNES
Architect researching architecture’s social and political influence

GIORGIA LUPI
Data designer, Pentagram partner

JEANNE GANG
Architect, founding partner of Studio Gang, behind the American Museum of Natural History extension

JONY IVE
Former chief design officer at Apple, founder of design studio LoveFrom

JULIA WATSON
Designer, activist, academic, leading expert of Lo–TEK (nature-based technologies for climate resilience)

KATE ORFF
Founder of landscape architecture and urban design practice Scape

MARIE VERONIQUE
Beauty entrepreneur

RJ SCARINGE
Founder and CEO of electric vehicle manufacturer Rivian

TYLER HOBBS
Generative artist, creative coder, painter

VANESSA BARBONI HALLIK
Founder, Co-CEO, and Executive Chair of sustainable fashion brand Another Tomorrow

YVES BEHAR
Founder and principal designer of Fuseproject, a brand development firm working across industrial design, transport and technology

Owners of small boutique hotels and behemoths whose properties stretch beyond the US: the names to know in American hospitality today.

ANDRÉ BALAZS
Properties include Chateau Marmont in LA, The Chiltern Firehouse in London and Sunset Beach on Shelter Island

ARI S HECKMAN
CEO and Co-Founder, Ash

BARRY STERNLICHT
Chairman of Starwood Hotels, which has 1 Hotels, Baccarat and Treehouse Hotels in its portfolio

BRAD KORZEN
Founder and CEO, The Kor Group and Proper Hotels

BRAD WILSON
Managing Partner, Ace Hotel Group

HOMI VAZIFDAR
Founder of Canyon Equity, whose portfolio includes Amangiri and Six Senses Costa Rica

IAN SCHRAGER
Properties include Public New York, Edition hotels in New York and Miami

LIZ LAMBERT
McGuire Moorman Lambert Hospitality (Partner); Lambert McGuire Design (Partner); and Bunkhouse (Founder)

NADIM ASHI
Properties include the Four Seasons at The Surf Club in Florida

Musicians, filmmakers and sound artists, multidisciplinary creatives telling stories and working beyond objects and places.

CHRISTINE SUN KIM
Deaf sound artist working predominantly in drawing, performance and video, using musical notation, written language, American Sign Language, and the body

DAVID BYRNE
Musician, artist and filmmaker

DOECHII
Rapper and singer

ERYKAH BADU
Singer, songwriter, record producer, actor

HONEY DIJON
DJ and Producer

KIM GORDON
Visual artist, bassist, guitarist, songwriter, vocalist, now as a solo artist and formerly for alternative rock band Sonic Youth.

LORI SCACCO
Musician and composer

MOSES SUMNEY
Musician

PATTI SMITH
Singer, songwriter, poet, painter, author

SOLANGE
Musician; Founder, Saint Heron

ST. VINCENT
Grammy award winning artist, musician, songwriter with signature guitar line

STEVE LACY
Musician

SWIZZ BEATZ
Producer and collector

Personalities working in a variety of fields, using art and design as a tool to raise awareness and amplify the voices of the oppressed.

ADAM ELI
Activist

ALEXIS BITTAR
Jewellery designer, filmmaker

CATHERINE OPIE
Fine-art photographer, educator

CHEROKEE JACK
Model, Indigenous activist

DANIEL CHEW, TEN IZU, KIRSTEN KILPONEN AND TIN NGUYEN
Members of Concept Foreign Garments New York (CFGNY), a fashion and art collective exploring what it means to be ‘vaguely Asian’

DEANNA VAN BUREN
Co-founder and design director of nonprofit architecture and real estate development firm Designing Justice + Designing Spaces, working to end mass incarceration through place-based solutions

DERRICK ADAMS
Visual and performance artist, curator, work focuses on themes of Black identity and culture

EMILY BARKER
Multidisciplinary artist, activist, work focuses on topics relating to disability, discrimination and capitalism

INDYA MOORE
Actor, model and social activist

JOSH KLINE
Artist, curator, explores how emergent technologies are changing our lives

LEILAH BABIRYE
NYC-based sculptor Babirye uses her work to respond to the anti-homosexuality legislation in her home country, Uganda

MICKALENE THOMAS
Visual artist, studies the Black female body as a vehicle of power, eroticism, agency and inspiration

NAN GOLDIN
Photographer, activist

NANCY KRICORIAN
Writer, humanitarian and activist

QUANNAH ROSE CHASINGHORSE-POTTS
Model, Indigenous activist

ROBERTO LUGO
Potter and activist

DEVONN FRANCIS
Queer first-generation Jamaican-American artist exploring his heritage and culture through art and food

Artists, collectives and restaurateurs who have brought global flavours to the US, using food as a creative medium to connect people.

DONNA LENNARD
Restaurateur

IGNACIO MATTOS
Founder/chef of Mattos Hospitality, comprising restaurants Estela, Altro Paradiso and Lodi

JON GRAY
CEO and co-founder of Ghetto Gastro, culinary collective from the South Bronx, and a Wallpaper* Design Awards 2022 judge

JORDAN KAHN
Chef and creative director, with a penchant for expressionist desserts, and three Culver City restaurants (Destroyer, Meteora and Vespertine) offering deliciously avant-garde dining experiences

KEITH MCNALLY
Restaurateur, owner of several New York restaurants including Balthazar

KWAME ONWUACHI
James Beard award-winning chef

LAILA GOHAR
Artist working with food as a creative medium

RITA SODI AND JODY WILLIAMS
Founders/chefs of The Commerce Inn

SEAN SHERMAN
Chef

SIMON KIM
Restaurateur, owner of COTE Korean Steakhouse and COQODAQ

Designers and artists whose practice has become the basis for a larger scope, serving local networks and connecting people.

ALEX SCHATZBERG
Yoga instructor and entrepreneur

ANN STEPHENSON
Poet

BEN GREENE
Speaker and inclusion consultant

CATOR SPARKS
Life coach

DARRELL THORNE
Performance artist

DAVID GODSHALL
Co-Founder, Terremoto

ELIZABETH BAUDOUIN AND NATALIE SHIRINIAN
Filmmakers, founders of Not All Films and NES Creative

ERIN BESLER
Co-founder, Besler & Sons

JAY EZRA
Founder, Del Vaz Projects

JENNY NGUYEN
Founder, Hello Human

JONATHAN LYNDON CHASE
Artist

KAZEM NADERI
Founder, NAD Projects Inc.

LAUREN HALSEY
Artist, employs architecture and installation art to reveal the realities of urban neighbourhoods

MALI AND ALAN BACON
Founders, Butter art fair

MAXWELL L ANDERSON
President, Souls Grow Deep

MICHAEL FORD
Architect; Founder, Hip Hop x Design

MICHAEL K CHEN
Architect

NORMAN TEAGUE
Designer, maker, educator, focuses on connecting with local communities

PETER DO
Fashion designer, brand is rooted in community and dedicated to supporting New York’s garment district

RAUL LOPEZ
Founder of fashion brand Luar

RICK LOWE
Artist, champions people and communities through social practice-based art projects

RITESH GUPTA
Founder of Useful School, a virtual learning platform that puts people of colour front and centre

ROB AQUINO
Community builder and nightlife producer

SARA ZEWDE
Founding principal of design firm Studio Zewde, which focuses on landscape architecture, urbanism and public art

SEAN YASHAR
Founder, The Culture Creative

SHANE DAVIS
Co-founder and creative director of Public Records, a multi-faceted music, social and exhibition space for the community, and co-founder of new design studio for worldwide hospitality/residential projects, Public Service

SHEENA ZADEH-DALY
Founder of beauty brand Kosas, which offers inclusive shades in its make-up ranges

TAMARA HOUSTON
Author, entertainment producer, founder of heritage development enterprise Icon Mann, managing partner of a mobile design and educational installation, the Pavilion of the African Diaspora (PoAD), which she curated alongside Ini Archibong

WILLY CHAVARRIA
Fashion designer, explores and amplifies the Latino voice

Gallerists and collectors putting great design under the spotlight, bringing historical design, contemporary makers and emerging talent to the world.

ADAM BLACKMAN AND DAVID CRUZ
Founders of Blackman Cruz

ALEX TIEGHI-WALKER
Founder of Tiwa Select, a curatorial platform dedicated to craft and self-taught makers, with a New York gallery space (across the pond, Tieghi-Walker will curate the 2025 Brompton Design District in London this September)

AMAURI AGUIAR & BRYAN YOUNG
Founders of Verso

BENJAMIN CRITTON AND HEIDI KORSAVONG
Founders of gallery Marta, which champions emerging creatives from a diverse background

BENOIST DRUT
Head of design gallery Maison Gerard, which specialises in fine French art deco furniture

BIANCA CHEN & JOEL CHEN
Art and design curator (Bianca), and her antiques dealer father (Joel), who founded JF Chen Antiques

CHARLES CONSTANTINE AND CHRIS HELD
Co-founders, Dudd Haus

CLAIRE WARNER AND SAM VINZ
Co-Founders, Volume Gallery Chicago

DAVID ALHADEFF
Founder of Casa Perfect and The Future Perfect

DEIRDRE MALONEY AND MINYA QUIRK
Co-Founders, Shoppe Object and Afternoon Light

DOBRINKA SALZMAN
Gallerist

ED BE AND JARED BLAKE
Co-Founders, Lichen NYC, a design incubator and store

EMMA SCULLY
Founder of Emma Scully Gallery, which promotes applied arts through a curated exhibition programme

MARC BENDA & JENNIFER OLSHIN
Co-founders, Friedman Benda

GLENN LAWSON AND GRANT FENNING
Co-Founders, Lawson-Fenning

JEAN LIN
Founder, Colony

JEANNE GREENBERG ROHATYN
Founder of Salon 94 Design

JOHN RADTKE
Owner, Somewhere Someplace

KIM HOSTLER AND JULIET BURROWS
Founders of gallery Hostler Burrows

LIN AND MAGDALENA TYRPIEN
Co-Founders, Lyle Gallery

MASON VINCENT AND JACK REDPATH
Founders, Darling Studios

PAUL DONZELLA
Furniture dealer

REYES AND LILLIAN HARDY
Co-founders, Landdd

RODMAN PRIMACK AND RUDY F. WEISSENBERG
Co-founders of design gallery Ago Projects

STEPHEN MARKOS
Superhouse

TARIQ DIXON
Co-Founder, TRNK

YANCEY RICHARDSON
Gallerist

ZESTY MEYERS AND EVAN SNYDERMAN
Founders of R & Company, champions of collectible design from contemporary and modern names

The names defining American fashion right now, both on and off the runway.

ANN CARUSO
Fashion brand advisor and consultant

BRANDON MAXWELL
Fashion designer

CHRISTOPHER JOHN ROGERS
Fashion designer behind Vice President Kamala Harris’ inauguration outfit

DYLAN CAO AND JIN KAY
Founders of fashion brand Commission, inspired by memories of their mothers when they were women at work in Vietnam and Korea

EMILY BODE
Founder of fashion brand Bode, creating handcrafted clothing cut from antique fabrics, Victorian quilts, grain sacks and bed linens

FERNANDO GARCIA AND LAURA KIM
Creative Directors, Oscar de la Renta; Co-Founders, Monse

FRANCES HOWIE
Creative director, Fforme

HENRY ZANKOV
Fashion designer

JACK MCCOLLOUGH AND LAZARO HERNANDEZ
Creative Directors, Loewe

JOSEPH ALTUZARRA
Fashion designer

MICHAEL KORS
Fashion Designer

MICHAEL RIDER
Creative director, Celine

RACHEL SCOTT
Founder, Diotima

STUART VEVERS
Creative director, Coach

VERONICA LEONI
Creative director, Calvin Klein Collection

When these groundbreaking talents have a show, seek it out.

ADAM PUTNAM
Multimedia artist whose work puts the human body in dialogue with the spaces we inhabit

AMBERA WELLMANN
Artist

AMY SHERALD
Painter

ANNIE SCHLECHTER
Photographer

CINDY JI HYE KIM
Artist

CLARE CRESPO
Artist

DAHLIA ELSAYED
Artist

DOUG AITKEN
Artist

DYANI WHITE HAWK
Award-winning Native American artist

FIN SIMONETTI
Artist

IVANA BAŠIĆ
Artist

JACK PIERSON
Photographer and artist

JASON SCHMIDT
Photographer

JEFFREY GIBSON
Artist. His US Pavilion at the 60th Venice Art Biennale was the country’s first solo presentation by an Indigenous artist at the event

JULIAN WATTS
Artist, woodworker

LOUISE BONNET
Painter whose large-scale works in oil touch on multiple themes ranging from sex and beauty to tension and humour

MAMALI SHAFAHI
Artist

MARIA MOYER
Artist

MATTHEW PLACEK
Photographer and film director

PIA RIVEROLA
Photographer and artist

RACHEL ROSSIN
Artist

RASHID JOHNSON
Artist

RICHARD STAPLETON
Photographer

ROKSANA PIROUZMAND
Artist

SASHA MASLOV
Ukrainian-American portrait and documentary photographer

SHUO HAO
Artist

SHUYI CAO
Artist

SIMONE LEIGH
Multi-media artist from Chicago

THOMAS LOOF
Photographer

WENDY RED STAR
Apsáalooke contemporary multimedia artist

After an extensive refurbishment, Tiffany & Co has re-opened its iconic Fifth Avenue store in New York City, marking the first renovation since the original opened in 1940. Peter Marino is behind the interior architecture of the new flagship – now dubbed The Landmark – while OMA New York, led by Shohei Shigematsu, oversaw the renovation, including the addition of three storeys to the existing building.

Tiffany & Co Fifth Avenue: step inside The Landmark

‘My main consideration was how to lighten and brighten an American icon without hurting its classic style,’ Marino tells us. ‘We integrated Tiffany & Co’s extensive history – in tribute we used mixed metals, silverworks – and all counters have mixed copper, stainless steel, or brass. There are ten floors, and for all individual spaces, we created unique wall finishes, custom carpets, and different layouts. No two spaces are the same.’

The vast new store is home to a Blue Box Cafe by Daniel Boulud, dedicated museum and exhibition spaces, a floor dedicated to engagement pieces and another to Tiffany & Co homeware, as well as the largest collection of Tiffany high jewellery worldwide. Dotted throughout the ten floors are nearly 40 artworks, including pieces by Damien Hirst, Julian Schnabel, Rashid Johnson, Anna Weyant and Daniel Arsham.

‘The Landmark represents a new era for Tiffany & Co,’ notes Alexandre Arnault, EVP of Product & Communications, Tiffany & Co. ‘The holistic transformation began in 2019 and marks the store’s first complete reimagining in its history. As a brand with a nearly 200-year legacy, Tiffany & Co’s drive for excellence and innovative spirit are what propel the house forward. The Landmark is the ultimate physical representation of our core values of innovation, fine craftsmanship and creative excellence. The Landmark is the perfect synergy of past and future. The building’s exterior was refurbished to pay homage to its iconic original structure, while the interiors introduce the world to a new Tiffany & Co. Upon entering the store, clients will experience ten floors of wonder and a retail experience unlike any other.’

tiffany.com

Rippling, shimmering, fluid: these words can all be used to describe the newly renovated Louis Vuitton Ginza Namiki flagship in Tokyo, whose façade is inspired by the surface of water.

The new seven-level boutique located on a prime corner spot occupied by the fashion house since 1981, has an abstract reflective exterior by Japanese architect Jun Aoki.

The water-like facade is complemented by smoothly layered interiors by Vuitton's longtime architectural collaborator Peter Marino, who also overhauled the brand's London flagship in 2019, spanning four retail floors and a salon. The store also takes its collaboration with famed Japanese chef Yosuke Suga to new heights: its apex is home to both Le Café V, the second in the world after launching in Osaka last year, and Le Chocolate V, marking its debut as a chocolatier, with the first line of Louis Vuitton chocolates released in April.

For Aoki, inspiration behind the Louis Vuitton Ginza Namiki facade is as precise as it is poetic: during the creative process, he contemplated Sazanami (Ripples), a 1932 Japanese-style painting by Heihachiro Fukuda, which depicts with graphic simplicity a shimmering water surface, as well the music of Claude Debussy.

‘It is a work where Fukuda, who was fascinated by reflections on the surface of water, painted only the shimmering of the water surface in ultramarine on a platinum foil screen,' he explains.

‘From music, it was Claude Debussy’s “Reflets dans l’eau”. It is not a grand composition, but a small piece made up of short passages. I felt that if paintings and music could be created from just the playfulness of water, I could do the same with architecture.'

The building’s shimmering resemblance to a ‘pillar of water' was achieved by layering its three-dimensional curved surface with panes of dichroic glass, producing a shifting spectrum of colour variations depending on the angle. 

The end result is an undulating monolith, whose smooth curves reflect in abstraction its surrounding environment, from the lights, motion and towers of Ginza to traces of blue skies and passing clouds.

‘Expressing the natural and continuous shimmering of the water surface by combining panes of dichroic glass with three-dimensional curved surfaces was itself challenging,' adds Aoki. ‘It took repeated trial and error to establish a mechanism by which the colour of the surface changes depending on the orientation, as well as the colour disposition and the range of change.'

Stepping inside, the water theme continues. Bright, fluid Marino-designed interiors unfurl in organic curves, with a dynamic ground floor ribbon staircase of oak and glass (alongside floating jellyfish-inspired décor) plus a mood-boosting scattering of colourful artworks by Vik Muniz, Peter Dayton and Ed Moses.

Curves are echoed throughout, from the rounded edges of wood and glass furniture by Morten Stenbaek and the organic lines of an orange Isamu Noguchi sofa to the infinite rippled reflections of the elevator interior.

Inside the store, visitors can find limited edition pieces including a cosmetic case created in collaboration with Japan’s famed Kabuki actor Ichikawa Ebizo, with an inner lining crafted by Kyoto’s centuries-old textile company Hosoo.

Another highlight is the rear staircase, wrapped in a layered four-storey feature wall of pastel shades of Japanese plasterwork – inspired by the delicate lines of 1977 painting Wave Blue Line by Kimiko Fujimura.

‘The entire interior architecture was designed with fluidity in mind – from the unfurling staircase of sculptured oak and glass visible through to the street, to the circulation of the store itself,' says Marino of the Louis Vuitton Ginza Namiki space.

‘This project was designed during some of the darkest times of Coronavirus. It was productive to work with orange, yellow, and gold – joyous, happy, cheerful and bright colors.'

‘I'm fascinated with what light does to architecture,’ says Peter Marino, swaddled in his signature leather — a taut vest, knee-pad adorned trousers and hat pulled down far over his pair of practically opaque aviator sunglasses. ‘What it does to sculptures, textiles, people.’

Marino is sitting, somewhat anachronistically, given the look, in a sumptuously silk-damask-lined room, beneath a Murano glass chandelier, in an ornately carved wooden throne that looks as if it’s lived in this particular palazzo since the day it was built. We’re in Venice, not far from San Marco Square, in the headquarters and family home of Rubelli, the fifth generation textiles company known for its Italian-made upholstery fabrics and interior furnishings.

But only the uninitiated might consider Marino out of place. Though he arrived in Venice to launch his first collaboration with Rubelli, his history with the city stretches much farther back.

Marino’s devotion to Venice was sparked two decades ago when the former Andy Warhol collaborator was commissioned to renovate an apartment on the Grand Canal. ‘That’s when I first fell in love with it,' he recalls affectionately, speaking with Rubelli CEO Nicolò Favaretto Rubelli.

Twenty years later, and many trips back, he holds the position of president of Venetian Heritage, a non-profit organisation that seeks to restore the left-in-disrepair art and antiquities that populate the city in droves. Since forming, Venetian Heritage has contributed to restoration of the Gothic silver altarpiece in the Church of San Salvador, the façades of the Church of Gesuiti and the Church of San Zaccaria, as well as three marble sculptures by Antonio Rizzo at the Palazzo Ducale, where he sprinted to for the unveiling of directly after presenting the collection.

So, when Rubelli approached Marino to collaborate on the project, all the pieces were already in place. ‘You have a city that has a unique light because of all the water,’ Marino describes of the inspiration for the collection, which was designed to mimic the glimmer of sunlight dancing on the canals. Alongside Rubelli’s team of expert weavers and textile designers, Marino narrowed in on a series of undulating patterns in silk jacquard, whose colours — a palette of pale pinks, glossy creams, ice blues — were plucked straight from a Giovanni Battista Tiepolo painting.

‘I want light in all of my work, and the light on the water in the canals makes me absolutely crazy with joy,’ Marino proclaims of his love for the floating city, ‘I could spend the rest of my life sitting looking at it.’

INFORMATION

petermarino.art

rubelli.com

Long-term Vuitton ally Peter Marino is known for his big, sexy, gallery-cum-galleria projects. In 2017 he returned two hôtel particuliers at 2 Place Vendôme in Paris to their former glory, creating a vast, sun-soaked home for Louis Vuitton, studded with bold artworks and site specific installations. This week, the brand’s revamped 17,500 sq ft London Maison on New Bond Street opens its doors after 14 months in the making. Step over its Damier check threshold made of warm Croix Huyart limestone and cool Pierre Bleue du Hainaut marble – bathe in luxury and light.

Gone is Marino’s once newfangled, illuminated LED floor and staircase – installed when the store first opened in 2010. It has been replaced with a softer, double helix cerused oak structure that now quietly connects three floors. The towering wall of trunk shelving has gone too, as has the darker wood cabinets – the immensity replaced with a convivial allure. Sections of the middle floors have been cut away to create a double height void, a vast skylight lending a voluminous, bright élan to the passing parade. 

In among the wares are antique African anklets, mid century Danish furniture, Jean Touret cabinets and piles of books, vases of seasonal blooms. Four Cocoon chairs by the Campana Brothers hover high in the main atrium, heralding the arrival of a dedicated space for Objets Nomades, Vuitton’s full travel and homeware collection. The pieces inject pops of colour to the stone toned interior. British artist Annie Morris’ colourful spherical totems have been transported from the Place Vendôme store, here placed against a glass wall so they can be seen across the third floor balcony.

Three tall stacks of LED, dyed concrete, oak, acrylic and brass discs by Los Angeles-based architect and designer Matt Gagnon run through the central cavity of the staircase, leading down to Virgil Abloh’s incisive work for the house. His pop art performance-wear pulses with vitality in Marino’s sombre staging; fitting room doors are re-purposed pieces by Italian designer Gaetano Pesce, dating back to the mid 1990s. Andreas Gurksy’s giant Düsselstrand print from 1996 hangs on a stone coloured wall; London based furniture maker Martino Gamper’s Wom table, with its warm insets in redwood and cedar, leads you into the men’s shoe department. Paolo Giordano’s cast bronze Ethno-Eames chair smoulders against an ochre rug. 

The floor above is where Nicolas Ghesquière’s sensuous sci-fi womenswear lives. New Bond Street will be the only Maison in the world, aside from Maison Vendôme, to hold a full high jewellery collection as well as a selection of demi-couture based on red carpet styles that can be made to order. The hallowed apartment and private shopping suites on the fourth floor are now reached by a jolly staircase finished entirely in pink, yellow, green and aqua tape by Scottish artist Jim Lambie or can be accessed via a gold-leaf lined elevator. A giant portrait of the young Louis Vuitton himself by Alex Katz – commissioned in 2017 – is installed on pale checked walls, surrounded by ceramics by Dutch design studio Floris Wubben and generous, nubby sofas. 

Meditative, calm, relaxed – the mood is best encapsulated in James Turrell’s serene light installation Tall Glass (2009), which thrums from deep purple and buttercup yellow to vivid orange and red, high up on the wall of the third floor. Beneath it, a mannequin perches on top of a Charlotte Perriand sideboard from 1958 wearing an embellished sequin leather coat, high neck animal print top and wide leg black trousers. The Fondation Louis Vuitton is also currently dedicating its 11 galleries to the French architect and designer, a show which is on view until February. Nestled close by are three of Pierre Paulin’s fluffy Alpha chairs and a gleaming bureau by sculptor Hélène de Saint Lager – its gold-leaf and sequins trapped in amber resin auspiciously riffing on Ghesquière’s silhouettes. High shine and high design.

INFORMATION

louisvuitton.com

ADDRESS

17-20 New Bond St
Mayfair
London
W1S 2RB

VIEW GOOGLE MAPS

There’s Donald Trump luxury, and then there’s real luxury. Architect Peter Marino, who is responsible for the design of practically every luxury retail outlet — Dior’s SoHo store, Bvlgari’s Rome outpost and a number of Chanel boutiques around the world are among his projects — went over that idea recently with a group of journalists whom he invited to his New York offices to discuss The Getty, a residential property located in New York’s Chelsea neighbourhood.

Located on West 24th Street and 10th Avenue, the building designed by Marino consists of the Lehmann Maupin art gallery on the ground floor, an art foundation above that, and six unique residences with interior architecture and design, all also designed by Marino.

The genesis of the apartment building started with Marino’s obsession with Carlos Scarpa’s Fondazione Querini Stampalia in Venice. ‘He takes the lines of light and moves them back and forth in front of solids,’ says Marino. ‘That vertical moving and placement is so great because nothing is the same.’

During the round table, Marino revealed that no two units would be alike, and rather than use the same ‘luxury’ materials to construct the same apartments, as Trump did with Trump Towers, each residence in the Getty has different, unique materials, like Carrara marble, silver leather walls that use a new technique by Fendi, and lava stone coated with Italian beeswax at the entrance hall.

‘We went to Carrara, and we went to the market and we bought blocks of marble where they went, “There’s only one or two of those…"’ explained Marino. ‘I went, “Great." So we were going for uniqueness, not Donald Trump luxury.’

Victor Group, the developer behind the project, wanted the property to be as unique as the works of art sold at the myriad galleries on the street, which include Gagosian, Mary Boone and Marianne Boesky.

INFORMATION

For more information, visit the Getty website and the Peter Marino Architect website

Chanel had the concept of playing house in mind when conceiving the interior design of its latest light-flooded 750 sq m boutique in Brompton Cross. The new space is merely a short walk away from its previous South Kensington location (which Italian label MSGM moved into last week), and its new three-storey outpost on the corner of Draycott Avenue and Walton Street has all the statuesque serenity of a townhouse, with several ground floor entrances.

The Parisian maison enlisted long time starchitect collaborator Peter Marino, to conceive its latest plush, art-filled space. Marino is the mind behind a host of the label’s global stores, from its Place Vendôme fine jewellery boutique in Paris, to its New Bond Street space in London, which was restored in 2015. Although lavish, Marino’s latest outpost has a comfortable, residential feeling.

Behind the completely renovated façade (with a camellia tree and topiary hedge-lined terrace), the boutique’s three floors are imagined in Chanel’s signature black and white colour scheme, with exuberant new accents of pink and blue. Carpets and furnishings in the house’s signature tweeds and gold flecked bouclé lend a tailored texture to the space, and delicate custom-woven window panels created by embroidery specialist Lesage, line windows in a residential and refined interior design touch.

Chanel looked to the 31 rue Cambon apartment home of its founder as inspiration, with an artwork-splashed space that nods to Gabrielle Chanel’s own commitment as an art patron. Jean-Michel Othoniel’s ‘Piece Unique’ (2009), a black murano glass and mirror polished sculpture hangs suspended above the store’s graphic staircase.

Also within the boutique’s interconnecting salons, which host a wide selection of accessories, ready-to-wear, watches and fine jewellery, its lifts and sumptuous changing rooms, feature abstract artworks by Michal Rovner, Erik Lindman and Jason Martin, their black and white hues echoing the iconographic shades of Chanel.

In the ground floor shoe salon, a textured Coromandel lacquered wall (a bespoke commission by Nancy Lorenz), echoes the polished dark wooden surfaces of the boutique, and reflects Gabrielle Chanel’s own passion for collecting Coromandel screens. Upstairs on the first and second floors, Saporiti chairs and antique Louis XV armchairs provide luxurious seating for Chanel customers settling into the haute new South Kensington home of the brand.

INFORMATION

For more information, visit the Chanel website

ADDRESS

200 Walton Street
Chelsea
London SW3 2JL

VIEW GOOGLE MAPS

With almost every inch of New York’s West Chelsea neighbourhood now claimed, an exciting new residential building has sprouted up where the iconic Getty gas station once stood. Designed by Peter Marino, The Getty is comprised of six apartments – five full floor units and a single duplex penthouse with a roof terrace and private pool – and houses the Hill Art Foundation and the latest outpost of the Lehmann Maupin art gallery on the first four floors

In contrast to the many architectural statements that already punctuate the neighbourhood, Marino’s design for the 11 storey mid-rise building is comparatively understated. Offset aluminium and glass panels on the façade give the building an individual identity, while unique glass curtainwalls and 6.7m high corners without mullions facilitate an immediacy to the High Line located adjacent.

For Lehmann Maupin, Marino devised three dynamic floors, which include column-free exhibition spaces on the ground level, private viewing areas and office space on the second floor, and a black box gallery space on the cellar level for films and other special projects.

Each gallery provides unique views and opportunities for artists whose exhibitions vary wildly in scale and medium,’ says Marino. ‘As architect of the entire building, our approach to the gallery spaces relates to our overall design approach – to create a series of unique, variable and flexible gallery spaces – which provided a substantial expansion from Lehmann Maupin’s Christie Street location.’

‘For most of the gallery’s history, we have had two spaces in New York, in Chelsea and the Lower East Side. We came to realise you really need the flexibility and space that two locations provides,’ says gallery co-founder David Maupin, who closed the Christie Street outpost earlier this year.

‘When we learned Peter Marino was the architect [of The Getty], we were immediately interested. I’ve known Peter for over 20 years, and trust that he knows the needs of our artists and aesthetic of the gallery. Rachel and I walked up the block to see the location, and knew immediately that this prime corner was exactly what we had been looking for. The location of 24th Street is hugely significant in Chelsea with so many amazing galleries on one block. We’re among good company.’

The new and improved location not only boasts a larger square footage, but generous amounts of daylight, special glass coatings to protect both artwork and interiors from UV damage and a unique mezzanine level as well.

Marino says, ‘Our intention to bring certain elements of Christie Street into the space can be seen with the mezzanine, which the Christie Street gallery also enjoyed. The mezzanine allows the artwork to be viewed from different perspectives and provides a space for social events and openings.  Each gallery provides unique views and opportunities for artists.’

He adds, ‘We intended to bring Chelsea as a former manufacturing neighborhood into the space. The solid oak floors, 12” wide, provides a consistent identity throughout all of the spaces and are a nod to the industrial heritage of Chelsea. The flooring was intentionally left natural, brushed for enhanced colouring and the edges were rounded to suggest something gently used, rather than the rigidity of something entirely new.’

In terms of programming, the new 24th street space is conceived as a standalone space, despite its 22nd street sibling being close by. Maupin says, ‘However, when it curatorially makes sense, we want to expand exhibitions between both locations. We often did double gallery exhibitions for special bodies of work in Chelsea and the Lower East Side. Our opening exhibition for Liza Lou: Classification and Nomenclature of Clouds at [the new space] will spread between both galleries as well, and now visitors can see both within two blocks walk.’ 

INFORMATION

For more information, visit the Peter Marino Architect website and the Lehmann Maupin website

We hear more and more that the younger generations are less interested in purchasing and owning things. They prefer to spend their money on experiences. Self-improving holidays, culture, live performances, eating out, eating in, yoga retreats, hiking Machu Picchu. While forensically documenting it all on social media of course. This naturally has been sending shock waves through the luxury industries. If this continues, soon nobody will be buying their products – no matter how good they are or how seductive their marketing campaigns.

But I beg to differ. I really don’t see that the love of experiences is at odds with the appreciation of well-designed, well-made goods. They are far from mutually exclusive. The stuff that surrounds the experience is still significant, if not more so. The enjoyment of a good wine is enhanced by the experience of drinking it from fine glassware. The rustle of tissue paper when you take out a new pair of socks is a pleasurable experience. Quality luggage – that should last a lifetime – makes your journey that much more pleasurable and, like your favourite watch or piece of jewellery, with time will be imbued with meaningful memories.

The best stores, the bricks and mortar sort, now offer their own sort of experiential high; part art gallery, lecture hall, social space but always dedicated to enhancing the act of retail consummation.

Of course, we all now understand the endorphin surge, the quick chemical hit, of buying stuff. ‘Unboxing’ videos go viral as we enjoy the vicarious thrill of watching other people unpeel the packaging off buried treasures. And Apple and others have redefined the art and science of cellophane and cardboard boxes, given them extraordinary levels of care and attention. But the best brands, their designers, makers and craftsmen, know that a great product has to keep delivering on an experiential level, to become part of the way we do things and enjoy things, change our behaviours and enhance our experiences.

I’m optimistic about the future of the businesses and industries that we continue to champion in Wallpaper*. This more thoughtful, well-educated and conscientious consumer is a good thing. They may well buy a little less, but they’ll be buying better. Less but better, to quote Dieter Rams, is the way forward.

Tony Chambers, Brand & Content Director

As originally featured in the March 2018 issue of Wallpaper* (W*228)

INFORMATION

The March 2018 issue of Wallpaper* is out now. Subscribe here

‘This is only ever the third licensed design I’ve ever produced,’ says Peter Marino, the New York architect best known for luxury boutiques and interiors, as he fishes around for something in his leather fanny pack. He pulls out his prior limited-edition design, a pen from a collection he designed for the Swiss brand Caran-d’Ache in April. It’s a weighty little scepter, topped with a skull and adorned in silver-coated eyelets and black leather – which is of course synonymous with Marino’s person at this point. He’s never not wearing it from head to toe.

But today, Marino is at New York’s Museum of Arts and Design to celebrate the launch of ‘Black Belt’, his new vase collection with historic Italian glass company Venini. It does not involve leather. ‘Well, I tried as hard as I could!’ he says, in good jest. ‘I got the black to look as much as a leather strap as I could.’

The gently rounded vessels, tinted in pale shades of green and pink, are accented with luscious, painterly bands of black and filled with peonies. ‘I have a different philosophy from many architects,’ says Marino. ‘It’s not just about art; I like art that’s used, so I made vases for flowers because I’m a flower freak.’

Marino’s collection is the latest in Venini’s longstanding work with legendary architects. Past collaborators have included Ettore Sottsass, Gae Aulenti and Gio Ponti; last month, the artistic glass company also launched a collection by Tadao Ando, titled ‘Cosmos’. It’s comprised of three rectilinear vessels that interlock to form a spherical void – the Japanese master’s meditation on nothingness.

Seen in tandem with ‘Black Belt’ (both collections are on view at Manhattan’s Les Ateliers Courbet this month), it’s a visual lesson in the diverse art of glassmaking: Ando’s precise geometries could not contrast more heavily to Marino’s bulbous, organic forms. ‘That’s the beauty of working with great architects – they are so different from one another, and from the craftsmanship point of view, it’s always a technical challenge,’ says Silvia Damiani, of the Damiani family of legacy jewellers, who acquired Venini last year. Damiani believes the two worlds are natural bedfellows.

‘I think a jewel is something that can define your elegance and the way you dress,’ she muses. ‘Jewellery is near to you because it is on your body and you wear it; and Venini works are near to you because they are in your house, and the places where you feel at home.’

INFORMATION

Black Belt and Ando Cosmos vase collections are on view until 30 November. For more information, visit the Venini website, and the Peter Marino Architect website

ADDRESS

Les Ateliers Courbet
134 10th Ave
New York
NY 10011

VIEW GOOGLE MAPS

Bulgari began honing its creative connection to New York in 1971, opening its first New York outpost at the Pierre Hotel. By 1972, it was so smitten by the city’s creative energy that it designed a celebratory ‘Stars and Stripes’ collection. A riot of red and blue stone designs, it was created to commemorate the United States Bicentennial.

Now, to mark the re-opening of its flagship store on Fifth Avenue – reimagined by Peter Marino – it pays homage to the city that never sleeps with a celebratory site-specific jewellery collection. Sparkling with humorous riffs on classic American symbols, it celebrates the spirit of Pop Art, Studio 54 and the geometric splendour of the city's skyline. The graffiti-strewn streets of 1970s Manhattan are also a key influence in the designs.

Bulgari’s bright, bold take on traditional diamond fine jewellery combinations emerged in the late fifties, during Italy’s design-boom years. They upped the glamour factor, adding sizeable, colourful sapphires and emeralds to big-volume forms, such as giant-link gold chains. That approach still resonates today, as the new collection proves. While bold colours, strong lines, twinkling star motifs and even a graffiti-art inspired Bulgari logo speak of a seventies-era Manhattan, the collection also reflects a transatlantic exchange of creativity between Italy and America.

The house’s signature styles, including the ‘Serpenti’ bracelet (a favourite of New York-based editor Diana Vreeland) has been given a stars and stripes makeover. The American Flag also informs a cascading necklace of tanzanite, rubelite and diamonds. A cocktail ring is set with diamond stars and coloured gemstones, and in an abstract interpretation of the Star-Spangled Banner, a thick bracelet is formed from concentric circles of pavé diamonds, lapis and coral. The Roman coin ‘Monete’ designs have been crafted using not only antique Roman and Greek coins, but American money too.

Nicola Bulgari took the helm of Bulgari with his brothers Gianni and Paolo in the sixties. After visiting New York in the 1970s, he split his time between New York and Rome for more than forty years. This collection flies the flag for both his birthplace and his adopted home from home.

INFORMATION

For more information, visit the Bulgari website

What could be more fitting as a symbol of rebirth in the City of Light, than a golden sun streaming spiralling metal rays? That’s the resplendent installation that Louis Vuitton visual creative director Faye Mcleod conceived for the façade of the maison’s new Peter Marino-designed Paris flagship. The store, which opens today, is spread across two historic hôtel particuliers – designed in 1714 by Versailles architect Jules Hardouin- Mansart – and is located in the Place Vendôme, where the young founder of the storied house first opened his trunk shop 160 years ago.

It’s a space that reflects the evolution of a house, which began as a specialist luggage supplier to aristocrats, including the Empress Eugénie de Montijo. The new two-storey boutique boasts not just leather goods, textiles, fragrance, jewellery and men’s and women’s ready to wear, but also its first savoir-faire corner, and its only dedicated home for its Objets Nomades collection of travel-inspired products. Each light-filled floor is connected by a staircase carved from 18th-century stone, complete with sleek glass balustrades, suspended by stainless steel cables.

‘I thought I would juxtapose a modern aesthetic to everything within the walls and restore as beautifully and faithfully as possible the exterior,’ Marino explains of the space’s design elements. ‘The balance between modern and old, is for me, what Paris is all about’.

This duality, too, is a reflection of Louis Vuitton. Nodding to its rich heritage, two of the maison’s most notable trunks are on display: a Library Trunk, ordered in 1933 by the Hollywood screenwriter Mrs W, and the 1917 Steamer Trunk, owned by Mr O, an admired Parisian jeweller. And what could be more symbolic of the brand’s future than the creation of an exclusive version of its Tambour Moon Tourbillon Volant ‘Poinçon de Genève’ timepiece, made with 296 diamonds on its movement and case.

Light was an essential element of Marino’s design, which features extensive windows and doors which encourage the space to feel airy and exuberant. ‘The ultramodern insertions bring an element of transparency, increasing the flow of natural light within the space,’ he says. ‘We filled in what was a courtyard between the two townhouses – now a double-height space with a skylight introducing daylight from above.’

These features illuminate not just clothes and accessories, but a collection of over 30 works by 22 different artists curated by Marino himself. Stacks of colourful spheres by the artist Annie Morris line the staircases and a 2015 portrait of a young Louis Vuitton by Yan Pei-Ming hangs omnisciently in the accessories space. The space also features custom light sculptures by Philippe Anthonioz, and other works by artists including Stephen Sprouse, Laurent Grasso and Gregor Hildebrandt. ‘Their purpose is to make you smile, and enjoy yourself,’ Marino says.

Despite the store’s grand Place Vendôme location (one which also boasts other Marino-commissioned flagships by Chanel and Dior), the intention of the space is not to overwhelm, but welcome. ‘The whole concept is that we call it the Louis Vuitton Maison. “The House of Vuitton” in this case is very fitting within the classic Parisian townhouses. This is intended to make the visitors feel at home,’ Marino says. 'On entering one should feel excited and expectant, and on leaving, happy and uplifted.’

INFORMATION

For more information, visit the Louis Vuitton website and the Peter Marino website

ADDRESS

2 Place Vendôme
75001 Paris

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Peter Marino is continually driven to make new and long-lasting marks on the creative world. Starchitect, artist, fashion house favourite, leather-clad luminary and landscape gardener; a few of the many titles Marino has collected over an ongoing 45 year career. His art collection is just as multifaceted, including Andy Warhol paintings, historic bronze sculptures, and one of the world's largest collections of Robert Mapplethorpe photographs.

Another title to add to the list: trend-avoider. 'Trends are for people who want to get noticed. Three months later everyone is yawning,' says Marino, clad hat-to-shoe in the iconoclastic biker-gear he's known for, complete with fingerless gloves bound in the same French calf leather used for his recent pen collaboration with Caran d'Ache. Silver bird-skull rings clink on each finger. 'Maybe it’s old fashioned, but I think the end goal in design should be timelessness. IM Pei achieved it with the East Wing of the National Gallery of Washington. It has no time, no place, no nothing. That’s why it was great when it opened, it's great now, and will always be great.'

His quest for design longevity explains his predilection for bronze – a material that can last 5,000 years. He has worked with it since 2012 on three collections of functional boxes, the latest of which is currently on display at Gagosian gallery's Davies Street location. 'There was a show about the age of bronze here in London about three years ago,' Marino recalls. 'The centrepiece was a Greek statue of a dancer that they found under the ocean from 400 BC. It was essentially 2,414 years old. I was so impressed. What art really lasts the ages? Does anything we do last that long?'

Bronze doesn't just appeal to Marino for its ability to outlive us. 'It's one of those materials that becomes more beautiful the more you touch it. It reacts to the oil in your hands, as opposed to plastic which gets scratched, or wood, that dries up and rots.'

Despite looking deep into the future, Marino's steel-toe capped shoes are firmly planted in the present. Physicality and touch are vital to his practice. He is preoccupied by texture, and the different patinas on his boxes attest to this. Charred, gilded wood gives way to undulating waves of silvered dragon scales, topped by impeccably varnished, blackened surfaces. The doors to one box bares imprint after imprint of Marino's thumb.

To the touch, such intricacies unfold themselves. From afar, the boxes are unshakable, ominous objects; some five foot tall, and just as wide. Marino calls them 'serious'. As with the previous two series (2012 and 2014 respectively), this collection was produced in France's Atelier St. Jacques, part of the Fondation de Coubertin – the French national institution for crafts and manual work. Marino describes his visit there as an 'emotional' experience. 'When I met the guys at the foundry, they were wearing hilariously long leather smocks and gloves so they don't burn. They pour out molten bronze liquid, the smoke pours everywhere – like the fourth of July. The casting is like giving birth to a work of art.'

Marino revels in the theatrical, almost mythological process, which he attributes to a childhood love of legend and storybook fantasy. 'All little boys love mythology,' he says. 'My favourite was always the "Golden Fleece". It is an enduring story. Myths are continually, universally relevant, which is why they last.'

As will these boxes. They are dateless, folkloric, and entirely untrendy. 'So often, people want to be an architect, or an artist, of their time,' says Marino. 'The higher goal, if I may, is to transcend it.'

INFORMATION

’Peter Marino: Fire and Water’ is on view until 11 August. For more information, visit the Gagosian gallery website

ADDRESS

Gagosian
17 - 19 Davies Street
London

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Caran d’Ache is no stranger to interdisciplinary collaborations – previous design partners include watchmaker MB&F, architect Mario Botta and designer Paul Smith. It makes sense, then, that the Swiss writing instrument maker would partner up with a man of many (leather) hats, Peter Marino.

The architect, artist, and prolific fashion boutique designer has contributed a limited-edition pen to the ‘Varius’ collection, which has seen 50 iterations over the brand’s 100 year history, and is one of the its most iconic designs. Marino, who has been sketching with ‘Varius’ pens for years, was keen to maintain its emblematic, hexagonal shape.

But in all other respects, the new ‘Varius’ is unrecognisable – and unmistakably Marino. A ‘high performance instrument dressed in leather couture’, Marino’s first foray into haute écriture is inspired by ‘motorcycle aesthetic’ and his distinctive ‘personal style’ (think rugged leather daddy in aviators).

The pen is encased in Harrison calf leather from France, and topped with a silver and rhodium-plated skull with black onyx eyes, reminiscent of the architect’s numerous rings. Marino aficionados might recognise the ‘1/150’ numbering imprinted onto the side, as a reference to the architect’s studio in Manhattan – 150 East 58 Street. Hand-laced details echo one of Marino’s many outré leather garments.

No small thanks to Caran d’Ache’s master craftsmen, Marino manages to reference architecture, fashion and even personal history – all in a little instrument you hold in one hand. This is interdisciplinary design at its most organic. Write on.

INFORMATION

‘Varius Peter Marino’, from £1,200. For more information, visit the Peter Marino website and the Caran d’Ache website

‘Who’s the skinhead with the beard, tight suit and tattoos?’ A few years ago, a distinctive looking chap appeared on the front row of the fashion shows and caught the attention of other regular attendees. ‘He’s the buying director for MyTheresa,’ replied one sage. This particular tattooed gentleman was Justin O’Shea and he was definitely rocking a ‘Thing’. And he was getting noticed. O’Shea came from a humble background. Prior to his Thingness, young Justin grew up in a remote village in Queensland, Australia, working in mines with his dad and shifting boxes at supermarkets. Now he was an unmistakeable feature on the fashion circuit with an exploding social media profile boosted by numerous half naked selfies. Some dismissed him as a bit of a joke. Others said he was a smart guy who knew his fashion retail and also knew how to project himself as a brand – as a Thing.

Fast forward to July 2016 and O’Shea is no longer on the front row but on the catwalk, taking a John Galliano-style bow for his debut collection for Brioni. His appointment as creative director a few months earlier raised eyebrows as he had no formal training or experience as a designer. But it was a reflection of the changing responsibilities of such a role and of the industry and society more widely. It’s no longer just about being able to design or oversee a collection, it’s about communicating a style and a vision. It’s about being an ambassador who projects that vision. It’s about being noticed and talked about. It’s about having a Thing!

I wish I had a Thing. I realised some years ago that anybody who is really successful, who has really made it, has a Thing. I’m doing all right, but if I had a Thing I’d be big. I’d be someone. A Thing gets you noticed and remembered. ‘Do you know Tony Chambers, the editor of Wallpaper*?’ ‘I don’t think I do… oh, hang on, is he the xxx guy with the xxx? Yes, sure I know him.’ Being noticed and  remembered seems to make you better.

Think of Le Corbusier. Would he have been as successful without those black, thick-framed round spectacles? Richard Rogers has his brightly coloured collarless shirts, while Jean Nouvel keeps it monochrome. Peter Marino’s career took off after he adopted the Tom of Finland look. John Pawson keeps it minimal, of course – he has his NOthing.

Steve Jobs had his black polo-neck and 
dad jeans – the low-key thing. While Italian industrialist Gianni Agnelli always wore his wristwatch over his shirt cuff. A bling thing!

Fashion designers are undoubtedly kings of the Thing. Alber Elbaz ‘owns’ the big bow tie and Rick Owens ‘owns’ elegant goth, while John Galliano has borrowed just about everything – currently settling on a sober Savile Row gent Thing. Karl Lagerfeld has about five Things. The greedy Kaiser has his powdered ponytail, his high-necked starched shirts, ever-present dark glasses and fingerless gloves, and his celebrity pussy, Choupette.

Although copper is his big Thing, designer Tom Dixon also had a pet Thing. Until her recent sad passing, Dixon would always be seen at cocktail events with his pet poodle, Molly. Even Molly had a Thing – she had to be carried as she was deaf, blind and 120 in dog years. Dixon also proudly sports artfully dishevelled curly hair, rides a vintage motorbike, and was apparently the first person in London to go sockless.

Ron Arad has his ever-present trademark hat, gallerist Rossana Orlandi her oversized eyewear, and Marcel Wanders has his 1970s playboy Thing. Karim Rashid, Jack Mama and Nina Tolstrup are the undisputed bright things. And the younger generation of designers are not to be outdone. Bethan Laura Wood does her Boy George Thing, while Philippe Malouin and the Formafantasma boys have made facial topiary their favoured chin Thing.

Photographers naturally understand the power of image. Terry Richardson has his retro porn star Thing and thumbs-up Thing. Juergen Teller is unvaryingly in the shortest of short, sporty, short shorts. And the late, great Bill Cunningham was never without his bright blue French worker’s jacket.

Successful magazine editors are inveterate thingsters. Graydon Carter’s sweeping patrician pelt, Anna Wintour’s bob, Suzy Menkes’ pompadour and Grace Coddington’s fiery red locks are their mane Things. The follicly challenged have to take another tack. British GQ’s Dylan Jones resorted to wearing comically large shirt collars. It may look preposterous, but at least it’s his Thing. He’s got a Thing. I haven’t. Even our Bespoke art director Aneel has developed a personal way of wrapping his shoelaces behind his ankle. ‘It’s my Thing,’ he answered proudly when quizzed by puzzled colleagues.

What could be my Thing? A monocle? Nah – too old fogey. A single bright, block-coloured outfit? Nah – too Rashid. A hat? A cane? A polka-dot bow tie? Deerstalker and pipe? Pants outside my trousers? Not right! I was about to give up when, lo and behold, I had a Thing bestowed upon me. Last year I contracted vertigo, an inner ear condition resulting in room-spinning, nausea, loss of balance and, subsequently, deafness in my right ear. All rather unpleasant and irritating, but at least I now have my Thing. ‘Tony Chambers? Oh, is he the wobbly guy with the ear trumpet who vomits involuntarily? I know him, he’s a legend!’

As originally featured in the October 2016 issue of Wallpaper* (W*211)

On the surface, rugged starchitect Peter Marino and the late Robert Mapplethorpe are a pretty good match, the former’s robust leather daddy look an appropriate bedfellow to the late-photographer’s erotically-charged, occasionally BDSM-heavy work.

The affinity is more than visual though: Marino’s extensive personal art collection includes myriad Mapplethorpe images, and over 90 of these – from nudes to still lifes, flowers to portraits – are currently on view at Tokyo’s Chanel Nexus Hall, in a new exhibition dubbed ‘Memento Mori’, on view until 9 April. The show is a successor to another Mapplethorpe survey Marino guest curated at Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac last year (he also appeared in the HBO documentary Robert Mapplethorpe: Look at the Pictures, as one the world’s foremost collectors of Mapplethorpe works).

Marino separated the Nexus Hall (which, on account of conceiving the entire Chanel Ginza building in 2004, he also designed) into three galleries, delineated by subject matter. The ‘formal classicism of architectural bodies’ segues into still lifes and Mapplethorpe’s more sensual – and sordid – ruminations on natural beauty. The first two rooms are conventionally set up, with wood-framed images hung across a white gallery space. The more provocative images in the third room, on the other hand, are set against black, leathery walls – a recognisably Marino gesture.

The show’s title refers to an object kept as a reminder of the certainty of death: prompting us, Marino's firm explains, ‘to think of the ephemeral nature of Mapplethorpe's subject matter and his untimely death’ from AIDS-related complications in 1989. This show, which next moves to Kyoto as part of the Kyotographie International Photography Festival, is merely the latest survey to celebrate the photographer’s extensive, resonant oeuvre.

INFORMATION

‘Memento Mori’ is on view until 9 April. For more information, visit the Peter Marino Architect website

ADDRESS

Chanel Nexus Hall
Chome−5−3
Ginza
104-0061 Tokyo

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In his Phaidon-published tome Art Architecture released earlier this year, starchitect Peter Marino explored the relationship between the design of his majestic retail spaces and the site-specific artwork he commissions for each interior. In his new vision for Louis Vuitton’s 11,000 sq ft store in Soho, New York, which opened originally in 1998, Marino has looked to the art-focused heritage of the neighbourhood, envisioning its new interior as a gallery-inspired space.

‘Soho’s identity as an arts district with studios and galleries was central to the development of the store design,’ explains Marino, whose spectacular designs for Louis Vuitton span London, Hong Kong, Singapore, Shanghai, Paris and Rome. In its New Bond Street maison, conceived by Marino in 2010, the scarf area of the store was imagined as a gallery, with individual scarves framed like works of art. The minimalist interior of the new Soho space features gallery-like track lighting, and high-tech and hand-painted fixtures. Twisted aluminium carbon fiber shelves offset tall pillars, decorated with abstract symbols by the Japanese artist Mukai Shuji.

The black and white installation took three people one week to paint, with the wall being angled to ensure that the columns are the focal point of the space. Their markings echo both the iconic Louis Vuitton monogram, and its chequered Damier Azur pattern. ‘If you visit the Louis Vuitton museum in Asnières, France, you learn that its monogram came from 19th century Japonism graphics,’ Marino explains.

A moulded leather and bronze installation by the Italian artist Giuseppe Penone hangs in an adjoining room. ‘I saw his show at the Palace of Versailles,’ Marino says. 'I was struck by Penone’s earthy use of leather and wood in such a glamorous and obviously French setting. I found the contrast cool, and the equivalent of carrying a Louis Vuitton handbag while visiting the great French monuments.’

Pieces from Louis Vuitton’s Objets Nomades furniture collection, created by leading designers, are also dotted about the space, which houses women’s and men’s ready-to-wear, leather goods, shoes, accessories, watches, jewellery and fragrance. The bright purple and orange leathers of Raw Edge’s concertina chairs enhance the vibrant hues in the women’s Resort 2017 collection, while the rugged rope detail of the Campana brothers' hanging cocoon chair complements the store’s petrified wood and stone fixtures. These work to integrate the original architecture of the space, like timber flooring and a tin ceiling.

INFORMATION

For more information, visit the Peter Marino website and the Louis Vuitton website

ADDRESS

116 Greene St
New York, NY 10012

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The sumptuously furnished, Peter Marino-designed House of Dior opened on London’s New Bond Street earlier this summer and is the first to display the new Dior Maison collection. Creative director Isabelle Dubern was tasked with creating a range that reflects the DNA of the fashion house, while holding its own in a community that is increasingly as discriminating about the quality of the accessories that top its table as trim its frames.

‘I imagined what could be a Dior house today, with its furniture, its art, its objects, and I built the collection by dreaming it and enlisting artists and artisans who understood Dior’s codes,’ Dubern says. The roll-call of contributors is a mix of established designer and artists, such as India Mahdavi, alongside younger design-world mavericks, including glass artist Jeremy Maxwell Wintrebert.

Pictured here are pieces from the Murano glassware collection by Venetian designer Giberto Arrivabene, which feature Dior’s signature colour palette of pink and grey. He has also produced a series of clear crystal drinking glasses etched with notable Parisian addresses, such as 30 Avenue Montaigne and Place Vendôme.

As originally featured in the September 2016 issue of Wallpaper* (W*210)

INFORMATION

For more information, visit the Dior Maison website

Photography: Phil Dunlop

'He has been known to literally move walls to accommodate a great painting and increase ceiling heights to add space for sculpture.' Such is the commentary from Gay Gassmann on starchitect Peter Marino at the beginning of Art Architecture. While some of us know him as the only man on earth to pull off the full leather look and still be taken as a serious architect, this latest new Phaidon tome takes us through the other phases of his oeuvre that make him unique.

From a career that started with an inaugural commission from Andy Warhol, his acclaim sprouted from the specifically commissioned artworks that make a Marino-designed space. Gracefully owning the crown as the fashion-go-to architect for retail spaces, his idiosyncratic limelight is celebrated throughout these artistic pages.

The book arrives in the same sleek jet-black tone as his leather-clad look. This fashion persona was embraced in our very own September 2010 shoot at the maverick’s Manhattan studio. Shot bravely with an army of matching waxy soldiers, here he initially told us about the merging of the art and fashion world. 'Isn’t it so fabulous that fashion has become so interested in art and architecture!'

Six years later and that intrinsic connection is being honed in on in this Phaidon encyclopaedia of his many artistic collaborations, forming his story as an official patron of multiple creative practices. 'I’m really proud of it. It’s a big deal for me.' Marino tells Wallpaper* at the opening of his recent opulent London Dior showroom. 'Phaidon went through our archives and said, "You’re the art architect, you commission art, other architects just pick art out and put it on the walls."'

It is with this layer of specialty that make his partnerships epic. Collaborating with the likes of Johan Creten, James Turrell and Qiu Zhijie, all of the distinctive, site-specific commissions navigate different styles. From his Dior makeover in Hong Kong that includes Beth Katleman’s installation of porcelain figurines to Tim Hailand’s ambitious photographic print across the Toyko space, Marino muses 'The work is actually in the architecture…it’s a total room.'

Phaidon also makes a pit stop at works created for Marino’s solo exhibition at Miami Beach’s Bass Museum of Art in 2014. For this he appointed admired artist Erwin Wurm who formed a skeletal sculpture that is meant to be Marino, covered in just his leather jacket and hat, with a Red Bull in tow. 'I thought that was pretty funny, because everybody goes, "That is you!"' he explains. 'I was actually a bit frightened as when you see a lot of his portraits he exaggerates your stomach or your tongue, so I knew it was going to be a caricature, but I never dreamt it would be this… It’s so fantastic the way that artists see you.'

It is not surprising that Art Architecture took nearly two years to curate, including all works commissioned for the Louis Vuitton, Chanel and Bulgari spaces plus private homes travelling Switzerland to Palm Beach. In the thralls of his dazzling commissioned work by some of the world's best artists, Marino left us with a gentle retrospective muse about our 2010 shoot: 'those shots of our studio have become a classic,' – it's true, Marino certainly knows his art.

INFORMATION

Peter Marino: Art Architecture by Brad Goldfarb, £79.95, published by Phaidon and available at WallpaperSTORE*

Every new show on Robert Mapplethorpe – and often, there are many running simultaneously – presents an opportunity to view his provocative work through a different interpretative lens. With Peter Marino as curator of 'XYZ', a Mapplethorpe exhibition at the Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac in Paris, the statement is as much about space as subject matter. Or, as he tells Wallpaper*, ‘I’m hoping to achieve something, if I may say, that appears a little more focused than what has been shown before.’

Most notably, the internationally renowned architect has impeded entry to the main gallery with a black wall featuring a trio of images that correspond to the themes of Mapplethorpe’s well-known X, Y, and Z portfolios (X for sex, Y for floral still lifes, Z for nudes). Visitors are forced to first confront this grouping – Marino’s so-called ‘table of contents’ – before turning one corner or the other to arrive into a darkened, temple-like space. It's a seemingly sacred backdrop for images that, at their most erotic extreme, might qualify as profane. Each of the three walls features an arrangement of 18 photos relating to the themes, but not, as Marino makes clear, a selection lifted directly from the portfolios. (Several have come from the permanent collections of the Guggenheim Museum, The Getty Museum and LACMA; Thaddaeus Ropac has represented the artist’s work since 2000).

This staging, says Marino, circumvents the feeling of 'walking into a void.' As revelatory as this sounds, given that it goes against most gallery architecture, it wasn’t his only reason. ‘I also don’t like, what I call, making value judgments. If, for a viewer, you walk directly into that wall, you are automatically saying, "Ah, that is my most important thing." And on purpose, I said, no, all three are equally important.’ Thus, the sadomasochism, sexuality charged flora and sculpted male nudity exist both independently of each other, and as a harmonised whole (one, that should be noted, is not suitable for children).

Finally, on the fourth wall (the reverse of the one installed for the show) is a single image of the photographer’s eyes, as if he has been watching everyone all along. In the outer gallery, meanwhile, is a series of 17 Polaroid images divided between explicitly sexual and intriguingly, experimentally abstract – the two sides of Mapplethorpe that Marino believes are 'never adequately explained'. In his mind, what they lack in aesthetic value, they make up for in establishing the artist’s early motivations.

If by this point, Marino comes off sounding a Mapplethorpe expert, that’s because he has been a collector for decades (he says they met briefly at Andy Warhol’s Factory but were never friends). In fact, his collection is so substantial that it will be traveling to Tokyo, followed by Osaka, for its own exhibition in 2017.

While Mapplethorpe isn’t known for obvious architectural themes – building facades, say – his style was unequivocally architectural. In fact, Marino began his personal collection with a tulip image because he was drawn to the shadow play from a mullioned window. ‘I always thought he had a very architectural eye,’ he says, adding how he arrived at the show's final edit by selecting examples in which Mapplethorpe worked both with and against ‘centrality’.

Asked what this reading of Mapplethorpe might reveal about him, Peter Marino, the architect laughs, pauses and replies, ‘I’m at a stage in life where I can afford to be brutally honest. I mean it’s liberating; it’s free; it’s great.’

INFORMATION

'XYZ curated by Peter Marino' runs until 5 March. For more information, visit the Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac website

Photography: Courtesy of Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac and The Robert Mapplethorpe Foundation

ADDRESS

Galerie Thaddaeus Ropac
7 Rue Debellyme
Paris

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Behind its stucco heritage listed facade, over the past year and a half Chanel has quietly undertaken the ground-up gutting of its London horology and fine jewellery boutique.

Some six years in the planning, and overseen down to the placement of the last sheath of wheat by Peter Marino himself, the complete transformation sees the former boutique’s one floor of retail space bolstered to three, and lavished from floor-to-ceiling with a golden gleam.

This gilt jewellery box is the antithesis of the homogenised luxury chain store, with their stark display cabinets and stamped furnishings, replicated from Shanghai to Sydney. This lavish enclave feels more like a resplendent private residence made up of elegant drawing rooms than a commercial retail space. And in spite of the building’s slim width, Marino has smartly done away with the first floor altogether so that the ground floor opens up with double ceilings from which two magnificent Goossens ‘Couronne’ chandeliers hang.

This townhouse’s grand environs – from its tufted ‘tweed’ carpets to its smooth suede walls – are so sumptuous that even the megawatt jewellery on show seems perfectly at home dotted between the address’ contemporary artworks, gilt 18th century Venetian mirrors, 19th century Chinese rugs and antique Louis XV chairs.

Nodding to Mademoiselle Chanel’s Rue Cambon apartment, a crystal ball sits atop the founder’s preferred scroll-armed coffee table, while Coromandel screens from the Qing Dynasty (dating back to 1671) have been fixed to the ground floor’s walls, just as they are appointed in Coco Chanel’s private residence.

But antiques aside, the boutique’s design centrepiece is Goossens' ‘bijoux espace’ rock crystal and bronze staircase. The balustrade, which joins the two main salons, was made entirely by hand, and encircles the store’s bespoke glass lift. The house’s relationship with Goossens’ studio dates back to founder Robert Goossen’s work with Coco Chanel, while the business itself was acquired by Chanel in 2005.

At the crown of the building, and sporting sweeping views over Bond Street lies the house’s VIP salon, complete with a working bio fuel limestone fireplace and Goossens’ ‘Vendôme’ chandelier. This one may only be viewed by a select few sets of eyes, but then this store is all about layers of discovery: a place where antiquity meets audacity, and haute meets heritage.

With so much of London’s fine jewellery district currently under construction (De Grisogono is working with David Collins Studio and Van Cleef & Arpels with Jouin Manku), what is crystal clear is that Chanel has set the design bar in solid gold here.

INFORMATION

Chanel

ADDRESS

173 New Bond Street London W1S 4RF

‘Mr Marino doesn’t know what’s coming,’ says Martine Goossens of the staircase design she is creating for Chanel’s new London watch and jewellery boutique. Designed by Peter Marino, the three-storey emporium, due to open in early November, marks a significantly expanded presence for Chanel’s watch and jewellery business. ‘It is my creation but he knows my work, so he leaves it up to me,’ she says of her collaborative process with Marino, a master of luxury retail design.

In making the balustrade entirely by hand, Martine, of Paris’ jewellery house Goossens, is carrying on a family tradition of creating what she terms ‘bijoux espace’ – ‘jewels for the home’ – a creative strand that grew from her father Robert’s jewellery design work with Coco Chanel. The fashion house subsequently acquired the Goossens studio in 2005, but Marino has been incorporating its baroque jewelled creations into his interiors for Chanel since the mid-1990s. Having looked at the architectural drawings for the London store, Martine sketched out the form of the balustrade in blue and red ballpoint. The gilt-bronze panels were created using the ancient lost-wax method, where a plaster mould is made from a wax cast of the design; hot metal is then poured in after the wax has melted away.

‘The bronze is strong and voluptuous, so I had to create the juxtaposition of light,’ she explains. ‘Rock crystal has a magical, dreamlike quality – everyone sees something different when they look at it.’ The rock-crystal cabochon studs connecting the panels were designed to be tactile, in the way the best jewellery designs are. ‘I had this idea of making it seem as though you are looking at them through a loupe, so they become magnified. You look at them and want to touch them.’

Martine also adhered to the tradition of a designer leaving their mark on a commission, humorously making the cabochons 5 sq cm, in a nod to Chanel No 5. ‘Well, it is Chanel. It’s extraordinary to work on this.’

From delicate and muted minimalism to eye-popping, era-hopping fancies, here are the designers who know how to mix, match, edit, illuminate, decorate and otherwise create sublime spaces… 

To celebrate our 200th issue, we decided to take our Power 100 and transform it into a meaty, two-ton Power 200; an upscaled calibration of design achievement. Or rather 100+100 (normal disservice will be resumed next year) – including the top 20 interior designers we who time and time and again create and compose the most seductive of spaces.

Kicking off our envy-inducing line up is the work of industry legends like Christian Liaigre, Dimore Studio, David Rockwell, Stéphane Parmentier and Roman & Williams. And it wouldn’t be a Wallpaper* celebration without a nod to minimalism, precise edits and arresting ideas. For that, we turn to Dorothee Meilichzon, Peter Marino, Chahan Minassian, Joseph Dirand and Gwenael Nicolas, the latter of whom is a Fendi favourite.

We’re not all about muted colours and clean lines though. India Mahdavi injects life through vivid hues and Mathias Kiss brings an artistic perspective to the table. And then, of course, there are those dedicate themselves to the world of hospitality, making those hotels and restaurants we can’t wait to visit and can’t bear to leave… Hong Kong-based Andre Fu, Toronto’s Yabu Pushelberg and London’s go-to man Martin Brudnizki, we’re blaming (and thanking) you.

Rounding off our selection of sumptuous space makers is queen rich materials Fiona Barratt-Campbell and big budget boho guru Francis Sultana. When the day is done and we need respite from the world or a cosy hideaway we turn to Ilse Crawford, Kelly Wearstler and Rose Uniacke, naturally. Who else?

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Hot on the heels of its new London flagship, Fendi continues the expansion of its empire with a new show-stopping emporium on New York's Madison Avenue.

Designed by fashion's go-to architect Peter Marino, who is also responsible for the brand's opulent Rome flagship, Beverly Hills boutique and its other New York outpost on Fifth Avenue, this new fashion mecca is an ode to the brand's Roman roots. From the street, an imposing façade with towering columns and sweeping arches built in Travertine echo the monumental grandeur of Rome's Palazzo della Civiltà Italiana, soon-to-be home to the fashion house's global headquarters.

Inside, Fendi's wares are arranged over two floors and set against a backdrop of exotic woods, marble and fur - an aesthetic that Marino describes as 'a beautifully abstracted version of Rome, of a Roman holiday'. On the ground floor - decked out in marble and petrified Indonesian wood - customers will find women’s accessories including an area dedicated to the label's irrepressible 'Baguette' bags - several miniature versions take centre stage set against a glittering display wall of handwoven, gold-foiled leather.

From here, a sweeping stair lined with Palisander and stitched Selleria leather curves upwards leading customers to ready-to-wear, furs, watches and a VIP area. While the fur room is lined with lacquered parchment, the walls of the ready-to-wear lounge are clad with white sculptural wall panels that resemble a canopy pulled in tension over hundreds of protruding poles.

ADDRESS

Fendi
598 Madison Avenue
10022 New York

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Visitors to Art Basel in Miami this week didn’t have to walk much beyond the entrance to get the message that the fair was taking its art seriously. On the left, at Helly Nahmad’s booth, an enormous black Alexander Calder mobile, 'Rouge Triomphant' (1959 -1962), was elegantly housed in its own white space – a spectacular piece with an equally spectacular $35million price tag.

Straight ahead, at Galerie Gmurzynska, a $1million Picasso fresco was attracting attention. The Swiss gallery, celebrating 50 years in the business, had brought in Baz Luhrmann (much in evidence, and looking joyfully younger as the years go by) to curate its birthday exhibition. The Australian director had made some classy choices, including a delicate Yves Klein 1961 fire painting where the trace left on the paper had an almost Brâncuși-like form.

After these grand gestures, the fair returned swiftly to the present day. At Sadie Coles, a ceiling installation comprising 1080 plaster 'raindrops' by Urs Fischer filled the booth with drops of colour graduating from green to yellow. At Gavin Brown Enterprises, eight garish paintings by the ever-eager-to-shock Bjarne Melgaard – all punkish voodoo faces and big dicks – had sold in the show’s opening hours at $45,000 a pop. (Melgaard had gone and spent a share of the profits at the Mr Nobody and Mr Somebody pop-up store in the Design District where fashion designer Bernhard Wilhelm’s back catalogue was on sale.)

Meanwhile, Swiss gallery Hauser & Wirth made a tactical nod to North America, where it will open a dazzling new space in Los Angeles sometime next year. 'We’re showing America at its finest,' said Iwan Wirth, of Los Angeles artists Diana Thater and Mark Bradford, while Paul McCarthy’s 'White Snow, Bambi' eclipsed the lot – a three-metre high tangle of pigs heads, hooves and human faces telling a hallucinatory X-rated fairy tale.

Over at Kavi Gupta Gallery, one of Mickalene Thomas’ fanatically detailed 1970s room sets was functioning as an artwork/resting place for tired visitors. 'Bringing this to Miami was a labour of love,' said Gupta surveying the scene. Thomas’ mission is to tell the story of Black America, and to freeze frame the minutiae of daily life. These included a pair of Crocs in highly polished cast bronze – quite possibly the first time that this footwear has looked even vaguely desirable.

ADDRESS

Miami Beach Convention Center
1901 Convention Center Drive
Miami Beach

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As the culmination of Bulgari’s ongoing project of reacquiring its historical jewels, a growing Heritage Collection that was previously itinerant is now permanently housed in DOMVS, a gallery space above the Italian jeweller’s Via dei Condotti boutique in Rome.

Much like the Pantheon, erected by the Romans as a temple dedicated to their gods, DOMVS is an intimate space dedicated to the jewels that shaped Bulgari’s legacy.

'I think it’s pivotal for a luxury brand,' said Jean-Christophe Babin, Bulgari’s CEO, indicating the importance of this milestone moment in the jeweller’s 130-year history. 'Eventually you need a permanent location. We’ve been lucky, because our Via dei Condotti space was big enough to house both a boutique and a gallery'. 

The Bulgari design signature – combining coloured gemstones with diamonds – is firmly connected to Rome. Many of the pieces on display in DOMVS pay homage to Roman landmarks: a ruby and diamond brooch from the 1950s once worn by Anna Magnani was inspired by the Piazza del Campidoglio; a trident shaped necklace recalls the three-way road structure that leads to Piazza del Popolo.

It’s an aesthetic link that Peter Marino, who renovated and designed both the gallery space and the boutique, has consciously extrapolated to the DOMVS’ interior elements. One striking new feature that ushers in the Eternal City’s history is the bronze openwork screen that shields the marble staircase, with a motif based on the floor pattern of the Pantheon.

Other interior elements are listed by Belle Arti, Italy’s Fine Arts Superintendency – an unusual situation Marino found to be a pleasant challenge. 'There is a past, there is a present, there is a future,' he said. 'You can’t ignore the past as if it’s something dirty.' So, he sought to integrate the two, aiming 'to be at the same time ancient and modern'.

A southern Italian walnut wood floor in 'crazy new geometric patterns that might have been done in the 1930s' carries out Marino’s lofty mission with a stateliness that’s reassuring yet homely. Faded green, worn-looking carpets of his own design add a nostalgia that Marino describes as 'the kind of old you want to live with', while an adjacent space is dominated by an intriguing reinterpretation of a classic Roman column by the Belgian sculptor Johan Creten. Symbolising 'the spirit of Rome, the eternal flame', it denotes the modern Roman elegance that permeates DOMVS. 

ADDRESS

Bulgari
Via dei Condotti, 10
Rome

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Aside from the Saint Tropez pop-up, it is rather unusual for Chanel to incorporate a garden into its retail space. But then this is Australia, and a rooftop event space was central to the brief presented to acclaimed architect Peter Marino. The stucco, arched exterior on Flinders Lane, the city’s most renowned shopping laneway, emulates an elegant Parisian maison, Marino having enlarged the windows and added balconettes to the first and second storeys. He also added an additional floor, along with the rooftop garden, and a central atrium staircase that links the departments.

Inside, the 620 sq m boutique transplants Karl Lagerfeld’s Parisian savoir faire - from ready-to-wear to handbags, shoes, fine jewellery, timepieces and fragrance - right into the heart of Melbourne. Following a traditional Chanel palette of black, white, gold and beige, the salons maintain a residential feel, alluding to the luxuriously layered interior of Coco Chanel’s rue Cambon apartment with tweed sofas and a 19th-century antique fireplace. Specially commissioned artworks include ‘Karlangu’ by Indigenous artist Dorothy Napangardi, ‘Gather’ by Liza Lou and ‘Pearls’ by Peter Dayton.

ADDRESS

Chanel
140 Flinders Lane
Melbourne, Victoria 8009 Australia

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While the leather-clad king of retail architecture has been busy creating the flagship stores of a long list of luxury fashion brands - Chanel, Louis Vuitton, and Ermenegildo Zegna, to name just a few - he's been quietly amassing a vast collection of Renaissance and Baroque bronzes on the side. These extraordinary pieces are now on show at the Wallace Collection.

Marino's first encounter with a bronze was his grandmother's 'slightly racy' 1930s river-nymph, which held an ashtray. Since then he has gathered an impressive family of works by French and Italian sculptors, dating from 1550 to 1750, including Corneille van Clève's masterpiece, 'Bacchus and Ariadne'.

Although his passion for collecting art is no secret - set in motion by some of his early clients, like Andy Warhol and Yves St Lauren - this is the first time his private collection of bronzes has been seen by the public. We quizzed him about his compulsive collecting, his latest projects and, of course, his love for leather.

What inspired you to collect bronzes?

Several friends of mine had family with bronze collections, which sparked my initial interest. Then I started buying and selling them to clients. But the danger of being an obsessive compulsive like myself is you stop passing them on. I'd hear myself saying to clients, 'look at the movement, look at the patina, look at the colour...' If the only thing they noticed about a piece was the price, I'd end up keeping it myself.

But why bronze sculptures over any other medium?

I find it amazing that so much movement can be expressed in molten metal. The level of artistry is off the charts. People always dismiss bronzes, and they did so particularly in the 70s. If I asked them, 'Why are you dismissing something so gorgeous?' they'd say, 'Okay, but I'd rather have a Warhol'. Well, I've got Warhols and I'd rather have both.

I always like to buy what's out of fashion. I'm very perverse like that. I've got a huge collection of 19th century French ceramics and when I bought the first piece for 10 Francs in a flea market, someone said to me: 'That's just unbelievably hideous. Don't you just hate that Victorian crap?' I'm always appalled that so many people spend their lives mouthing things that aren't really their own opinion. When you push them about something, then they sort of back off. I hate that banal, middle of the road mentality.

Do you see yourself as 'a collector'?

The term 'collector' implies a scholarly approach. Only people who are very self-important use that term. I just buy stuff. I wasn't even really aware that I collected bronzes until other people pointed it out. My house is a kind of 'Mad Max' environment. I live with the bronzes like they're my friends. My wife and daughter virtually have to push them aside to eat. I say things like 'Don't do that to Diana'.

You're known for creating modern temples to luxury like the Chanel and Louis Vuitton stores. How does this fit with 'Marino, the Renaissance bronze collector'?

Well, bronzes were the luxury status symbol during the Renaissance period. If you were Medici or a prince, you'd have a whole troop. Comparing the patina and the artistry was a definite status game.

Anyway, my job as an architect isn't to define luxury, it's to create a backdrop for luxury products. There's a big difference. I just make it look good.

You curated the Lalanne retrospective at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris, and the Meissen porcelain gallery at the Zwinger Palace in Dresden. Why the sudden surge in arts projects?

When the recession hit, four of our very large hotel projects were cancelled - one in Morocco, Abu Dhabi, Croatia, and the Caribbean. So I said, 'we're not going to make any money for a while, let's make culture instead'.

Creative disciplines like art and architecture are often very segregated. Do you set out to bring them closer together in your work?

Viewing art as just something you hang on a lobby wall is a kind of post-war industrialist mentality that has stuck for far too long. Think back to Renaissance times. What would the Sistine Chapel be without the ceiling? The artist should be involved before the lobby is even built. I commission art for almost every project I do, calling in sculptors, painters, ceramicists and plasterers right from the start. Artists see things from a different perspective, which is what I try to do.

What's the most interesting thing you've ever commissioned?

For the new Chanel store in Shanghai, we commissioned Jean-Michel Othoniel - the great glass artist - to make a giant, black and gold pearl lariat, which we suspended from the ceiling in the entrance. I would never have made the space so clean or so high if he hadn't come up with this crazed idea. It's so startling. I had to coax Chanel into keeping this space empty of handbags. I don't know of any other store with an entrance room completely without merchandise.

What do you see as the most important project of your career?

The Barneys New York flagship store, which opened in the 90s. I was just a normal architect then, without a specialty. Before I knew it, the press started calling me, 'retail expert, Peter Marino'. I kept thinking, 'who?'

What can we expect from you next?

I've designed a gigantic new London HQ for Louis Vuitton, which will open in May. The brief was to make it even more spectacular than the landmark store on the Champs Élysées, which was wildly successful, so it was no small challenge. I couldn't touch the historic façade, so I knocked everything else down internally. As you walk through the door you find yourself on a glass bridge over a moat. I think it will be different, and weird and kind of amazing.

Would you ever do a fashion collection? A line of leathers, perhaps?

My clothes are just for me. Leather is my thing. I design all my clothes myself and I have fun doing it but I actually really don't care what other people dress like. So no, I never would.

ADDRESS

Hertford House
Manchester Square
London W1U 3BN

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