Oct
14
You’ve seen leather and steel chairs before, but probably never one that looked like this:
That’s the Pepe, by Italian architect/designer Raffaella Mangiarotti.
I have no equestrian background and have no idea how comfortable this is, but I covet it.
The vegetable-tanned leather is stretched long over the steel frame and stitched into place, then the excess is sliced off by hand:
The chair is in production by Italian furniture manufacturer Opinion Ciatti.
Oct
14
The Colombian capital sits high on a plateau in the Andes at over 8,500 feet, cradled by steep green mountains. Here, design heritage and culture can be found in markets and murals, metal and thread, in historic places and purpose-built spaces.
In the city’s historic center, the Museo Botero and the Museo del Oro anchor two ends of a cultural spectrum. Botero is Colombia’s most internationally recognized artist, and his sculptures and paintings stretch forms into chubby satire, while the gold museum holds one of the world’s most significant collections of pre-Hispanic ritual objects, designs made not for display, but for ceremony.
Fernando Botero, “Mona Lisa,” 1977. Photo by Anki Delfmann
Fernando Botero, “Caballo” 1998.. Photo by Anki Delfmann
I had a chance to see that sensibility first-hand in Chapinero, where gold- and silversmith El Metalero invited me into his workshop. He creates beautiful hand-forged objects that draw on ancient stories and a strong streak of rebellion, often interpreting forms borrowed from animals and humans in local mythology.
El Metalero. EPhoto by Anki Delfmann
El Metalero. Photo by Anki Delfmann
El Metalero. Photo by Anki Delfmann
El Metalero. Photo by Anki Delfmann
El Metalero. Photo by Anki Delfmann
Just around the corner, the concept store Diseño Colombia (by Artesanías de Colombia) presents the country’s rich material and craft traditions in a contemporary context. The collection includes cane-fiber hats, barniz de Pasto lacquerware, charred and carved stools, hand-dyed hammocks, and maize-inspired jewelry. Many of their pieces have appeared at international design fairs like Maison & Objet and NY NOW – but they’re all rooted in Colombia’s diverse regions and long-standing craft techniques.
Diseño Colombia. Photo by Anki Delfmann
Diseño Colombia. Photo by Anki Delfmann
Diseño Colombia. Photo by Anki Delfmann
Diseño Colombia. Photo by Anki Delfmann
Weaving in particular, and creating surfaces from canes, threads and leaves, plays a central role across cultures here. It is used both as a crafting technique and a way of telling stories. From the sombrero vueltiao to contemporary homeware, fashion, and even architecture, woven forms carry ancestral knowledge while continuing to evolve, and remain a defining thread in Colombia’s design identity even today.
Diseño Colombia. Photo by Anki Delfmann
Diseño Colombia. Photo by Anki Delfmann
Diseño Colombia. Photo by Anki Delfmann
Diseño Colombia. Photo by Anki Delfmann
Another material ubiquitous in the city is brick. Brick facades, lots of them from the 70s and 80s, define Bogotá’s urban landscape. There are two primary reasons for this: Bogotá sits on a plateau with abundant clay deposits, and the city expanded rapidly experiencing waves of rural migration in the 70s and 80s. From family houses to skyscrapers, it gives the city a distinct reddish warmth that blends with the surrounding mountains.
Bogotá bricks. Photo by Anki Delfmann
Bogotá bricks. Photo by Anki Delfmann
Bogotá bricks. Photo by Anki Delfmann
A few miles away in La Merced, walls start to become more colorful and mix bricks with murals. Often depicting themes of indigenous heritage and native flora and fauna, they tell a story of local pride at street level.
Street art by Resistiza. Photo by Anki Delfmann
Equally colorful, Mercado La Perseverancia shows how grassroots creativity, paired with government support, can revive a city landmark. There is a strong female presence at La Perseverancia, where women reinvent traditional dishes from across Colombia, celebrating the nation’s biodiversity and cultural richness. A state-backed renovation with public art and training programs helped the market earn the title of Bogotá’s best place to eat in 2019 (and also got it featured in a Netflix street food documentary).
Mural by Draku. Photo by Anki Delfmann
La Perseverancia. Photo by Anki Delfmann
“Kuna Tule” by Carlos Trilleras. Photo by Anki Delfmann
Further south in colonial La Candelaria, the murals continue. Piqueteadero El Egipto is another place that tells the region’s story through food, materials, and architecture. Just a street away from the once-notorious Barrio Egipto, long marked by gang violence, it works to restore neighborhood pride beneath a striking bamboo ceiling designed by architect Simón Velez, Colombia’s master of structural bamboo and a global pioneer of sustainable design.
Piqueteadero Egipto. Photo by Anki Delfmann
Piqueteadero Egipto. Photo by Anki Delfmann
Bamboo roof by Simón Velez. Photo by Anki Delfmann
Bogotá’s design landscape is as layered as its mountains: rooted in ancient history, reshaped by human hands, and fertile with creativity.
Watch the Bogota Design Postcard to get a more immersive feeling for the city
Oct
11
This re-thinking of central heating systems is by Moritz Walter, done while pursuing his Master of Industrial Design degree at the Weissensee Kunsthochschule Berlin. Rather than relying on central boilers and radiators, Moritz took a cue from space heaters—minus the metal fins. Instead, Walter did testing with electrically-heated fabric, then experimented with a variety of elegant forms to support the fabric.
How do we want to heat in the future? We will have to switch to sustainable and renewable energy sources, as fossil fuels do not offer a long-term perspective. Furthermore, conventional heating systems with complex infrastructure only insufficiently meet individual heating needs. The project HOTSPOT explores the possibilities of decentralized, electricity-based heating.
By creating small heat zones in the room, heating is both more comfortable and efficient. I developed a product-family with two objects: a heat panel for large-area radiant heating as well as mobile, modular heat-storage units for near-body heat transfer. The objects are capable of responding flexibly to individual heating needs and they fit seamlessly into residential environments.
Walter, now a dual-degree industrial designer, won a 2025 Rising Talents Award for the project.
Oct
11
This La Libreria project, designed by Diller Scofidio + Renfro Architects, is based on a concept by Diane von Furstenberg and is currently being showcased at the Venice Architecture Biennale. The project’s execution relied on a special textile membrane called STFE developed by the Serge Ferrari Group, a French materials manufacturer. (STFE is made of polyarylate, a type of durable polyester with good optical clarity and UV resistance.)
La Libreria is a creation by the American firm DS+R Architects, aiming to promote reading and access to knowledge. Its lightweight and mobile design allows the library to be moved and brought directly to its audiences. It draws inspiration from tensile lightweight architecture, and in particular from the experimental work of French engineer Robert Le Ricolais in the mid-20th century, who explored the concept of “tensegrity.”
“We considered several ideas around nomadic, tent-like structures,” says DS+R Architects’ Matt Ostrow. The main challenges were: it had to be quick to assemble and dismantle, potentially reusable, and respect a tight budget. The site itself also posed difficulties for transporting and assembling materials. We wanted people to feel like they were in a garden—even inside. The transparency allows natural light in, which is important since the structure is primarily used during the day. It also connects people to the surrounding environment. But we needed more than just transparency: we also needed shading, durability, and security. Additionally, we had to adapt to the site’s linear constraints, which influenced the overall design.”
“We naturally began exploring the use of a transparent material for the outer shell. As we were working with a spindle-like system—a 24-meter cable-reinforced steel structure—we knew that deflection would occur and heavy materials would compromise stability. To preserve the span and overall lightness, we turned to a textile membrane. We explored several materials, but many lacked the necessary stiffness or didn’t offer adequate security. We needed something more robust to protect the books and furnishings inside. Ultimately, STFE emerged as the solution, offering greater natural light and improved interior visibility.”
“This project is an experiment. It embodies themes we’ve explored in past proposals: creating social spaces centered around books and learning—not digital media. It’s like an outreach library concept—something that could pop up in a park or public space rather than a central, permanent building. For the Biennale, we also wanted to experiment with structure. The lightweight, cable-stayed system allowed us to enclose a significant area without heavy components. And of course, the Biennale encourages experimentation—so the use of advanced materials and a design intended for multiple future lives was a natural fit.”
Says the manufacturer: “STFE is extremely lightweight—ten times lighter than glass—and reinforced with polyarylate fiber, providing high structural strength. This composite material can span wide distances without the need for extensive secondary support structures. Its transparency, strength, and flexibility make it ideal for maintaining tension while allowing for great freedom in the final shape. These characteristics make it an optimal solution for meeting the technical demands of advanced architectural applications.”
The material looks ideal for greenhouse construction, but I suspect its cost is more in line with high-end architecture projects.
Oct
11
Here’s what we looked at this week:
Oct
9
It’s time for Google Japan’s annual wacky UI experiment, where they design an absurdist keyboard. (See previous ones here and here.) This year’s iteration of the Gboard, as the object is called, is the Gboard Dial Edition. Its design harkens back to the time when rotary phones were king.
The pitch video for the design is hilarious (turn the subtitles on); the developers sing the praises of the “revolutionary” design completely deadpan.
Who says engineers don’t have a sense of humor?
Oct
9
You’ve heard of origami, but perhaps not its cousin, kirigami. Origami involves folding paper. Kirigami goes a step further, adding cuts to the paper that allow it to form new shapes.
Researchers at Canada’s Polytechnique Montréal started messing around with kirigami “purely out of curiousity,” to see what would happen if they cut precise patterns of slits into a parachute. Their findings were surprising. By using a lasercutter to slit a plastic sheet…
…they found that when they dropped it from height, it achieved a remarkably smooth and straight downward flight.
They then began testing higher drops using a drone, with a payload attached to the ‘chute.
The inside-out parachute works because the slits all generate a slight amount of turbulence, and these work in concert to slow the descent. Furthermore, they don’t drop precipitously faster than a conventional parachute, as you might expect:
We show that at low load-to-area ratios, kirigami-inspired parachutes exhibit a comparable terminal velocity to conventional ones. However, unlike conventional parachutes that require a gliding angle for vertical stability and fall at random far from a target, our kirigami-inspired parachutes always fall near the target, regardless of their initial release angle. These kinds of parachutes could limit material losses during airdropping as well as decrease manufacturing costs and complexity.
The research team is also investigating how the parachutes could sort their cargo by weight. “We could have parachutes that move to one side if they are carrying water, while those carrying a lighter payload would move to the other side, so the cargo would be sorted as soon as the parachutes are released,” he suggests. “The idea is to see how we can program the descent in different ways.”
Oct
9
Aerohart is a Boston-based company that makes metal EDC-style objects inspired by flight, whether by airplanes or butterflies. Their business model is untraditional: Company founders Steph and Seb Emerson (of whom no details exist online) design something they like, then Kickstart it so that they can get paid to make a batch of them. In this manner they’ve done over a dozen projects.
The object of theirs that we’re looking at today is this butterfly-inspired Flutterbox. CNC-machined out of aluminum, it has an absurdly overengineered hinged lid system that sort of turns inside out.
There are people for whom this type of mechanism scratches an itch, and the Flutterbox was successfully Kickstarted last year. For the campaign they sold them below-cost, by their own admission, at $57 a pop. Now that the campaign’s over, they’re selling them for $300 each.
Oct
8
Brothers Tavish and Breton Rice shared an unfortunate experience: Watching their father, who suffers from a neurological condition, struggle with the vessels containing his numerous medications. “We watched our father go through every issue imaginable with his pill containers,” they write. “Breaking, spilling, accidentally opening–constantly. Handling a flimsy plastic pill box is already a hassle, and even more so when your hands aren’t working very well due to his disease.
“We tried every pill case we could find. Unfortunately, none worked for him.”
The Rice brothers then set about producing a better pill case, and launched Ikigai Cases.
The company produces sturdy, minimalist, anodized aluminum cases with a spring-loaded ball mechanism that keeps the lid securely closed; pressing down on the textured part of the lid allows you to slide it open. Furthermore, hidden detents make it so the lid clicks open at each pocket. ” This makes it super easy to dump single pockets out while holding the case with just one hand,” they explain.
They also offer engraving.
The cases come in multiple sizes, and draw rave reviews from owners. They come with a lifetime warranty, and have a 100-day return policy—even for the engraved cases.
Simply put, “We make the best pill cases in the world,” they write.
Oct
8
Design/build firm Stand and Build operates out of a workshop in Long Island City. The staff, consisting of a dozen creatives, turns out furniture, fixtures, cabinetry, displays and more for both retail and residential clients.
An upcoming project required them to produce a large sphere, about two feet in diameter, made out of blue foam. The firm’s clever Kristin Taibl, a/k/a KT, built a simple jig that gets the job done with a regular ol’ router:
I well remember working with blue foam in my ID school days. I can almost guarantee that stuff is all over not just the studio, but was also tracked back to their apartments….