A Party Set Among Stone
As a pregame to design week festivities, AN hosted an intimate gathering at Salvatori’s Soho showroom to celebrate ten years of printing AN Interior and unveil the new Spring/Summer 2025 issue. Guests included Steven Holl and Dimitra Tsachrelia of Steven Holl Architects, Adam Yarinsky of ARO, Tal Schori of GRT Architects, Nicko Elliott and Ksenia Kagner of CIVILIAN, Daniel Selensky and Yannik Neufang of Office JDY, Sebastian Hofmeister of Henning Larsen, David Bench of Bench Architecture, Sara Lopergolo of Lopergolo + Bartling, Jejon Yeung of Worrell Yeung, Maurizio Bianchi Mattioli of Studio MBM, Michael Yarinsky of Office of Tangible Space, Philipp von Dalwig of vonDALWIG Architecture, Zeynep Arolat of Zarolat, Alda Ly and Tania Chau of ALA Studio, James Slade and Hayes Slade of Slade Architecture, and Bea de Uña Bóveda and Pej Gombert of SOL & SOL, among other talented designers. CEO Gabriele Salvatori gave remarks, as did AN’s CEO/creative director, Diana Darling, and executive editor, Jack Murphy. Then dessert was served, a white sheet cake with yellow piping outlining the cover of AN Interior. It got us thinking about a new business idea: a magazine you can eat. Would you subscribe?
Vitra Finds a Home
Afterward, Eavesdrop managed to make it to the opening party for Vitra’s new showroom, a wide-open, third-floor expanse in Chinatown with views of the Manhattan Bridge. The space is organized by an X-shaped set of curtains that can divide the interior into smaller zones. Pinch Food Design nailed it with the edible spread, notably with a cocktail fountain reminiscent of that famous Kim Kardashian cover for Paper magazine. The device’s low-flow spigot spouts a stream of tequila-based beverage onto a pyramid of glass coupes.
Sugar Rush
Eavesdrop encountered that same cocktail fountain the following evening at the opening party for NYCxDESIGN, held under the glass-vaulted roof of The Refinery at Domino, designed by PAU. (Did you hear? It won the Project of the Year Award from our inaugural Faces of Our City program.) Ilene Shaw welcomed guests with an encouraging message, and again Pinch Food Design delivered the goods, this time perched on sculptural display boards carried by two servers. The dessert course was red-velvet cookies suspended like the title characters from the Barrel of Monkeys game. No cake was harmed in the making of this fun event.
Don’t Touch!
Nearby at Zarolat’s opening in DUMBO, AN Interior designer-to-watch Zeynep Arolat hosted artists from her group show. Eavesdrop chatted with photographer turned designer Philip Greenberg, who created a purse out of barbed wire, which he told us is a critique of the current sociopolitical moment. A longtime New York Times photographer, he said he maintains his photographic impulses, so his jagged work— which guests at Zarolat couldn’t resist their desire to touch, at their peril—also is represented on the wall.
By Lamplight
Afterward, the late-night crowd piled into Public Records for a night hosted by Openhouse magazine and Hello Human. The rush was in part an attempt to see lighting set up within the venue’s upstairs chill space by ateliers like Ah Um Design Studio, Devin Wilde, Astraeus Clarke, Frama, Kalon Studio, Ladies & Gentlemen Studio, and others. Vinyl selections by Renata Do Valle jumped from speakers designed by Devon Turnbull of OJAS. Attendees included Nathan Rich of Peterson Rich Office, Justin Donnelly of Jumbo, Manuel Cordero and Galen Pardee of CoPa, and a gaggle of New York’s best design writers. Tea was spilled.
Noshes in Nomad
On our way up Madison Avenue on Friday evening, Greg Melitonov tipped Eavesdrop off to the pasta at Porada’s showroom, the first single-brand store in New York for the Italian furniture brand. The company flew in Michelin-starred chef Mauro Elli of Il Cantuccio in Albavilla, Italy, for the occasion.
Blocks away, the Blu Dot store was hosting Dudd Dot for THIS IS NOT A STRUT, a collaboration with JONALDDUDD (JD) to showcase eccentric furniture and lighting in the space’s vaulted back room. (The event also marked 20 years of production for Blu Dot’s Strut table.) In alignment with JD’s brand values, hot dogs were served.
Mercer Street Mayhem
The youth were out in Soho. At Orior, its creative director, Ciarán McGuigan, hosted guests who were there to observe new lighting designed by Peter B Staples of Blue Green Works. (They were also there to drink from the portable Guinness tap operated by The Dead Rabbit.) Nearby, Tyler Hays’s BDDW was a crazy scene, with some sort of carnival-like target shooting game set up in the back, complete with a taxidermied bear for decoration. Though Orior had a Mister Softee truck parked outside to distribute soft-serve cones, there was no cake in sight.
Shelter Was the Place
The brainchild of Deirdre Maloney and Minya Quirk of online home goods platform Afternoon Light, Shelter launched this year with a strong showing of furniture and home goods brands arrayed on a floor of the Starrett-Lehigh Building. There were bigger players like Blu Dot and Moooi alongside individual makers, and a long installation, set on shag carpet, by the aforementioned JD. The vibes were on point at the chore jacket convention, and it seems likely Shelter will return for round two in 2026.
AN was there to present The Library by AN Interior, a chill space stocked with magazines from media partners; books curated by AN’s executive editor, Jack Murphy, offered for sale by Brooklyn architecture and design bookstore Head Hi; and furniture by supporters like Harry Allen Design, Kasthall, and Stellar Works. Over the weekend, Murphy was in conversation with David Michon, who edits the Substack for scale and whose second print issue dropped as a guide to Shelter; and Alexandra Hodkowski and Alvaro Alcocer, Head Hi’s visionary founders.
Units for Sale
Two furniture shows at the SO – IL–designed, Tankhouse-developed 9 Chapel building offered nerds a chance to check out its cool wavy metal facade up close. Musings, a project by Olivia Sammons, took over one apartment with works by artists and designers. (The show is on view by appointment through July 15.) And on the ground floor and in a 2-story penthouse, VERSO gathered an eclectic set of furniture, lighting, and objects.
Javits Slay
Hats off to Odile Hainaut and Claire Pijoulat: It was another strong year for ICFF, with a big set of emerging talent on view at WANTED. The scenography, visioned by Rodolfo Agrella, was great. A standout spot: Rarify’s Form & Forest exhibition next to the Be Originals lounge. It was designed with Office Office and Auburn University’s School of Architecture to showcase wood construction and furniture. The demountable timber display structure will now travel to Auburn to be used as a showcase for the school’s work. It won the Sustainable Design award from the judges, which included AN’s design editor, Kelly Pau.
In Our Renaissance Era
A discussion moderated by former AN editor Sophie Aliece Hollis, which included Jean Lin, founder of Colony; Mirkku Kullberg, Kasthall’s CEO; and Omar Nobil, creative director of Design Within Reach, touched on hot topics in the furniture industry like lead times for high-quality pieces; how neutral designs reigned during and just after the pandemic, before color returned; and the importance of resurfacing vintage pieces and traditional craft methods. Held in Kasthall’s Soho showroom, it featured drinks that matched the decor: The evening’s floral specialty cocktail was concocted to align with the firm’s new Anemon rug collection.
Snakes and Bikinis
At Herman Miller’s space on Park Avenue South, a packed house listened to a stacked panel discuss creative collaboration in the Land of Enchantment: Wendy Goodman moderated a chat with Giustina Renzoni, director of historic properties for the Georgia O’Keeffe Museum; Aleishall Girard Maxon and Kori Girard of Girard Studio (and Alexander Girard’s grandchildren); Eames Demetrios from the Eames office (and a grandchild of the Eameses); and Kelsey Keith, Herman Miller’s creative director. Jerry Saltz even lobbed a query during the Q&A portion of the event.
The gathering was a launch for a drop of collaborative furniture: An occasional table inscribed with a circular snake graphic resurfaced from a 1967 collection called The Girard Group and an Eames wire chair with a “bikini” seat pad in ocher/dark sienna strips. (The table, an edition of 100, sold out within hours.) Downstairs, guests could check out the goods and hang around for a slice of a large circular cake decorated with the very same 🐍 design.
Scandi Chic
On Monday evening, a VIP reception was held at the Residence of the Consul General of Sweden in New York. The reception promoted Nordic creativity and showcased products by Sweden’s Bolon, Design House Stockholm, and Mizetto; Finland’s Made by Choice; and Norway’s Vestre. And the award for the tallest participants at NYCxDESIGN goes to…
Fine Communion Wine
The Architectural League hosted its annual President’s Medal Dinner to honor Elise Jaffe and Jeffrey Brown in the Crossing of the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in front of a who’s-who crowd of New York architects (and beyond). Before remarks from people like Deborah Berke and Michael Maltzan, The League’s executive director, Jacob Moore, let folks know that despite losing NEA funding, the organization was strong financially: It had achieved the reach goal for the evening’s event. It was admittedly a new—and pleasant—experience to dine and drink in a cathedral. After the program, bite-sized desserts were distributed (no cake), and guests paraded across the echoing space.
Once outside, attendees splintered into the night, with some revelers hopping trains to make the long trek back to Brooklyn. At one stop close to home, a station kiosk was taken over by a dinosaur to become Rex’s Dino Bodega, which stocked the Maul Street Journal and sold Snarlboros. A drunken, pun-infused hallucination? Apparently not: It was still there in the morning when Eavesdrop slunk back to the office.
Amenitize That Curb!
On a rainy morning, a group led by Kristoffer Vestre of Vestre; Mike Lydon of Street Plans; and Jeffrey LeFrancois, executive director of the Meatpacking District, descended on 14th Street to witness its transformation into a series of parklets. Planned as part of ongoing improvements to the neighborhood, the decking, 16 feet wide on either side of the street, utilizes Vestre furniture to add more space for dining, gathering, working, and observing. It should be ready for peak summer promenading later in June.
Closing Remarks
NYCxDESIGN finished strong in DUMBO. After a discussion at BIG’s office, the designerati migrated to Space Theory’s new showroom in the historic Stable Building (Henrybuilt will open upstairs later in the year) before continuing to an open studio at Post Company, the official closing party, a For Scale issue launch at the Ace Hotel, and a bash at Reform. The last affair had a towering, 6-tier cake made by Lauren Schofield and finished in cream and rhubarb pieces both stacked upright and running horizontally to cap each layer. Its serving method quickly turned messy, giving Tower of Babel energy, which felt right for these trying times. At least we have a vibrant local community of architects, designers, makers, and brands—oh, and cake.
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