So much to see, so little time, but DnA tried to get to as many events this past June as possible. Following are visual reminders of some of what we saw (captions bottom of page):
Top row: Parachute Market in downtown opened the same weekend as Dwell. It’s theme was Psychedelia, the look but not the acid. Seen, hanging pots by Tracy Wilkinson, rope hangings and jewelry by Tanya Aguíñiga; and wares by Scout Regalia’s Benjamin Luddy and Makoto Mizutani.
2nd row: 3D printed design took over A+R store on La Brea, as part of LADF’s Shopping Night. Michael Schmidt’s dress for the teeny-waisted Dita von Teese was on show (Michael behind) as were lamps, wedges (with phone holder) and other one-off printed objects. Rose Apodcaca was keeping it all together as the band readied to play – on 3D printed guitars, of course.
3rd Row: After weeks of drama worthy of a telenovela, MOCA’s New Sculpturalism show opened, albeit with the original title scratched out. Critics complained about the curatorial confusion but it didn’t obscure the talent on display, including pavilions by Tom Wiscombe and Elena Manferdini’s, his black and forbiddingly elegant, hers a welcoming explosion of color and flowers; also Thom Mayne’s high-rise tower for Paris. At MOCA Grand on Sunday, I’ll talk with fellow talents, Michael Maltzan, Ming Fung and Neil Denari, about LA architecture today and its global influence (to the extent it has one).
4th Row: Swiss architect Peter Zumthor unveiled his surprising scheme for LACMA – a 340,000 square feet “inkblot” or “black flower” or “blob” (depending on how you perceive it) to replace the three original Pereira buildings and the Art of the Americas structure built in the 1980s by Hardy Holzman Pfeiffer. Intrigued viewers of the model include Ming Fung and Craig Hodgetts (designers of the installation for LACMA’s Design for Modern Living show; Craig shares some pithy insights about the Zumthor scheme on this DnA); also Miranda Carroll, head of communications at LACMA. Also, on show at the same time at LACMA as part of Pacific Standard Time Presents: Modern Architecture in L.A., “Stephen Prina: As He Remembered It,” viewed here by Danielle Rago, turns the top floor of BCAM into a pink footprint of R.M Schindler.
5th Row: a preliminary viewing of our pending replacement Tom Bradley International Terminal, designed by Curtis Fentress (Denver, Incheon) and brought to you by Westfield Shopping Malls. Fentress’ airy, curvy design is partially obscured by Kitson, Fred Segal and a host of high-end brands (aimed at affluent Pacific Rim customers, it seems), as well as multiples screens for digital advertising (no, that’s not a waterfall behind the man in the image at end of row; it’s a wall of flowing pixels). The scene brought to mind a sanitized version of Bladerunner. The public art projects being created by Ball-Nogues, Pae White and Mark Bradford are not installed yet.
6th Row: Despite feeling a little more corporate than in previous years, Dwell on Design trade show at the downtown convention center, made room for creative kids and the always inspiring Tanya Aguiñiga, now a momma-to-be, who brought in volunteer knitters to help make and package Kits for the Formerly Homeless; meanwhile a vendor showed off their sleek Murphy bed for the aspiring occupants of Micro apartments.
7th Row: Just before Dwell took up temporary residence at the Convention Center, E3, the huge gaming show was there. While thousands of visitors checked out the latest iterations of the usual suspects, a large crowd also gathered at IndieCade, the festival devoted to independent game producers. One of the big attractions was SoundSelf, a game designed for the Oculus Rift, a goggle and headset that enables immersive audio-visual experiencesm, by Robin Arnott, shown with his Best in Show rosette.
8th Row: Two very intriguing shows the tiny WUHO storefront gallery on Hollywood take on the big topic of finding a way to house growing numbers of people in smaller spaces as Los Angles densifies. “How Small is Too Small,” curated by Katrina Stoll Szabo and Takako Tajima, with Daina Swagerty builds an abstracted (you won’t see Murphy beds or bathroom fittings, just the structure), 10×30 square feet Micro Unit to give people a taste of living very small. BY Right/BY Design, curated by Liz Falletta compares multifamily housing designs in LA, by developers who conform to code, to those by architect/developer teams who bend the rules and improve multifamily living spaces. Hear about How Small is Too Small on this WWLA.