Adain Avion - a Cultural Olympiad 2012 project

Following a collaboration on the design of Chapter Arts interior between Angela Gidden and Marc Rees under their Gidden+Rees i.d the creative partnership, the creative duo are embarking on an exciting project bringing together two Welsh brands - Nomad & Nest and Adain Avion.

The latter is the brainchild of Marc Rees who was selected to represent Wales in the Cultural Olympiad 2012. His Adain Avion project is a site specific touring community based performance that takes place inside the fuselage of a DC-9 which is being brought over from Spain. The AA brand has been created by one of our design associates Dylan Griffith of Smorgasbord (Amsterdam & Cardiff Agency). The project also includes the design of the travel accessories and in-flight merchandise including flight bags - retro style of course. This is where Angela comes in....... along with Nomad & Nest as the design, manufacturing and retail 'wing'.... excuse the pun!

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Design Guild Mark Award 2011 - Angela Gidden & Cwtch

Angela Gidden has just been awarded the prestigious Design Guild Mark for Excellence in British Furniture Design 2011. Orangebox submitted the Cwtch which was presented to the judges as a full collection at the M&S Conference Centre last month.





The Design Guild Marks introduced by the Furniture Makers Company recognises and rewards excellence in the British design of furniture in volume production.

Press Release quotes -

Although there was a very extensive list of submissions the eminent judges only selected eleven products to receive a Design Guild Mark.
As explained by Jonathan Hindle, Chairman of the Design Guild Mark Judges: "The Worshipful Company of Furniture Makers introduced the Design Guild Mark to reward the work of the finest furniture designers working in volume production in Britain and the best of British furniture designers working abroad. The Mark is awarded for excellence in design, use of materials, manufacture and function".

Lee Cheong, BDP, Design Guild Mark Award judge commented:
"I thought it was really heartening to see the increased number of entrants this year and so many quality pieces, what was also interesting was that the judges were fairly unanimous on the passes and rejections."

The Design Guild Marks is one of the only award systems where all products meeting the criteria are called into a warehouse to enable the judges to assess them. By the ward of this Guild Mark for designs which met the Company's criteria, the designers received due recognition and the industry will be made more aware of the importance of investment in design.

-end-

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Anna Gravelle - a textile & furniture collaboration

I was asked many years ago this question - "When you design a piece of furniture is the form influenced by the fabric or does the form influence the selection of fabric?"
Many years on and the answer is either or. At the moment I'm inspired by the fantastic 'tufting work by contemporary textile designer Anna Gravelle. We are exploring the potential to collaborate where i'm in no doubt the fabric will definitely be influencing the form, style and detail of the furniture. One thing we have agreed on - we will introduce a sense and celebration of past design decades in the overall furniture design. Some exciting developments being explored already with some technical boundaries to be pushed!

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Cwtch For Orangebox is launched

An eight month design project and commission and the 'Cwtch soft seating system' is launched.

"Cwtch offers a fresh addition to Orangebox's soft seating landscape.
My design ethos was to complement the Orangebox portfolio with a product that timelessness and sophisticated form. The aim was to design a system that was elegant, yet simple, allowing specifiers to create diverse configurations within the space they require. An additional design dimension featured in the Cwtch design is a tailored, contemporary twist introducing a unique stitch and seam detail called the Reveal Seam - an up to the minute take on the past traditional contrast piping".

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Tokujin Yoshioska - a master!

A master of designing with materials and technology that perform and play with light.
Yoshioka has recently designed a mobile phone concept for KDDI iida, that presents a totally fresh approach to the technology within - exposed and not hidden.

This is what Yoshioka says about the design - XRAY:
"Apart from arranging visual appearance, I have pondered a design without a shape. This collaboration project started with an enthusiasm of designing a new mobile phone that infuses a fresh, striking idea into today’s diversified mobile designs. I came to reach an idea of “designing from inside.”
via Dezeen

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