Tabla de contenidos para Fall 2024 en Frame

When relocating its Tokyo headquarters to a ninestorey building slated for demolition in a few years, Jins Holdings enlisted Fumiko Takahama Architects to create a flexible workspace, with art direction by Yuko Hasegawa. With over 700 retail locations in Japan and abroad, the eyewear brand wanted a physical hub to accommodate its needs without a complete overhaul of the temporary space. The designers embraced a philosophy of ‘creating space by demolishing’, adopting a subtractive design approach while minimizing new construction, an important aspect of the transformation of the impermanent space. Parts of the original structure were chiselled away to produce a bespoke work environment. A new atrium, for example, was created by drilling holes through the core of the slabs. Spanning from the fifth to the eighth floors, where the…

Hospitality experiences are fleeting by nature, but the best ones solidify themselves in our memories. Chef Ferran Adrià – the name behind El Bulli and considered one of the world’s top chefs – has created countless unforgettable experiences for his guests. Spanish furniture brand Ondarreta teamed up with Chef Adrià and the El Bulli Foundation to develop a chair for ElBulli1846, the museum of the famous restaurant, that would also work in any gastronomic environment. The result is a special finish for the Supra collection – whose original design is by Note Design Studio – that captures a specific ephemeral phenomenon related to gastronomy and memorializes it in a chair. Reflecting on his many years spent in restaurants, Adrià had the idea to develop ‘a special chair for the cook…

Getting people involved in the act of space-making is a great avenue for sparking curiosity and engagement, allowing visitors to become more involved in a brand’s corresponding mission or content. Non-permanent spaces that invite audience participation through iterative, modular or flexible design leverage their temporary nature to generate buzz and excitement, an approach that creates engaging spatial experiences that centre on the user. REFRAMING VISITORS AS PARTICIPANTS During the most recent edition of Milan Design Week, Danish brand Ecco, best known for producing footwear and accessories, invited visitors to become co-designers of its Material Matters installation. Located in the newly reimagined gallery of Corso Como 10, Ecco initiated a conversation about our relationship with resources, hosting a workshop where attendees were encouraged to leave their own mark on features in…

1 Think beyond moveability Flexibility doesn’t just mean moveable furniture. In fact, it can even mean fixed furniture. Some designers believe putting everything on wheels dilutes the spatial experience and doesn’t reflect how we typically interact with our environments. An alternative is to design interiors whose flexibility comes from their openness to interpretation – structures where every solution is embedded, allowing for varied uses. 2 Create flexible frameworks From the climate crisis to the development of new technologies, the future is getting increasingly unpredictable. Rather than designing buildings with rigid interiors that are impossible to alter without drastic, costly changes, developing systems based on non-structural partitions can make spaces easier to adapt to changing needs or different uses in the future. 3 Use agility toco-create Incorporating transformable – and even…

Based in Kyiv, Ivan Protasov is the founder of Prototype, the architecture and design studio he established in 2020. From the outset, it’s been Protasov’s goal to create a dynamic practice with a focus on building agile and human-centric architecture responsive to fast-changing circumstances. To realize this responsiveness, flexibility has become his leitmotiv, as becomes evident in both his studio’s operations and output. ‘In the field of architecture, where the feedback loop is relatively slow, it helps to keep things moving forward,’ he explains. But beyond promoting productivity, flexibility is a crucial tool in futureproofing our built environment, believes Protasov. ‘Designing in an agile way is more sustainable. And considering economic uncertainty, it’s reasonable for some spaces to have different use opportunities and support the customization of scenarios,’ he says.…

‘I cannot teach anyone anything. I can only provide an environment in which he can learn.’ This idea seems radical given the stereotypical education environment of the past decades – a teacher pontificating from the head of the classroom to students in a grid of desks, a symbol of the former’s authority over and separation from the latter. Yet the quote is attributed to Albert Einstein, who lived between 1879 and 1955 – not what you’d call the most innovative era of schooling. While the ‘environment’ in question includes many variables – two being a student’s peers and teachers (or perhaps that should be ‘learning facilitators’) – the physical space has a huge impact on a pupil’s ability to receive, process and integrate information. Recent years have seen the common…