We look back at the week that was...

Milan was the flavor of the week this week at MoCo Loco & Art MoCo, but there's no doubt ICFF is just around the corner. Unexpected and fun were Post Fossil's First Light with it's weight and cog light power system, Peter Jansen’s rapid prototyping sculptures, Alvin Aronson's D/A Clock whose surface tells time, Kaiju Studio’s ceramic, felt and walnut i/o desktop organizer and Adieu, the arts magazine with dissipating ink that becomes personal journal. And finally, The House on the Table polarized you - and open cubicles/pens are more natural and human?

+ House on the Table from Design Mong, the rooful cubicle
+ William Speakman’s Experience and Logic Structure exhibition lit art
+ Greg Lynn’s Blobwall, blobby bricks
+ Preview of new company Bond, featuring Partisan the socio-political plaything
+ Fundraising project from Scott Wilson for the World Wildlife Fund
+ Preview of the Botanist Blank Canvas Series, something old is new
+ Projects from Post Fossil/ pre production
+ New work from Florian Gypser, ABC-Button, Knoend and Vito Selma, who wouldn't want a geo cocktail?
+ New work from One & Co, Dogenvol, Stanley Ruiz and Tract, the Tract Soliflore, light and transformative
+ New work from Parvez Michel, Kaiju, La Tête au Cube and the University of Idaho, printed concrete furniture and eco friendly
+ New work from Incorporated, Tim Buckley, notNeutral, Michelle Kaufman and Sandy Lam, got Hex on the mind now
+ Domestic's Milan show, a 2D company makes 3D interesting grâce à Matali
+ Design Factory Brainport Eindhoven's Milan show, more concrete and color
+ Shows in the Exansaldo space in Milan, project-a-couch
+ This Week from Tokyo, we want a Mini Chimney
+ This Week at Art MoCo, designy
+ Fresh MoCo round-up, featuring the Alice in Wonderland Vagabond Cabinet

Above, Devilrobots & Kidrobot's Mochi serves as the mascot for MoMA’s Destination: Japan collection and our Week-in-a-minute, for a minute. Featured earlier this week as wallpaper on Twitter/mocoloco.

+ ThrICE Cubes form an interactive table light by Henry Bagshawe that is part of the Nottingham Trent graduate show. The website shows a plethora of interesting work covering a range of furniture and industrial design.

+ The Debranded Home has a very simple mission: eliminate intrusive labels on products in the home by replacing them with simple labels that are straightforward and to the point.

+ Buro North, in conjunction with the Victorian Eco-Innovation Lab, has developed a solar-collecting sunshade for Australian schoolyards to create energy while protecting children from too much direct sunlight.

Switzerland’s Postfossil presented some interesting projects at Salone Satellite in Milan. One of these was TheSpill by Corina Zuberbühler, made up of two rectangles, cushions and a carpet element that can be mixed and matched to create a sofa, a lounge chair, a guest bed or an island. The Branch series by Michael Niederberger uses branches as the legs for chairs and tables and First Light by Anna Blattert and Daniel Gafner is a reading lamp powered by a weight and cog wheels. No plugging in required.

+ postfossil.ch

This week at Art MoCo, we featured more art that we came across in Milan, like Dejana Kabiljo’s pretty stools and poufs that look too well coiffed to be dishevelled by commonplace sitting.

Peter Jansen’s sculptures make use of rapid prototyping techniques to show us man in motion.

The Helica by Anouk Omlo was an intricate piece of ceramic work that we came upon at the Design Factory Brainport show.

Work in Turkish marble by several international designers was featured in an exhibition entitled Block and held at the Design Library.

And Erika Calesini puts the humble (and smashed) bicycle to good use. SM

More at Art MoCo.

We know we shouldn’t … but wouldn’t the silver leather sofa at Fresh MoCo be such a wicked indulgence? There is also a great Two-Timer clock from Established and Sons and a Vagabond Cabinet with a wild variety of knobs from One Eco Home. The interactive knitted lights from Weidekamp are in complete and utter contrast to the silver couch, for a different mood and emotional need. The Bright Awakening pillow alarm clock from Embryo looks like something that has to be tried out before making any decisions, but it certainly looks tempting – if one has to get up. And the Buzzispace room dividers are a great way to create different zones, plus they are made from recycled plastics.

The huge Exansaldo space in Zona Tortona is just across the street from Superstudio Più, so it was a natural progression to drift into more great design from established companies and the excellent That’s Design exhibit that featured student work from all over the world. Stockholm’s Konstfack was well-represented, showing a knitted radiator and a table that made us look again. A pebbly rug by Piet Boon Zone and the Booklamp for Autoban by De La Espada were two designs that definitely married form with function, while Meeting Erwin had a clean display of car-inspired designs. The Rhode Island School of Design focused on the concept of time, and New Zealand’s Hothouse placed an emphasis on open innovation. There were also some great entries in the LG HI-MACS Design Contest at That's Design.

+ thatsdesign.it
+ exansaldo.it