Introducing: Kei Shigenaga Jewelry

Fashion

Kei Shigenaga decided to become a jewelry maker because he saw it as an intersection of fashion and sculpture, two things he’s been interested in for a long time. “I feel that jewelry is not simply something fashionable, but it can be an art object you can have with you every day,” says the Japanese silversmith, who makes everything by hand in his Tokyo studio. He often goes back to traditional Japanese culture for inspiration, trying to make it modern in his own way. Lately he’s been interested in “kintsugi,” a traditional form of art where broken ceramics are mended back together using lacquer covered with gold dust, only Shigenaga uses melted gold instead. In a way, the combination of destruction and creation is the crux of his work.” In my work I try to concentrate on the roughness of precious metals,” says he. He is interested in tension between the image of fine jewelry as something delicate, yet tough.

Studio Visit: Philip Beesley

Design

When you talk to the Canadian architect Philipp Beesley, a long time collaborator of the designer Iris van Herpen, you must rewire yourself. Beesley talks in abstractions – instead of walls and floors and ceilings, you get planes, and motion, and thermodynamics. This isn’t because he’s trying to obfuscate anything, it’s just the way his mind works. In a way it’s a requirement for Beesley, because he has moved on past the traditional architecture of making buildings, which he has done exceedingly well in his career. Instead he creates spaces and environments that operate on a level above the basic requirements of architecture, such as protection from the elements. It’s not that it’s not his concern, but these problems have been thoroughly solved. Instead, he’s more concerned how space interacts with human beings on a philosophical level – freedom, community, interaction. Abstraction is the language that’s required.

SZ10 Sale

Fashion, Retail

We are now offering our readers a discount on selected designer collaboration pieces from our 10-year anniversary pop-up shop.
Use code “sz10” at checkout for a 30% discount on any of the items listed below.