This article is part of our Design special section about the reverence for handmade objects.
Practical, No-Fuss Pieces Fit for an Evolving Family
The Paris-based design studio Goons is presenting its first solo show and new collection at St. Vincents gallery in Antwerp, Belgium. Titled “Evolving Forms,” the show stars an adaptable dining set composed of a console and two dining tables that can be arranged in nine different ways. Also in the collection, which is made from Scandinavian birch plywood, are a stool, a bench and three chairs.
Goons’s co-founders, Mia Kim and Paul Trussler, blend their backgrounds in fashion and architecture to create multifunctional goods that can evolve with life’s ever-changing demands. In fact, many of their pieces, the couple said, were developed in response to the spontaneous needs of their own young family.
Visitors to the show are encouraged to experience the objects for themselves. “There’s definitely something more robust about our pieces that almost begs you to interact with it because it’s not so precious looking or so delicate,” Mr. Trussler said.
Far from being foolish or brutish, as the studio’s name suggests, these Goons are pragmatic and precise. “We don’t like to fuss around,” Ms. Kim said. Through March 23 at 13 Kleine Markt 13, Antwerp, Belgium; studiogoons.com — MORGAN MALGET
The Marble Chest Inspired by Palestinian Embroidery
Nisreen Abu Dail and Nermeen Abu Dail wanted to make something special for their young niece, Shams (“sun” in Arabic). As the founders of the 16-year-old design studio Naqsh Collective in Amman, Jordan, the sisters turned a retrospective eye to their own Palestinian heritage and translated the bold patterns of traditional embroidery into a marble bridal chest.
Nisreen, an architect in Amman, said the chest was inspired by a Palestinian wedding custom in which women assemble trousseaus from an early age. On the wedding day, “There is a tradition that the bride will sit on top of a chest that is filled with her precious wares,” she said.
Nermeen, a graphic designer who now lives in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, added, “Embroidery was a common language across all Palestinians in the diaspora and back at home in Jordan.”
The sisters recalled their aunts’ embroidering their own wedding garments, which sometimes took a year to complete, even with other women pitching in. The pair knew the craft, but not the meanings carried by the floral and animal motifs. So they learned them.
The White Bridal Chest for Shams is adorned with examples from their library of antique patterns. Inside the marble door, they carved a guide to the designs: cypress trees, plumed stitches known as “moon feathers” and beehives.
Unlike fabric, the sisters pointed out, the marble isn’t subject to decay. naqshcollective.com — SARAH ARCHER
Faux Cakes That Look Good Enough to Eat
Life was not always sweet for Heather Rios. “I didn’t have cake or candy when I was little,” said the artist, who grew up poor in rural Appalachia and now lives in Morgantown, W.Va. For kindergarten birthdays, a teacher would present a fake cake, made of cement and frosted with drywall spackle, then add candles for kids to blow out. “I would stare up at that thing; I couldn’t wait for it to be my birthday,” she said.
Today, Ms. Rios, 45, is making faux cakes of her own. The confections are embroidered on a hoop with ramenlike loops that she snips to look like fluffy, colorful layer cakes. Using piping bags, she applies acrylic paint as she would buttercream frosting.
She uses a conventional oven to bake polymer clay sprinkles and coconut flakes and often serves her creations on ceramic dessert plates. “I just like the idea of the subtly surreal, something from our reality, but slightly askew,” she said.
She opened an Etsy shop to sell her trompe l’oeil confections in 2018 after leaving an abusive relationship. “I was going through a hard time,” she said. “I started thinking about birthdays and celebrations. Regardless of where you’re from or your religion, people enjoy cake together. It’s a little bit of joy.” etsy.com/shop/HeatherRiosArte — YELENA MOROZ ALPERT
Household Objects Reveal Their Racial History
For the last 15 years, the art historian and curator Adrienne L. Childs has scoured institutional and private collections for luxurious European household objects that depict Black people. These at times appalling yet mesmerizing pieces, which proliferated between the 17th and 19th centuries, are the subject of her new book, “Ornamental Blackness: The Black Figure in European Decorative Arts.”
The figures, many semi-nude and enchained, muscles straining and backs bowed, support tabletops, fireplaces, doorways, cabinets, clocks, sugar bowls and candlesticks. Some were sculpted from raw materials — ebony, precious metals, gemstones — that were extracted from the earth or harvested by enslaved laborers.
For the manufacturers, Dr. Childs said, “They were tour de force objects,” while for the aristocratic owners, they amounted to “trophies of empire.”
Many pieces remain in their original princely quarters. In the Green Vault, part of a castle in Dresden, Germany, that has been turned into a museum, for example, figures of shirtless, bejeweled Black men made in the early 1700s proffer trays full of emeralds and pearls. Avid collectors in more recent times have included the fashion mavens Diana Vreeland and Coco Chanel and the grotesquely brutal slaveholder Calvin Candie, played by Leonardo DiCaprio in the film “Django Unchained.”
Dr. Childs said that being in the presence of the depictions of subjugated people, sometimes little noticed in the corners at historic buildings, “feels sad to me.” She described them as “serving in perpetuity.” yalebooks.yale.edu — EVE M. KAHN
