Your week in design events from DnA.
1. Los Angeles Design Festival
Los Angeles Design Festival (LADF) is the constellation of design events that have sprung up to coincide with the annual Dwell on Design design trade show (taking place June 20 – 22 at the Convention Center). Packaged as a collective event by design entrepreneurs Michael Sylvester and Haily Zaki, LADF has grown into three weeks of tours, parties, and gallery shows in the spirit of the “fuorisalone“ offsite events during the Milan Furniture Fair (above, A+R store on La Brea).
It starts Friday June 13, with a party honoring Cal Modern designer Gere Kavanaugh (whose work is also the subject of an installation by product design company Artecnica) and the first of a “Design Hooky” series. Design Hooky East (DH West and DH Center City are on following Fridays) is a daylong tour of studios and sites, including stop-offs at Line Hotel (where you can meet designer Sean Knibb), Shepard Fairey’s Studio One, Michael Maltzan‘s Silver Lake architecture office and Cage Aux Folles, the current installation at Materials and Applications by architect Warren Techentin.
LADF has five pairs of tickets to Design Hooky East, which gets you entry to all three parties and all three tours. Just write us at DnA@kcrw.org and we’ll give them to the first five to respond.
When: June 13-29, 2014
Where: Various venues across Los Angeles
Tickets: Get tickets to L.A. Design Festival events here.
Click here for more information.
2. SCRATCH
“Scratch,” at the ESMoA art laboratory in El Segundo, is a fascinating exhibit of graffiti art by local writers that sits alongside rare books from the Getty’s collection of liber amicorum, “books of friends” dating back 100s of years in which artists would trade visual images in friendly rivalry. A goal of the exhibit is to demonstrate the artistic connection between the artists and calligraphers of centuries past and today’s graffiti writers, many of whom use complex lettering, hieroglyphics and code drawn from antique sources, and “compete” in rival crews.
The exhibit, curated by Getty rare book specialist David Brafman (speaking to attendees at Sunday’s opening, above), grew out of by his LA Liber Amicorum, also known as the Getty Graffiti Black Book, a publication he created featuring the graffiti work of 150 artists that was intended to resemble the institution’s liber amicorum. At the ESMoA exhibition you can see the original liber amicorum of Johann Joachim Prack von Asch, a military attaché of the Holy Roman Emperor Rudolph II’s embassy to the Ottoman court at Constantinople, whose book contains entries by Prack’s friends and contacts spanning 1587 to 1612. It and other rare books sit in secured cases amidst the painted walls and floors curated by local graffiti artists Axis, Cre8, Defer, Eyeone, Fishe, and Miner, and their crews of writers, many of whom had worked with the Getty in creating its LA Liber Amicorum.
When: June 8-September 21, 2014
Where: ESMoA 208 Main Street, El Segundo
Tickets: Free and open to the public.
Click here for more information.
3. Design-n-Dim Sum Bike Tour; Austere Talk about Chairs
Design-n-Dim Sum Bike Tour
deLaB joins forces with bike store Flying Pigeon for its sixth annual Design-n-Dim Sum bike ride, taking place Saturday, June 14. This year deLaB leads riders on a tour of studios of some of LA’s newest design voices, including design studio Scout Regalia, ceramicist and artist Bari Ziperstein and a very special stop at REMAP’s Interpretive Media Laboratory in the second oldest industrial building in Los Angeles.
Austere Talk about Chairs
deLaB’s Alissa Walker also helms a panel Thursday, June 12, on the design of chairs, past and present. That’s sponsored by Austere and features Daniel L. Wenger, Peppe Trulsen, Matthew Sullivan and John Kinsey as panelists. Click here for more information.
When: Saturday June 14, 2014 10:30 AM
Where: Meet at Flying Pigeon L.A.; 3404 N. Figueroa St., Los Angeles
Tickets: Reservation Required. Price depends on what you sign up for.
Click here for more information.
4. Petit h at Hermès; Installation by Escher Gunewardena
If you want to get an exclusive piece of Hermès, visit ‘Petit h’, a pop-up at the Hermès South Coast Plaza boutique; a collection of “upcycled” objects designed by Pascale Mussard, sixth generation member of the family-owned company. Made from materials salvaged from the Hermès’ workshops, the objects will be displayed in an installation at the South Coast Plaza boutique created by Los Angeles architects Escher Gunewardena, that will also incorporate Ikebana arrangements created by the firm’s co-principal, Ravi Gunewardena. Ravi will also lead an Ikebana workshop on Saturday June 14 where you can make arrangements that in turn incorporate offcuts of Hermès leather and silk.
When: June 13-June 29
Where: Hermès’ South Coast Plaza store at 3333 Bristol Street Suite 1424, Costa Mesa
Tickets: Free and open to the public.
Click here for more information.
5. In Flux Historic Photos of Downtown
The fascination with downtown L.A. and its transformation is reflected in this photo exhibit, dedicated to historic downtown L.A. through photos by Michael Britt at Gloria Delson Contemporary Arts.
When: June 1st-June, 30th 2014 (Gallery Hours: Tues. – Fri. 12noon – 7pm, Sat & Sun. 12 noon – 5pm.)
Where: Gloria Delson Contemporary Arts; 215 W. 6th Street #115 Los Angeles
Tickets: Free, put RSVP here.
Click here for more information.
And don’t forget to listen to our most recent DnA, “Apple Buys Beats; Who Built the Beats Brand?“