The Monocle Minute
On Design

How do you preserve the charm of heritage homes while bringing them into the 21st century? A light-filled Paris property and Buenos Aires wine cellar and tasting room might just have the answer. Plus: we meet the architect behind this year’s playful Serpentine Pavilion. First up, it’s Ed Stocker with a few ideas about what makes great design companies tick.

The Palermo Chico barrio in Buenos Aires is home to one of the city’s most emblematic belle époque buildings, Casa Cavia. In 2014 architecture practice Kallos Turin was commissioned to renovate the landmark residence, which was designed in 1929 by artist and architect Alejandro Christophersen. To commemorate the 10th anniversary of the refurbishment, Casa Cavia’s creative director, Lupe García, wanted to highlight the property’s long history of wine collecting and making. Once again, he tapped Kallos Turin to work on the project. The result is a celebration of Argentinian viticulture through an intimate wine cellar and a private tasting room.

The additions complement Kallos Turin’s earlier designs for Casa Cavia’s café, perfumery, flower shop and publishing offices. The wine cellar’s dark, burgundy walls echo the rich selection of vintages that can be savoured around a table made from salmon-coloured resin. The tasting room, “El Privado”, is more airy and light, ideal for long dinners and conversations. According to Stephania Kallos, co-founder of Kallos Turin, the 1920s building is an ode to the city’s history and “a very powerful force” in an area that’s being quickly developed.
casacavia.com

A good home in an urban environment should enhance its location – and that’s exactly what architect Dora Hart has achieved near the Arc de Triomphe in Paris. Here, she has created an elegant space called the Giraudoux apartment inside a four-storey building. The home retains many of its 20th-century charms, which are balanced with contemporary features that capture the buzz of modern city living.

Original details include dark oak parquet flooring, floor-to-ceiling windows and marble countertops that give the home a sense of depth. The new curving staircase is a complementary modern addition. In the kitchen-cum-dining area, a contemporary Angelo Mangiarotti glass-top table is accompanied by a set of rosewood-and-leather Vilhelm Wohlert chairs from 1958. The combinations are cleverly balanced and do not bombard the senses. Instead, they reveal traces of the building’s history, while also enhancing its 21st-century Parisian appeal.
dorahart.com

For more outstanding Parisian design, pick up a copy of Monocle’s dedicated Paris newspaper, on newsstands now and available online.

This year’s Serpentine Pavilion in London’s Hyde Park was designed by South Korean architect Minsuk Cho, the founder of Seoul-based design studio Mass Studies. The temporary structure is often seen as a conceptual testing ground for the selected architect, with previous participants including Zaha Hadid, Oscar Niemeyer and Rem Koolhaas. Cho’s project, Archipelagic Void, is composed of five separate structures – an auditorium, a tea house, a gallery, a library and a play tower – positioned to create a small, central courtyard or madang, similar to those found in traditional South Korean houses. It is open to the public until 27 October.

What inspired your pavilion?
Architecture occupies a specific space and time. We thought that the surroundings of the pavilion were interesting and something that we could explore in order to give it a completeness, rather than design a utopian structure. Our pavilion is also an inversion of the traffic roundabout, where there is usually a monument or focal point in the centre. Instead, we kept the centre of our pavilion empty to allow unexpected things to happen. The void acts as a madang, where people can converge but also move into different spaces. For example, you can have tea, then go to the library afterwards. There are many trajectories that you can take.

What message do you hope to communicate with this pavilion’s design?
The design is a response to this specific time. When the first Serpentine Pavilion was made in 2000, the world was a very different place. Google had just been founded and Facebook and iPhones did not exist. There was a lot of optimism about technology and how it would connect us but it has, in many cases, had the opposite effect. It’s important for architecture to bring people together. Hyde Park seems to be a great place for that to happen.

How do you hope people will feel when they visit the pavilion?
I want them to feel a sense of togetherness. I read a story about Frederick Law Olmsted, who designed Central Park to encourage “gregarious” interaction. Park users could encounter others within a space and appreciate each other’s company without feeling overwhelmed.

For more from Minsuk Cho, pick up a copy of Monocle’s dedicated design newspaper, ‘Salone del Mobile Special’, which was produced for Milan Design Week. The publication is packed with tips and insights into design events across the summer.

As far as design power couples go, few have been as successful as Antti and Vuokko Nurmesniemi. Antti ran a large interior-design studio; Vuokko, now 94, is one of textile house Marimekko’s leading designers and founder of her namesake label, Vuokko Oy. The Finnish couple lived together in a house on Helsinki’s waterfront that they had designed (and is now open to public visits). In the open-plan living room stands an example of the Nurmesniemis’ professional collaboration: a pair of 001 lounge chairs.

The form of this floor-grazing seat originally appeared in a collection of plastic rattan outdoor chairs that Antti designed for German brand Tecta in 1968. This padded version was later put into production by Vuokko, upholstered with the textile designer’s patterns of thick stripes in either black and white or red and white. Though the soft 001 is unsuitable for outdoor use, why not have riviera-style sunloungers right in the middle of a living room? We could certainly see it adding some summer flair to our homes.

Milan-based design studio Formafantasma was commissioned by Italian light-manufacturing company Flos to come up with Superwire, a modular system that does away with the headache often involved when repairing LED lights. The new line was first presented at the Palazzo Visconti during Milan Design Week and comes in floor-lamp, sconce, table-lamp and pendant versions. The design is characterised by the use of glass panels, an aluminium framework and narrow LED strips that emit a warm glow.

The lights’ hexagonal shape gives the design an art deco feel, though the engineering is firmly rooted in the 21st century with LED components that can easily be replaced, instead of needing to be shipped back to the manufacturer when problems arise. For Flos, this reflects a commitment to the evolution of light manufacturing. And it’s an intriguing proposition from Andrea Trimarchi and Simone Farresin, the creative duo behind Formafantasma, whose research-based practice influences their work.
formafantasma.com; flos.com

Train stations are inherently liminal places. Christopher Beanland’s new book, Station, however, invites readers to stop thinking about reaching their destination for a moment and take in the beauty of these spaces. With imagery from stations all over the world, interviews from experts and a smattering of social history, Station, published by Batsford, reminds us that train stations are a feat of engineering.

Many of the book’s images show stations in cities from Los Angeles to Warsaw in their quiet, empty states, offering readers a rare chance to focus on the craft and subtleties of their style. “There’s such an incredible variety of design in stations across the world and that fascinates me,” says Beanland. “There has been a resurgence in train travel recently. People are more excited by it.” Whether it’s London St Pancras or Takanawa Gateway in Japan – or whether it’s elegant art deco or sleek brutalism – Station will make you appreciate your local transport hub with fresh eyes.
batsfordbooks.com