As oft opined in these dispatches, the popular narrative of the (hi)story of design in Europe is a very abridged retelling, one contributed to by but a limited number of protagonists, invariably from dominant groups, and viewed from a limited number of perspectives, invariably those perspectives we're all conditioned to view that narrative, and those protagonists, from, with the myriad problems the thereby inherent skews and distortions cause not only for our understandings of the (hi)story and
read more
As Emily Dickinson so very nearly wrote in the early 1860s: Answer July — Where is the Bee — Where is the Blush — Where is the Hay? Ah, said July — They are all — In a museum — Why aren't you? Answer Thee — Me —* Our five recommendations for new architecture, design and art exhibitions opening in July 2025 for bees, blushes, hays, and you, can be found in Berlin, Remagen, New York, London and Chemnitz....... "Defiance. Jewish Women and Design in the Modern Era" at the Jewish Museum,
read more
"There is terror and panic in our city", wrote the, then, 14 year old Clara Schwarz of life in, then, Żółkiew, Poland, today, Zhovkva, Ukraine, in the summer of 1942 of life under German occupation, "the Jews are building bunkers of all kinds: underground, double walls, anywhere they can find a spot to hide".1 For Clara and her family that "spot" was a "3 metres square and a meter and a half deep" bunker under a house, a bunker dug out by Clara and other children with their bare hands; a
read more
