Positively Brilliant - Lighting Designs by Bec Brittain

Irwin Weiner ASID - I've just been shot up with truth serum, and I cannot lie: many of the exhibits at the latest Architectural Digest Home Design Show were boring and same-old-same-old. So imagine my delight when I discovered Bec Brittain, the talented industrial design and architecture trained product designer (from lighting to jewelry). Everything she does has a sculptural edge to it, a love of beautiful materials, a familiarity borne of combining elements from our collective past, and a love of modern LED technology. Her Maxhedron two-way mirror pendant light (top photo) is a revelation ... a floating optical spaceship that looks like a piece of contemporary designer jewelry.

Brittain's SHY Light (photo above) features skinny LED tubes in brass fittings that can be configured into infinite custom shapes. I loved how she's reworked the designs of Gerit Rietveld's 1920 Hanging Lamp - with its sculptural use of fluorescent tubes - yet given homage to his influence. Her beautiful A Shades line (photo below) features sensuous copper pendant shades suspended by leather rope.

Visit the Bec Brittain website for more information. Designers like Bec are the future of the interior design industry, and I hope to see many more push-the-envelope designs from her.

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Architectural Digest Home Design Show - Catch It Now!

Irwin Weiner ASID - The latest Architectural Digest Home Design Show has some real innovations for homeowners and interior decorators alike. If you're at the show, please look for the booth I designed with the Ozer Marble Group - one of the most amazing suppliers around. Our display is all around a Stone = Wallpaper theme, and mark this down as a major design fashion trend for the coming year.

To illustrate, I just used some of Ozer's amazing Verde Laguna green marble, with pronounced vertical veins, as a wall treatment to create a focus wall behind an industrial kitchen range - and I continued the vertical-cut stone as a backsplash. This stone really makes the room pop! In the photo above is a kitchen column I clad in beautiful stone; it's smashing, and it really sets this room apart (it's just been published, too, and I'll share more news with you on that in a week or two).

But back to the Design Show: a new wrinkle in this year's AD festivities is the pairing of vendors with interior designers, and I was delighted to work with the Ozer folks on their booth concept this year. I do hope you stop by and visit the show and the folks at Ozer ... and enjoy this video overview of last year's activities.

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Trends from Latest AD Home Design Show

 

Irwin Weiner ASID - The Architectural Digest Home Design Show isn't the sole arbiter of style trends for the home, but it's interesting each year to see who exhibits and is putting money and public relations into their product lines. Will someone new break through the noise and become a standout and a true trendsetter? The following LifeMinute.TV video shows their favorite trends including some mid-price pro ovens and a refrigerator solution from Jenn-Air, US-made shagreen furniture from Skatemoderne, fascinating stereo speakers turned into high art from TON Art (each piece combines gold and light), and indoor-outdoor furnishings from Oasiq Outdoor Furniture.

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