5 Handmade Furniture Favorites from BDDW

Irwin Weiner ASID - Last week I told you how I was early for a client appointment in lower Manhattan and took advantage of the extra time to go for a Soho neighborhood stroll, discovering some teriffic design stores. A cluster of posts on Design2Share will be devoted to telling you what I found during my pre-meeting walkabout.

Imagine my delight in discovering the BDDW showroom on 5 Crosby Street! The space is wonderful (soaring) and the furnishings are phenomenal. The Craft is on full display with heirloom quality hardwoods, traditional joins, hand-rubbed oil and lacquer finishes, imaginative finishes and materials (add leather to a mirror, and I'm fully engaged), and beautiful designs that gently twist classics - but one would expect no less from Tyler Hays, the accomplished artist and sculptor who founded the company and serves as its design chief. Here are a few of my favorites from BDDW; click on each photo for more information - and explore

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Wood Wonders from J.B. Blunk

Irwin Weiner ASID - The epitome of 1960s counterculture artists, J.B. Blunk is now revered for his sculptural forms in wood. We wanted to feature this silent video overview of Blunk and his work to underscore his talent and vision. He wasn't just expressing himself or rebelling against an established art culture; he let the wood do the talking. Go to the J.B. Blunk website for more information. 

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Biophilic Design Wraps Its Tendrils Around Furniture

Irwin Weiner ASID - Our recent Design2Share blog post on biophillic design caught the attention of a furniture maker and designer, Austin Heitzman, who's been influenced greatly by Eastern culture, most notably by the art of Suiseki. I'm going to use his words for the rest of the post - and thanks for reaching out to D2S, Austin, and sharing your work with us and our readers.

It seems that the Japanese, and the Chinese before them, have long been aware of the principles of biophilic design - the importance that nature plays in the health and well-being of human beings - and addressed this problem centuries ago by bringing natural debris into their home.

Suiseki is the art of displaying found rocks in such a manner that they're evocative of some greater natural occurrence, be it mountains, caves, animals, and so on. These small bits of debris focus the mind outside the home in a transcendental manner that would later become the hallmark of the Abstract Expressionist painters, except they would utilize scale to their advantage; suiseki is kept manageable.

I've tried to incorporate these principles of suiseki into my own design, creating furniture pieces that form

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Handy Hidden Leaf in Expanding Dining Table

Irwin Weiner ASID - I'm always looking for a good dining room table for my clients. I prefer round or oval tables - just because I like putting a round shape into a squared-off or rectangular-shaped room and it's great to sit around a table and be able to see everyone around "the pie." Check out this lovely round expanding table: the DB Fletcher Capstan Table, for instance.

But some families and their entertaining needs require a longer table in the traditional rectangular shape. The new Omnia Wood Dining Table demonstrated in this video exhibits clean lines, and I love the way the side leg and side details present a beveled picture frame molding appearance. It adds a nice tailored twist. Extend the table and you've got much more seating room, but you'll need a tablecloth to hide the sliding metal track that borders the stored leaf. It would have been better to extend the side molding to provide an "edging leaf" when the table is extended so you wouldn't have to use a cloth. Calligaris, keep this in mind for a revised reissue of this otherwise elegant wood dining table.

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