Christo and Jeanne-Claude's wrapped Arc de Triomphe opens to the public

L'Arc de Triomphe Wrapped, an installation designed by the late artists Christo and Jeanne-Claude, has opened to the public in Paris.

The installation sees the iconic triumphal arch on the Champs-Élysées shrouded in 25,000 square metres of silvery, recyclable fabric, which is tied in place by 7,000 metres of red rope.

L'Arc de Triomphe Wrapped has opened in Paris

L'Arc de Triomphe Wrapped opened to the public on Saturday 18 September, following its postponement due to the coronavirus pandemic, and will be in place for 16 days.

As part of the installation, the large Place Charles de Gaulle road junction that surrounds the monument has been temporarily pedestrianised to allow people to see the installation and touch it freely.

Visitors can also observe the installation from the Arc de Triomphe's terrace, which remains open alongside its interiors.

The installation was designed by late artists Christo and Jeanne-Claude

The huge quantities of fabric and ropes used in the installation have all been made from polypropylene, a type of thermoplastic that is recyclable.

Christo had previously said that these materials will also move in the wind and reflect light to evoke "a living object" so that "people will want to touch" it.

It sees the monument covered by silvery fabric and red rope. Photo is by Lubri

Commissioned by French ruler Napoléon Bonaparte following his victory at the Battle of Austerlitz in 1806, the 50-metre high triumphal arch was designed by French architect Jean Chalgrin.

Its construction was halted following Bonaparte's fall from power, finally being completed in 1836.

According to project director Vladimir Yavachev, the installation fulfils the "life-long dream" of partners Christo and Jeanne-Claude, who were best known for wrapping famous buildings around the world.

The idea was conceptualised by the pair in 1961 but it was not until 2017 – eight years after the death of Jeanne-Claude – that Christo fully developed the design.

Visitors can touch it and see it up close. Photo is by Lubri

Due to the death of Christo in 2020, the installation was carried out by his team along with the Centre des Monuments Nationaux, Centre Pompidou and the City of Paris.

It was funded solely through the sale of original work by the duo, reflecting their unwavering mission to retain complete artistic freedom.

Read:

Eight key projects by Christo and Jeanne Claude

"I won't give a millimetre of my freedom [away] and damage my art," Christo told Dezeen in 2018 at the opening of The London Mastaba.

The London Mastaba, which was Christo's final project, comprised a stack of 7,506 brightly coloured barrels placed on the Serpentine Lake in London.

The road surrounding the monument has been temporarily pedestrianised

At the opening, the artist also told Dezeen that "many people have difficulty reading our projects", but said that "every interpretation is legitimate".

Other key projects by the duo include Valley Curtain in Colorado and Surrounded Islands in Florida. The pair also famously covered the German Reichstag in Berlin with similar materials used in l'Arc de Triomphe Wrapped.

The installation will remain in place for 16 days

The Arc de Triomphe is due another makeover as part of a wider masterplan to convert the Champs-Élysées avenue into a pedestrian-friendly public space.

This will see pockets of greenery introduced around the monument and along the iconic 1.9-kilometre-long road.

The photography is courtesy of the Christo and Jeanne-Claude Foundation and taken by Benjamin Loyseau unless stated. The main image is by Wolfgang Volz. 

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Method lounge chair by Blu Dot

Dezeen Showroom: US brand Blu Dot has paired a playful silhouette with mismatched upholstery in its Method lounge chair.

Meant to look more like a "stellar medley of disparate elements" than a familiar object, the Method lounge chair has a slim seat, back and armrests set atop an architectural frame.

The armchair combines leather upholstery on its seat with velvet on the backrest

Blu Dot conceptualised the design by imagining the main components of a lounge chair as separate "modules", tied together by a thin steel frame.

"We felt this approach would impart a certain lightness to the chair and allow us to really dial in the comfort by slightly tweaking the 'modules' in relation to one another," the brand explained.

Alternatively, there is a new shearling option

While the frame is made from powder-coated steel, the seat and back come upholstered in complementary textures – durable leather on the seat and velvet on the backrest, with colours ranging from tomato red to ink grey.

Alternatively, the chair is also available in a new all-over shearling option.

Product: Method lounge chair
Brand: Blu Dot
Contact: partnerships@bludot.com

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London Festival of Architecture appoints Rosa Rogina as director

The London Festival of Architecture has been appointed a new director, Rosa Rogina, who is the event's outgoing programme director.

An architect, researcher and curator, Rogina served as the London Festival of Architecture's (LFA) programme director from 2016 and has also been involved in the 2018 Venice Architecture Biennale and 2020 Venice Design Week.

She takes over from Tamsie Thomson, who has taken on the chief executive role at the Royal Incorporation of Architects in Scotland. Rogina will head up the festival's 2022 programme.

Director brings international festival experience

In addition to her ongoing work with the festival, Rogina was part of the international team behind the Montenegrin Pavilion at the 2018 Venice Architecture Biennale and was curator in residence at Venice Design Week in 2020.

She also teaches architecture at the University of East London and holds an MA in architecture from the Royal College of Art and an MA in research architecture from Goldsmiths, University of London.

She has extensive writing and speaking credits to her name, and has previously worked at the offices of Dutch studio MVRDV and UK studios Grimshaw and Farshid Moussavi Architecture.

Peter Murray, who is curator-in-chief at New London Architecture (NLA), the organisation behind the festival, said that Rogina's appointment represented a "welcome continuity" for the organisation.

"I'm very pleased that Rosa has agreed to take on the role of director of LFA," said Murray.

"She is well known to all those who have been involved with and supported the festival in recent years and brings a welcome continuity to the role which is enhanced by her work in practice, academic teaching and international curatorial projects."

Festival with impact "needed more than ever", said Rogina

Rogina signalled that topics around the pandemic and climate change would continue to be a focus for the LFA and that she intends for the event to make an impact on the city.

"I am thrilled to become the new director of the London Festival of Architecture," said Rogina. "I cannot wait to work with my festival colleagues and the New London Architecture team, as well as our wonderful network of supporters to shape the future of the festival."

"Ever since joining the festival team in 2016 I have been struck by the LFA's ability to impact everyday experiences of the city: something that's going to be needed more than ever as London emerges from the Covid-19 pandemic, and as we focus more keenly on the climate emergency," she continued.

"I'm proud to be part of a team that does so much to promote the value of London's built environment, and I'm excited for the festival's future."

Festival to return in 2022 following callout for theme

The LFA is the world's largest annual architecture festival. After going online in 2020, it presented a hybrid programme of digital and live events in June 2021 under the theme of "care".

Projects included the Daylight Robbery exhibition by photographer Andy Billman capturing bricked-up windows of homes and the annual City Benches installation of imaginative seating designs.

The "care" theme was picked following a callout for suggestions from the LFA's network of existing and new event organisers. It was chosen by a curation panel, who also had input into the event.

The 2022 event will be shaped by a similar process, with the theme set to be announced later this year.

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New golden age of Danish design sees Copenhagen rivalling Milan, according to Kvadrat CEO

Danish design is experiencing a "golden age" with Copenhagen becoming a manufacturing centre comparable to Milan, according to Anders Byriel, CEO of Danish textile brand Kvadrat.

"We've got some large companies and it's becoming like the area around Milan," he said, referring to the concentration of design-led furniture and lighting manufacturers in northern Italy.

Copenhagen becoming "third hub" after Milan and London

Byriel made the comments during the 3 Days of Design festival in Copenhagen last week, which saw dozens of design brands launch new products in showrooms and exhibition spaces across the city.

Business is booming, Byriel said, with local brands "growing on all parameters."

"I think Copenhagen is pitching in to be the third hub after Milan and London," he added. "It has a lot of energy."

Top: Anders Byriel is the CEO of Kvadrat. Above: the brand launched a collection of textiles designed by Peter Saville during 3 Days of Design

Byriel attributed the boom partly to global interest in the Danish lifestyle, which is perceived to be both stylish and sustainable.

This has been fuelled by a revival of interest in Danish design from the last century as well as the recent surge of interest in hygge, a Danish concept that strives to achieve cosiness and wellbeing.

"It's really a golden age"

Several heritage marques have rebranded and revived classic products from their archives. "Many companies have been very smart, combining the future with their heritage," Byriel said.

Meanwhile, a new generation of entrepreneurial business leaders has seen dozens of new company launches. "There are new brands starting on every street quarter," Byriel said. "I feel it's really a golden age".

The strong sense of social responsibility and community in Denmark also helps explain the boom, Byriel said, with companies helping each other out.

"It's very community based," he said, "There's a camaraderie. There are a lot of social bonds. The ecosystem keeps growing."

Vipp launched a supper club inside a converted pencil factory during the festival

Byriel pointed out that 3 Days of Design, a modest event that is now in its tenth year, runs along non-profit lines for the good of the sector.

"Somehow I think the power of this event is actually that it's very community based," he said. "It's not commercially driven. It's a non-profit. The organisation is a community organisation. You pay a small amount and you're in."

Copenhagen's balanced lifestyle "is attracting talent"

With no major trade fair as its anchor, the festival instead features events dotted around the city, often working together with Copenhagen's strong food culture.

This year's event saw local brand Vipp launch a supper club inside a converted pencil factory while Frama hosted dinners each evening in its studio inside a converted pharmacy. It also hosted a talk with Dezeen.

This community approach is also making Denmark a desirable place for talented people to live and work, Byriel said, with half of Kvadrat's staff now hailing from abroad.

"It's also something about welfare, society and of course lifestyle," he said. "The whole thing is blending together. It's more sustainable living and a balanced lifestyle. I think that's attracting talent."

Frama hosted a talk with Dezeen during 3 Days of Design

Danish architects have also shared in the success, Byriel said, with Bjarke Ingels Group and Henning Larsen among firms to have grown beyond their Copenhagen roots to become international studios.

"It's not only about a good lifestyle and creating a beautiful interior but also that things are driven by values," Byriel said. "We just need to watch out not to become too self-content."

Kvadrat, which is based in Ebeltoft in northern Denmark, was founded by Byriel's father, Poul Byriel, in 1968.

The textile brand launched a new collection of textiles by British designer Peter Saville at its Copenhagen showroom during 3 Days of Design.

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Bauhaus-informed chair and hemp vases feature in Ukurant Perspectives exhibition

Exhibition platform Ukurant has launched Perspectives, a showcase of emerging designers, in Copenhagen as part of 3 Days of Design.

Held in a high-ceilinged former library in the centre of Copenhagen, the show was curated by Ukurant founders and recent graduates Laerke Ryom, Kamma Rosa Schytte, Kasper Kyster and Josefine Krabbe Munk.

Works by 17 designers are on display at Ukurant Perspectives

Exhibition designers Frederik Gustav transformed the space, which showcases work by 17 emerging designers, to give the room the feel of a theatre.

"We see it as a technical room where we have a lot of backdrops and a lot of stage curtains that all, in different ways, set the stage for each artist and their different work," Frederik Gustav founders Frederik Weber and Gustav Dupont explained.

Stage-curtain backdrops divide the room

The designs are displayed in front of individual stage curtain backdrops, held up by blue strings that criss-cross beneath the ceiling and are weighed down by sandbag-like Ukurant tote bags.

This is the Ukurant exhibition, after the initiative premiered at 3 Days of Design last year, and features pieces by upcoming designers from all over the world.

Hemp Vases can be broken down and remoulded

Among the designs on show is Kristina Lula Brown's Hemp Vases series, which were developed to make use of a hemp byproduct that otherwise would have gone to waste or been used for rabbit and horse feed.

"The vases are made from hemp hurds – a bioproduct of industrial hemp – that was mixed together with chalk and water and then moulded by hand, before being given another layer of chalk and then a finishing layer of beeswax to make it smooth," the Danish designer told Dezeen.

The vases can eventually be broken down and mixed with more chalk and water in order to be remoulded, making for a design that is endlessly recyclable.

The Heavy Duty collection is made using industrial byproducts

Industrial designer Carsten in der Elst, from Cologne, Germany, also used waste materials for his Heavy Duty Collection 2020, which is comprised of five pieces that are all made from industrial byproducts.

"My pieces are made from the byproducts of a woodturner, an industrial forge press, an aluminium company, a construction site and a coating company," he explained.

The resulting furniture includes heavy circular side tables made from forged steel and chairs covered in polyurethane dust and shotcrete.

The Lath Chair was informed by Bauhaus design ideas

German designer Tanita Klein looked to create an accessible design with her Lath Chair, which was constructed from beechwood laths joined together using traditional wood joinery techniques.

"It was inspired a little bit by my German heritage," the designer told Dezeen.

"I looked to the Bauhaus movement in the 1920s, which was a lot about making design more accessible and for it to reach more people."

Read:

Ukurant Objects exhibition features squishy chair and waxy vases

"My chair is made from a very standardised wooden beam that you can get anywhere in Europe in different profiles," she added.

"This is just made from one profile and it's all about the wooden connections – the design of it is inspired by a super-stereotypical idea of a chair."

More than 200 designers applied to take part in the exhibition

The designers taking part in this year's Ukurant Perspectives exhibition were chosen from an open call for young global designers, which received more than 200 applications.

"When we pick out the works for this exhibition we value experimental character, craft and originality," co-founder Krabbe Munck said.

"When we enter 3 Days of Design, we really want to get in touch with the established scene," she added. "When we are here, we really think that we are on equal ground with the bigger companies."

Muuto showed some of its products on the upper shelves

This year's exhibition was supported by design brand Muuto, which showcased some of its goods on shelves above the main exhibition space and for which Ukurant designers Davide Ronco and Pablo Dorigo also created a sculpture.

According to the curators, working with a bigger brand didn't change the way Ukurant works.

Davide Ronco and Pablo Dorigo designed a sculpture for Muuto

"When Muuto contacted us and suggested this collaboration, it was very important for us to still be autonomous and do our own thing," co-founder Rosa Schytte told Dezeen.

"We are one thing and they are another thing and the interesting thing is the meeting between us. When we curated the show it was important that it was our decision and our perspective, to keep the young perspective which is the whole point of this."

Baptiste Comte created sculptural vessels called Monolith

The annual exhibition also works with a different graphic designer, exhibition designer and photographer each year, which it gives free hands to create what they feel is appropriate for Ukurant.

"We don't do a theme because we really want to see what inspires and interests the designers themselves and what is important to young designers right now, so I guess that can be the grand theme," Rosa Schytte said.

Ukurant Perspectives was held in a former library

"In the end, what's important to us is that when people leave here, they have a feeling," she added. "It doesn't have to be a good feeling, they can also feel provoked – but they have to feel something."

Ukurant Perspectives was awarded 3 Days of Design's prize for Exhibition of the Year. It was one of many design showcases at this year's 3 Days of Design, which also included the renovated Hay House 2.0.

Photography is by Sofie Flinth.

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Ukurant is on show at 3 Days of Design from 16 to 26 September. See Dezeen Events Guide for an up-to-date list of architecture and design events taking place around the world.

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