DESIGN A bed for the stars of the media age 2/12/2016Sleep or simply doze during the day – a thing of the past. Today, the bed drifts in a veritable ocean of information. Lying down is no longer about resting, but about moving.
FAIRS & EVENTS Work like the ancient Greeks4/22/2015Michele de Lucchi is convinced he has found what creative work primarily need. A walk on his installation "Workplace 3.0 - La Passegiata" at the Salone Ufficio.
FAIRS & EVENTS Where are all the thinking caps?3/21/2015Coinciding with this year’s CeBIT exhibition, Kunstverein Hannover is examining “Digital Conditions” – and contemplating whether the user in front of the screen will soon be redundant.
FAIRS & EVENTS Lines in space 2/19/2015With “Sketch” for Schönbuch Markus Jehs and Jürgen Laub of Jehs + Laub demonstrate how to design a minimalist coat stand. Martina Metzner talked to the pair about their idea, pared-down design, and models of Fritt chews.
FAIRS & EVENTS The New Order10/28/2014“New Order” is the new all-rounder by Stefan Diez for Hay: A modular system for the office and the home that can be used to structure just about any space.
INTERVIEWS Beyond the upholstered world10/28/2014“Allstar” and “Hack” are the two items of office furniture that Konstantin Grcic has designed for Vitra. At the Orgatec Thomas Wagner talked with him about changes in the office world and the two newcomers.
FAIRS & EVENTS The survival of the office10/27/2014Claesson Koivisto Rune’s Mårten Claesson explains why Swedes found the transition to open offices so easy and why you shouldn’t turn a lawyer’s office into a playground. An interview by Martina Metzner
FAIRS & EVENTS Work with love10/24/2014One thing is clear at this year’s Orgatec in Cologne: the lines dividing homes from offices are becoming very blurred. While the playful office world may still be a topic, work is being taken seriously again. We outline the key new products at the fair.
FAIRS & EVENTS A touch of quiet never harms10/24/2014Think gray felt clouds above your desk, planks on the table and gingko leaves on the wall: At the Orgatec in Cologne, there’s a colorful and fun office world full of acoustic panels on show that constrains the communicative cacophony of open-plan offices.
FAIRS & EVENTS Workplace or playground?10/14/2014The office as a large playground where it’s all about fun and performance counts more than output? Are the designers and manufacturers who create offices getting overly inspired by the habits of Silicon Valley nerds?
FAIRS & EVENTS Simple and smart – perfect working from home10/10/2014Working from home – a convenient alternative in today’s networked age. Working at the dinner table or cram heavy-duty desks is not necessary – considering the abundance of small, delicate, readily movable and well-designed alternatives. We present the best choices.
ARCHITECTURE Inside the cube can be fun9/20/2013At long last there’s a bit of life in the “Sanaa Cube” in Essen. In the fall, the newly established course offered by Folkwang University will start - there. Entitled “Heterotopia – Summer Workshop 2013”, the designers and students have developed prototypes for the interior – and the results are astonishing.
MAGAZINE Technocrats make the world a duller place1/16/2013What will tomorrow’s offices look like? What role will technology play in all this? Or aesthetics? Thomas Wagner spoke to Hanns-Peter Cohn, CEO at Vitra, about the office as an urban landscape, tiny office cubicles and places of retreat, replacing felt with polyester and future developments.
MAGAZINE Forecasting offices11/14/2012On the silver screen and at Orgatec, office environments are depicted as having a life of their own. What kind of image of reality do they convey? A rummage through the film archives and walkabout in the trade fair halls.
MAGAZINE The office, just a little different11/13/2012At this year's Orgatec trade fair, Ankara-based firm "Gug" confidently promoted a little different office design under the slogan "The Choice of the Elite".
MAGAZINE What should offices be? A small town or a camping site?10/29/2012Orgatec 2012 in Cologne presents the 21st-century office as an urban landscape in colors as fresh as spring itself. Seldom does one feel so content at work – be it alone in a cocoon or in a meeting in a sheltered seating group.
MAGAZINE Why the office is what it is10/26/2012Cell offices and cubicles are considered negative examples of office design. The era of what we would today regard as the human office started with the “Citizen Office”. Concepts such as the “Net'n'Nest” symbolize the attempt to combine networking and concentrated work. So will we in future work in a kind of adventure playground for adults?
MAGAZINE Thinking through building10/23/2012A site-specific installation by Canadian artist Cedric Bomford has radically changed the working environment in the large loft space that houses Stuttgart-based agency Dorten. The artist used found materials to create areas and installations that are surprisingly practical and have also given rise to a fundamental change in perspective.
MAGAZINE Selected exhibitors at Orgatec 201210/22/2012October 23rd will see the presentation at Orgatec in Cologne of all the new products for the design of offices and public spaces. A list of selected exhibitors tells you which manufacturers are attending, and where to find them.
MAGAZINE How the office became what it is today10/22/2012Are you still living or already working? Since the launch of the Internet we are not only available more or less everywhere online, but the line dividing work and living has become increasingly blurred. At least in some areas. Moreover, fixed office and work structures are increasingly dissolving. What does this mean for the contemporary office? How has it developed? Its history holds the one or other surprise in store.
MAGAZINE Changing the way we see the world10/18/2012Office furniture trade fairs are more than just a guide to new interiors, they’re social labs. In times such as these, when the world of work is changing super-fast, they promise to offer exciting insights into the changed mind-set. Some thoughts prior to Orgatec 2012.
MAGAZINE A chair for 40 hours12/5/2011We hardly spend as much time anywhere else as on our office chair, other than in bed that is. Only logical that the chair should help us sit comfortably and healthily. That goal may sound simple, but finding the right solution remains a challenge to this day.
MAGAZINE Work wherever you want! Office worlds 2010 – part 2: of sheds and queues of seats11/9/2010Offices are increasingly turning into social centers. To make certain the stress of constant communication does not become too fierce and the office becomes a social flashpoint, the modern work nomad withdraws into a chic little shed or a new kind of basket-chair.
MAGAZINE Work wherever you want! Office worlds 2010 – part 1: of citizens, territories and islands11/8/2010You will search in vain for a new paradigm or new typologies of work at the Orgatec 2010. Instead, people are busy working away at furniture systems that enable the temporary privacy of retreat in the midst of the open field of omnipresent communication.
MAGAZINE The Return of the Phone Booth11/2/2010Phone booths have more or less vanished from public space. Yet now they are returning in a changed shape - in offices. While they once served to provide access to phones, phone boxes now offer a touch of privacy in the world of today's open-plan offices.
MAGAZINE What Bauhaus could never have imagined10/18/2010The latest tubular steel product from Thonet is a floor luminaire called "Lum". With its curved shape, it seems to bridge the gap between classic and contemporary tubular steel furniture. Let us take you on a tour of the history, spanning decades, of its development.
MAGAZINE Pit stop with Bene9/18/2007Major events often leave behind a void. It takes a little time to fill a vacuum again and in the case of Expo 2000 in Hanover, it seems this time has now come. Competence and creativity have now settled on the site which, seven years ago, was devoted to representation and discourse between countries.
DESIGN Inspiration from your jacket pocket5/1/2001It needn’t always be digital. The good old notebook, without the upper case N, proves its worth in an age when everyone has to be permanently creative.