Wabi-Sabi

Wabi-Sabi - for Artists, Designers, Poets, & Philosophers - By, Leonard Koren

It has come to my attention that the design world is silently and subconsciously preparing a drastic shift in popular theme.

Since the middle of the last century and onward, much of the design world has been defined by a concentration on modernism as a departure from 19th century classicism. A fascination on universal prototypical solutions and concepts that imply a logical and rational worldview have been concerns of the current design administration... that is, until now.

At the moment, what we are experiencing is a move toward personal, idiosyncratic solutions in design... a new appreciation for all things imperfect, impermanent, and incomplete... a worldview that is self-referential, intuitive, ambiguous, and based in a metaphysical understanding that all things are devolving toward, or evolving from, nothingness. What is being discussed here is the Japanese concept of "imperfect beauty", Wabi-Sabi.

Wabi-sabi is the most conspicuous and characteristic feature of traditional Japanese beauty. It occupies roughly the same position in the Japanese pantheon of aesthetic values as do the Greek ideals of beauty and perfection in the West.

Wabi-sabi is the undeclared beauty that waits to be discovered. It is the beauty of things as they are...an embrace of the imperfections, pared down to its barest essence, at the border of nothingness.

Unlike Modernism which solicits the reduction of sensory information, this view solicits the expansion of sensory information. In Modernism, people are adapting to machines. In Wabi-Sabi, people are adapting to nature. Beyond the hype of all that is packaged as "eco" these days, is this new understanding of the relationship between design and nature.

Author Leonard Koren is a trained architect, but never built anything—except an eccentric Japanese tea house—because he found large, permanent objects too philosophically vexing to design. Instead he created WET: The Magazine of Gourmet Bathing, one of the premier avant-garde magazines of the 1970s. Subsequently Koren has produced unusual books about design- and aesthetics-related subjects. Koren resides in both America and Japan. For more information, visit www.leonardkoren.com.

This book is an updated version of the enduring classic that first introduced the concept of “imperfect beauty” to the West. Text, images, and book design seamlessly meld into a wabi-sabi-like experience.


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Wabi-Sabi

Wabi-Sabi - for Artists, Designers, Poets, & Philosophers - By, Leonard Koren

It has come to my attention that the design world is silently and subconsciously preparing a drastic shift in popular theme.

Since the middle of the last century and onward, much of the design world has been defined by a concentration on modernism as a departure from 19th century classicism. A fascination on universal prototypical solutions and concepts that imply a logical and rational worldview have been concerns of the current design administration... that is, until now.

At the moment, what we are experiencing is a move toward personal, idiosyncratic solutions in design... a new appreciation for all things imperfect, impermanent, and incomplete... a worldview that is self-referential, intuitive, ambiguous, and based in a metaphysical understanding that all things are devolving toward, or evolving from, nothingness. What is being discussed here is the Japanese concept of "imperfect beauty", Wabi-Sabi.

Wabi-sabi is the most conspicuous and characteristic feature of traditional Japanese beauty. It occupies roughly the same position in the Japanese pantheon of aesthetic values as do the Greek ideals of beauty and perfection in the West.

Wabi-sabi is the undeclared beauty that waits to be discovered. It is the beauty of things as they are...an embrace of the imperfections, pared down to its barest essence, at the border of nothingness.

Unlike Modernism which solicits the reduction of sensory information, this view solicits the expansion of sensory information. In Modernism, people are adapting to machines. In Wabi-Sabi, people are adapting to nature. Beyond the hype of all that is packaged as "eco" these days, is this new understanding of the relationship between design and nature.

Author Leonard Koren is a trained architect, but never built anything—except an eccentric Japanese tea house—because he found large, permanent objects too philosophically vexing to design. Instead he created WET: The Magazine of Gourmet Bathing, one of the premier avant-garde magazines of the 1970s. Subsequently Koren has produced unusual books about design- and aesthetics-related subjects. Koren resides in both America and Japan. For more information, visit www.leonardkoren.com.

This book is an updated version of the enduring classic that first introduced the concept of “imperfect beauty” to the West. Text, images, and book design seamlessly meld into a wabi-sabi-like experience.


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Jessy G Brights the House

Our BFF Jessy G of Bright House Events is adding DJ to her impressive resume. This blue-eyed ingénue of the music scene offers a fresh spin on spinning, incorporating oldies, electro, and even 90's hip hop into her playlists. We love.

This Damsel of D'Fresh can be seen and heard at her Tuesday residency at Hollywood Hotspot Kitchen 24.

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Jessy G Brights the House

Our BFF Jessy G of Bright House Events is adding DJ to her impressive resume. This blue-eyed ingénue of the music scene offers a fresh spin on spinning, incorporating oldies, electro, and even 90's hip hop into her playlists. We love.

This Damsel of D'Fresh can be seen and heard at her Tuesday residency at Hollywood Hotspot Kitchen 24.

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HFH - SECRET Home Improvement Store

(HFH) Habitat for Humanity Greater Los Angeles operates what feels like a secret home improvement store in Gardena, CA. The inventory is unlike anything I've ever seen. They carry everything from doors, windows, lumber, and everything you need to build a home, to oversize lighting fixtures, crystal chandeliers, boxes of beautiful decorative tiles, dining chairs, tables, desks, stainless steal refrigerators and other appliances, etc... Everything is donated and than sold at an extremely nominal price points. Let me stress that when I nominal I mean ridiculously cheap. My only disclaimer is that depending on the day, the inventory changes. Because everything is donated at random, there's no consistency with what's available. Obviously, those who know about the store swoop up the best things as they come in, so try to get there in the morning and try not to go on a weekend.

"Habitat for Humanity’s Home Improvement Store is a retail business selling surplus new and used home furnishings and building and home improvement materials to the general public. Retail businesses, contractors, individuals and other organizations that are remodeling or have surplus or discontinued merchandise donate usable materials. For example, a lumber company that is remodeling donated most of its inventory to the Home Improvement Store, and a lighting company who went out of business gave Habitat the remainder of its merchandise to sell. " -HFH website

"Profits from the Home Improvement Store will be used by HFH to further its mission of providing home ownership opportunities to low-income families in need of safe, decent, and affordable housing. Another benefit of the Store is environmental: materials that would otherwise be thrown into landfills are reused and recycled." - HFH website


17700 South Figueroa Street in Gardena.

www.shophabitat.org


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HFH - SECRET Home Improvement Store

(HFH) Habitat for Humanity Greater Los Angeles operates what feels like a secret home improvement store in Gardena, CA. The inventory is unlike anything I've ever seen. They carry everything from doors, windows, lumber, and everything you need to build a home, to oversize lighting fixtures, crystal chandeliers, boxes of beautiful decorative tiles, dining chairs, tables, desks, stainless steal refrigerators and other appliances, etc... Everything is donated and than sold at an extremely nominal price points. Let me stress that when I nominal I mean ridiculously cheap. My only disclaimer is that depending on the day, the inventory changes. Because everything is donated at random, there's no consistency with what's available. Obviously, those who know about the store swoop up the best things as they come in, so try to get there in the morning and try not to go on a weekend.

"Habitat for Humanity’s Home Improvement Store is a retail business selling surplus new and used home furnishings and building and home improvement materials to the general public. Retail businesses, contractors, individuals and other organizations that are remodeling or have surplus or discontinued merchandise donate usable materials. For example, a lumber company that is remodeling donated most of its inventory to the Home Improvement Store, and a lighting company who went out of business gave Habitat the remainder of its merchandise to sell. " -HFH website

"Profits from the Home Improvement Store will be used by HFH to further its mission of providing home ownership opportunities to low-income families in need of safe, decent, and affordable housing. Another benefit of the Store is environmental: materials that would otherwise be thrown into landfills are reused and recycled." - HFH website


17700 South Figueroa Street in Gardena.

www.shophabitat.org


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Arts & Architecture, Complete Box Set

Arts & Architecture: The seminal architecture journal resurrected in facsimile.

From the end of World War II until the mid-1960s, exciting things were happening in American architecture: emerging talents were focusing on innovative projects that integrated low-cost materials and modern design. This trend was most notably embodied in the famous Case Study House Program, which was championed by the era’s leading American journal, Arts & Architecture. Focusing not only on architecture but also design, art, music, politics, and social issues, A&A was an ambitious and groundbreaking publication, largely thanks to the inspiration of John Entenza, who ran the magazine for over two decades until David Travers became publisher in 1962. The era’s greatest architects were featured in A&A, including Neutra, Schindler, Saarinen, Ellwood, Lautner, Eames, and Koenig; and two of today’s most wildly successful architects, Frank Gehry and Richard Meier, had their debuts in its pages. A&A was instrumental in putting American architecture—and in particular California Modernism—on the map. Other key contributors to the magazine include photographers Julius Shulman and Ezra Stoller, writers Esther McCoy and Peter Yates, and cover designers Herbert Matter and Alvin Lustig, among many luminaries of modernism.

This collection comes with ten boxes, each containing a complete year’s worth of Arts & Architecture magazines from 1945–1954. That’s 6,076 pages in 118 issues reproduced in their entirety—beginning with Entenza’s January 1945 announcement of the Case Study House Program. Also included is a supplement booklet with an original essay by former A&A publisher David Travers, available in English, German, French, and Spanish; plus a master index and tables of contents for the magazine from 1945-1967. Arts & Architecture 1945–1954 will be followed in autumn 2009 by a second set, 1955–1967, bringing together all the existing issues of the modern era.

This new TASCHEN publication, limited to 5,000 numbered copies, provides a comprehensive record of mid-century American architecture and brings the legendary Arts & Architecture back to life after forty years. - Taschen.com

Thanks to LA Times Magazine - Design & Culture Editor, Mayer Rus, for covering the Arts & Architecture reproductions.