Conran Columns: Design Heaven and Design Hell: Paul Zara

This time it’s the turn of architectural director Paul Zara from Conran and Partners to tell us his idea of the best and worst in the world of design. Rather an aeronautical themed one this.

Paul works down in our Brighton office and is always busy organising talks and various other exciting things like Brightbuild and even helping out with site specific theatre pieces…

Design Heaven

The miracle of the 20th century was flight.  From the Wright Brothers to Concorde in the blink of an eye. From staring at the moon to standing on the moon.  It’s almost unbelievable that we managed to reduce the time from the UK to New York from 6 days to just over three hours.  Concorde was and is a beautiful thing and should never have been grounded. Classic cars are cherished and preserved.  The Concordes have been left to rot or sulk in the corner of hangers around the world.  They were design at its peak.

Design Hell

Ryanair make flying miserable.  I have flown with them once and never again. Cheap yes. Joyless yes.  No customer service. A flight where the tannoy is permanently on bellowing sales of lottery tickets, expensive snacks and drinks.  Then landing in airports nowhere near anywhere with no facilities. Luggage dumped in a pile.  Help yourself.  Flying at its lowest common denominator.  Democratic maybe. Design?  Nowhere to be seen. How have we come to this? I would rather stay at home.

Paul Zara

Conran: Studio Conran mixes it up!

Swirl fuse medley knead shake turn twist concoct rotate pulp blend beat pulse – Studio Conran’s kMix promises a banquet of typographic food delight, sensation garnished by hand.

The designers at Studio Conran seized the brief with glee when invited to collaborate with the Kenwood brand by creating a unique version of the iconic kMix stand mixer in aid of an online auction for the Make a Wish Foundation. The story behind the online auction made the task even more delicious, knowing these energies will contribute to such an important cause.

Studio Conran’s colourful kMix is embellished with words that celebrate its function. The result is a culinary explosion of vibrant, food-coloured typography, applied meticulously by hand.

We very much hope our kMix will help in raising money and awareness for Make a Wish Foundation and give somebody’s kitchen an enjoyable splash of colour!

Other designers who took part in the project include Zandra Rhodes and East London duo PPQ.

Visit:
www.onlineauctions.org.uk/kenwood for more info

And for the chance to bid please visit:
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=160489216723

At the time of writing our kMix was up to £132. The kMix retails at £349.99 so get bidding!

Conran: Aynhoe Park plaster casts at The Conran Shop

Something rather monumental is going on at The Conran Shop in Fulham Road.

Alongside our new Conran Classic range a collection of beautiful, bright white plaster casts of animals and ancient forms stands resplendently – a striking contrast to the fluid lines and crisp corners of the modern design classics around them.

The casts were taken from ten of the 4,500-strong collection of original casts at Grade I-listed Aynhoe Park on the Oxfordshire/Northants border.

It’s definitely worth a look. Read more about it here on The Conran Shop blog.

Conran: Brightly coloured collection for Autumn at The Conran Shop

The Conran Shop have just launched phase 2 of their vibrant and extremely well priced Well Considered collection.

Read more about the new products on The Conran Shop blog.

It is looking fabulous in its own Well Considered shop at the new-look store in Fulham Road. Go and see it now! We guarantee you won’t be able to walk away empty handed.

Conran: Postcard from Brighton

On Wednesday Terence paid his first visit to Conran & Partners’ office-by-the-sea, down in Brighton.

The Brighton office was set up almost three years ago and has gone from strength to strength in that time, working on numerous high-profile jobs. It was a good opportunity for Terence to meet all 18 members of the south coast staff, as well as get a closer look at some of the work the office is undertaking at the moment, including large-scale housing developments in London, beautiful one-off houses in East Sussex and their work in trying to save the historic, art-deco Saltdean Lido.

Back in June, the Basement in Brighton (housed in the Argus Lofts building, designed by Conran & Partners) played host to an evening of architecture talks organised by our very own Paul Zara as part of his role on the South Coast Design Forum.

The well attended event was wittily introduced by Simon Fanshawe, (writer, broadcaster and chair of Sussex University and the Brighton and Hove Economic Partnership) in his usual provocative style, with Ian Taylor of Feilden Clegg Bradley Studios and Paul Appleton from Allies and Morrison completing the bill.

This was the third in a series of talks put on by the forum on a range of art and design disciplines, including typography and photography (organised by our photographer, Jim Stephenson), with more to follow throughout this year and the next.

More on those large-scale housing developments and beautiful one-off houses next week…