Along With Some Darn Good Lamps, Dwell’s Marketing Associate Saw the Future at ICFF

To say that there’s a lot to see at ICFF is an understatement. North America’s largest furniture fair nearly fills the Jacob Javits Convention Center floor, packing in hundreds of designers and their newest and most enticing objects. It’s a sight to see, and somewhat of a pain to navigate, so I did it for you. If you’re ready, let’s get into it.

Let’s start at the beginning—historically. Even if you don’t know it, you’ve probably seen Rarify’s work. The online retailer of rare vintage furniture and contemporary designs has gained traction through their digestible, brief-history-of-an-object videos. This year, they brought that expertise to ICFF with a collection of furniture that follows how metal—particularly chrome—has permeated design from the early 20th century until now. It’s the perfect starting point for a furniture fair all about cutting-edge design, providing a sense of history that contextualizes the rest of the exhibitors.

Rarify wasn’t alone in highlighting historical icons and novel iterations of them. Sawyer Made has whittled down a name for itself by perfecting the Windsor style. A traditional English craft, Windsor furniture follows a simple formula: a solid wood seat with dowels that create the legs and back support. What isn’t so simple is what Sawyer Made is doing with the form, modernizing it with subtle interventions, like an arm rest that becomes a shared table between two benches—an energizing take on a traditional conversation chair. The woodwork is impeccable, but it’s the innovation that’s really impressive.

Dwell 24 alum Robert Sukrachand also offered a refreshing take on tradition with Pern Baan, where irregular marble sconces stole the show. The Thai-American designer has always focused on his local traditions, and the collection of wall-mounted, Thailand-sourced marble provided a fresh perspective on a material we often associate with antiques.

Twenty years ago, Molo, a Vancouver-based company that makes everything from room dividers to tea sets to runways for brands like Céline, was born. It also won Best New Designer at ICFF that year—so it shouldn’t surprise anyone that their installation was a stand-out. Making use of the fabrication technique they’re famous for, a ribbon of accordion-like paper wrapped around a section of the Javits Center, providing a colorful, welcome respite from the convention center aesthetic while also highlighting their 20-year-old legacy. There were also moments of community—like the circular note pad—which will always be timeless.

I also loved to see a new take on tapestry making, particularly with a focus on reuse. In The Crossroads section of ICFF, the curators put the works of multiple design teams into conversation. A few fantastically comfortable—and entirely biodegradable!—chairs by Common Object Studio welcome visitors to take a seat in front of a massive landscape by Liora Manné fabricated largely from recycled materials.

Like the tapestry, LikeMindedObjects took the abstraction of familiar forms a step further. Underneath a layer of woven t-shirts, a Breuer Cesca chair sits on a white pedestal. The form is immediately recognizable, but it’s not until you get up close that you begin to see traces of old logos still hanging onto the shredded fabric.

Unsurprisingly, some of the youngest designers had the most to say. What was most impressive about the Schools Showcase, though, was that it seemed the students had all done their homework. Designers from Pratt once again iterated traditional forms: Natalie Saint’s Marriage Chair stands out for its ladder-like rungs for a back that reached at least 25 feet in the air—all while maintaining the profile of a rather standard seat. George Knowles’s Seet chair, painted with a natural landscape, can be hung on a wall as decor. But once its feet touch down, it folds out into a functional addition to the home.

When I asked Nicholas Sangaré of Sangare Studio what inspired his red lounge, he gave me a pretty clear answer: The form follows Mies van der Rohe’s Barcelona Chair, while the red upholstery references Eero Saarinen’s TWA Hotel. The aluminum base modernizes the piece, but the overall form nods to its roots.

I had a similar interaction with Ash Fischer of Fisch Design, who designed this daybed with Ditto. While a recycled plastic base brings the piece into the 2020s, the green upholstery references the nostalgic saturation of a pool table.

While I especially appreciate designs that reference iconic forms and predecessors, I do also welcome a total departure or two. That being said, it can be rather difficult to riff on the chair, as so much has already been done. So what makes a chair exciting? Material use. Throughout ICFF, there was a clear focus on more responsible materials. The yellow Capri chair above, from Mediterranean Design, is made from 3D printed plastic. This method of construction cuts out the offcut as we know it. No materials wasted—just use what you need, then turn off the printer.

LikeMindedObjects (the designer behind the t-shirt-ified Cesca chair above) also did something unexpected with the chair form. According to the designer, Elise McMahon, the chair is designed to disappear. That is, it’s constructed from paper, and the padding is filled with shredded mycelium, which is essentially what forms mushrooms. It’s very 11th-grade-science-class-chic, and I live for it. (You could also argue it once lived for me.)

I don’t have a lot to say about the work Canada-based Studio D’Armes brought to ICFF, besides that I loved it. The entire booth was coated in a perfectly disarming powder blue, a healthy contrast to the rather industrial forms. The powder-coated lighting—from floor lamp to wall sconce to pendant—felt perfectly strict, and seemed to reference the office landscape that has changed so much, so rapidly. A pulley-system brought a bit more light to the mechanical style. J’love.

My favorite booth elicited a gasp, followed by me running across the convention center floor, followed by our intrepid photographer Levi Mandel. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: We don’t see enough Depression Era furniture. For their debut at ICFF, Wretched Flowers scratched that itch.

The design duo perfectly employed the "crown of thorns" woodworking technique—this time in steel—to produce furniture that looks like it precedes all of us. Hanging in front of one of the mirrors, a small pendant light also makes use of metal in the form of chain mail. A matching floor lamp stands to the side, while its jewelry, in the form of cast-pewter stars traditionally seen on Amish fabrics, stands at the ready. Taken altogether, the collection was the perfectly tarnished star of ICFF, in my eyes. 

And that, folks, is the crème de la ICFF. We'll see you next year!

Related Reading:

Everything Our Editor-in-Chief Liked at Brooklyn’s NYCxDesign Shows

Everything Dwell’s Style Editor Saw in an Afternoon of NYCxDesign