The Danish-Italian design studio GamFratesi were Guests of Honor for the Stockholm Furniture Fair 2014. As such, they got to design the prominent exhibition and meeting area at the entrance of the fair. Quite appropriately, they called it "Balance". Photo by Tiffany Orvet.

It is about the creation of products rather than the products themselves, says Oki Sato of the Nendo installation in the entrance hall of Stockholm Furniture Fair. 80 lasercut sheets of Forex foam board take on mountain-like shapes when stretched, and create a partly invisible landscape surrounding examples of Nendo’s designs up through the last decade.

Ryan Anderson of RAD Furniture designed the stools as well as the table and benches on the pool deck.

Robin and Lucienne Day Churchill College at the University of Cambridge commissioned Robin Day for the first time in 1962 for dining room furniture. The results yielded additional projects for himself and his wife, Lucienne, a textile designer. Robin’s black leather Club settees and armchairs and black vinyl–covered Interplan desks and tables still outfit the Senior Combination Room today.

Design duo GamFratesi (2014 Guests of Honor at the fair) designed the Cartoon chair for Swedese last year. This year they followed it up with a high-hacked big sister with a similarly unforgettable charm.

Suspended over many of the various furniture pieces GamFratesi has designed for Swedese, Fredericia, FontanaArte, Casamania, Ligne Roset and others, were large Calder-like hanging textile pieces that swung and whirled ever so gently. According to the designers, it was meant to represent the everyday struggle to find balance in life, and emphasize the movement of the fair's visitors through the space. Besides being beautiful, the sculptural pieces worked as room dividers and sound absorbers. Photo by Tiffany Orvet.

Danish silversmith Georg Jensen unveiled two new contemporary collections at Rossana Orlandi during the 2014 MIlan design week as a follow-up to its collaborations with the likes of Ilse Crawford and Alfredo Häberli.

In the living room, spare Scandinavian design takes center stage. Hans Wegner’s Wishbone chairs surround an Essay dining table by Cecilie Manz for Fritz Hansen; a mostly wood palette is enhanced by slate-gray brick around the fireplace. The paper lanterns throughout the home are a mixture of classics by Isamu Noguchi alongside those picked up in Japan and France.

Built-ins reduce the need for furniture.

At the client’s request the kitchen contains neither upper cabinets (Shino can’t reach them) nor an oven (they only used the old one once—to reheat a pizza). A modular Roche Bobois Mah Jong sofa adds a decorative flourish to the living area while maintaining as low a profile as the traditional Japanese furniture.

Yang Yeo and his girlfriend Ching Ian relax on the back stoop of their renovated and radically updated Singapore shophouse—an archetypal building type in this busy port city. “Shophouses brought back memories of our childhood,” says Yeo.

The beanbag chairs and outdoor sofa and chairs are from West Elm and the Case Study Museum Bench is from Modernica.

Two San Francisco art and travel addicts overhauled a loft—and customized a pair of shipping containers—to accommodate their collection and reflect their passions.

To highlight the existing architecture of the home, Hill retained the dark polish of the casement windows, which she finds enhances period details instead of undermining them. In the rear sunroom, the vintage Case Study furniture pieces with Plexiglas bases are from Metro Retro in Houston. A Bourgie lamp by Kartell is atop an old marble end table by Knoll, and the Gan kilim rug pictures a branch motif echoed in the kitchen and breakfast room.

Builder Ross Percival helped finesse the finely tuned detailing that separates the internal slope from the rock outside (opposite). The Pedro wire stool is by Craig Bond for Candywhistle.

Alex enjoys a sun-filled breakfast at the built-in dining table and bench, one of many space-saving designs.

The pair debuted the piece at the 2010 Stockholm Furniture Fair.

A look at the SaloneSatellite exhibition.

Day, Hachigian, and Sosi congregate on the back terrace at a dining table designed by Day and his brother-in-law, Garo Hachigian.

According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, food scraps and yard waste make up 20 percent of what we throw away. Composting organic materials keeps them out of the landfill, which cuts down on greenhouse gases, and enriches the soil. To compost at home, make a pile in your backyard, or introduce an indoor bin for throwaways like apple peels and eggshells.

Though only two feet deep, the Ikea cabinet Azevedo bought for the guest bath didn’t quite fit, so she sliced off eight inches with a table saw. “It might be unorthodox, but it was just easier, faster, and cheaper to do it myself,” says the former furniture designer.

Simple utilitarianism at its finest: Takagi's Simple Machines series of stools, benches, and tables in white oak.

A departure from the mod-meets-baroque dining room, Turin’s breakfast area is far more sedate. She and her daughter, Helena, have a chat at a Progetto 1 table by Monica Armani for B&B Italia surrounded by four Lia chairs by Roberto Barbieri for Zanotta. The painting behind Helena is by Ricci Albenda.

Taking its inspiration from Stockholm's suburban skyline, this lamp by Folkform for Örsjo Belysning is made up of block-like shapes in brass that are different from every angle. You may have seen it's sibling pendant, but this was its first foray as a floor lamp. And as if we needed any support that it was classy enough, Queen Silvia of Sweden received one of her own from the country's Prime Minister earlier this winter. Folkform were quite chuffed to install it themselves at the Royal Palace. Photo by Tiffany Orvet.

Plymå bench by Mattias Stenberg for Nola The smooth curves of this indoor bench may look a bit like plush upholstered furniture, but the resemblance ends there. With its ash wood seats and optional backrest, and limestone table surface, it's durable enough for hardwearing public spaces with a softer side.

Speaking of Nathalie du Pasquier, the Memphis group was well-represented by a special retrospective furniture exhibition at Fondazione Stelline; elsewhere, du Pasquier was the subject of an installation by Disegno magazine.

Celebrating the 50th and 75th anniversaries of the 1939 and 1964 World Fairs, the New York Transit Museum will share postcards, photos, ephemera, and souvenirs that show how transportation was a symbol for modern American life and technology.

In the living and dining area of Jean Risom's Block Island family retreat, mostly vintage Risom furnishings share space with a few new additions, the view facing north is framed by the wall of glass. Photo by: Floto + Warner

The home’s original living and dining rooms were updated with custom cabinetry and new fir floors. The living room sofa, coffee table, and lounge chair are from Blu Dot.

It’s a good idea to read reviews about specific pieces before buying them, which can help prepare you for the unexpected.

Overlooking the Hudson River, Allan Shope’s nearly 3,000-square-foot sustainable home features handmade furniture and an undulating floor, all crafted from the site’s felled black walnut trees.

The living room features two side chairs and an end table by Edward Wormley for Dunbar and a bronze screen designed by Harold Balazs.

In a small seating area at the base of a two-story tower, Oslo chairs and sofas by Anderssen& Voll are paired with Around tables by Thomas Bentzen, all from Muuto. The lamp from Svenskt Tenn was designed by Josef Frank in 1938.

"Shane enjoys both cooking and entertaining so we maximized the counter space to make meal prep and hosting easy," Priftaj says. "It was also very important that the kitchen include a gas grill so he could quickly and conveniently grill without having to climb up five flights of stairs to use the bbq on the patio." Priftaj selected high-gloss acrylic white cabinets from bulthaup's b3 line with an aluminum backsplash and b3 prism drawer system to keep things tidy. A Wolf hood and gas cooktop with chargrill give Carslake the flexibility he desired for indoor grilling. The counters are polished white quartz.

Those hammers and saws built a home for the family’s chickens, watched over by Apolo among outdoor furniture by Richard Schultz.