Issue link: https://read.dmtmag.com/i/48690
1 At the Collins Building, the Cartier Foundation is presenting the work of artist Beatriz Milhazes, who exhibited at the Fondation Cartier pour l'art contemporain in Paris in 2009. For the occasion, Milhazes—along with Cartier Workshops—produced an unusual mobile, created from pearls, semi-precious gems and precious stones. is busy holding down the fort at the New York office of his and his partner Chris Lasch's architecture firm, Aranda\Lasch. Lasch is in Arizona where the firm has just opened a studio for design, production and fabrication of their creative out- put, which, at the moment includes new products for Baccarat, an installation for the Calder Foundation and a series of limited edition pieces for an upcoming show at New York's Johnson Trading Gallery. We caught up with Aranda to discuss the studio's westward expansion, defense contractors turned designers and taking Design Miami/ off the grid. BEN ARANDA Congratulations on expanding your studio. Thanks. My partner, Chris Lasch, is heading up the studio in Tucson, Arizona; it's a much more hands-on space than our New York of- fice is. Why Arizona? There are a few reasons, one of which is all of the fabricators out there. Historically there have been defense contractors out there—you know, people whose experience is in making aircraft parts for the military. We're able to use them to fabricate work for us and have been able to lower costs and increase capacity while maintaining the integrity of our work. Were the contractors receptive to this type of work? We've had a lot of inter- est, yes. Fabricators in aerospace in general are having to retool their output because the military contracts are not as plentiful as they used to be. A lot of designers have to seek new opportunities. They have this ability and they're no longer making bombs, so they can do something cool, like make a table. And what do you have in store for Design Miami/? This year we've laid out the tent again. All fairs are organized on grids and it's a difficult thing to change because you're trying to change the mentality of everyone involved, get- ting them off the grid. From the beginning we wanted to do something very differ- ent, and now this "scatter" plan has turned into a kind of a template for Design Miami/ now. People are talking about it as an alternative model of how you lay out a fair. The way in which you move is pretty radical in that it allows you to get lost in circles and figure eights. You move much more intuitively. So are the pieces for your spring show being manufactured in the new Arizona studio? The show's actually going to be called "Arizona," and it's all work we've made out there. We've been talking about doing this exhibition for a couple of years now. Paul [Johnson] has been our gallerist forever—we've been through a lot together, but it's actually the first solo show we've had at the gallery. 40 CULTURED Architects Chris Lasch (left) and Ben Aranda; their new Scallop Table 2