- Patricia Urquiola and Kvadrat's sustainable upholstery
- Design Dynasties
- A new era for Iittala
- Ikea and Raw Color's vibrant crafts
- David Lynch presents 'A Thinking Room' at Salone del Mobile
- Rimowa and La Marzocco’s compact espresso machine
- Ido Yoshimoto's sculptural pieces
- 50 years of the Rubik’s Cube
- Air Play Moon Safari
- Designing the Olympics
Reflect on a year of trailblazing design with a look back at the top ten design stories of 2024 – as chosen by you, the readers. Wallpaper* magazine's most-read design stories of the year point to exciting firsts, like David Lynch’s debut installation at Salone del Mobile, and Patricia Urquiola and Kvadrat’s upholstery textile made from 100 per cent ocean-bound plastic. There are also collaborative triumphs, such as Rimowa and La Marzocco’s new espresso machine; and the celebration of a design classic, the Rubik's Cube.
Top 10 design stories of 2024
Patricia Urquiola and Kvadrat's sustainable upholstery
Named Best Recycled Material at the Wallpaper* Design Awards 2024, Patricia Urquiola’s Sport textile for Kvadrat was a collaboration with Swiss company #tide and is the world’s first upholstery textile made of 100 per cent ocean-bound plastic.
The post-consumer plastic used is collected within 10km of the coastline of Thailand, as part of #tide’s commitment to prevent the materials from reaching the oceans.
The resulting sportswear-inspired fabric features subtle tactile patterns enriching the surface and a colour palette defined by vibrant shades of purple, green and blue, as well as a series of neutrals.
Writer: Rosa Bertoli
Design Dynasties: the powerhouse families of Italian furnishing
Wallpaper* met with eight Italian families who, generation after generation, have set the standards of furniture design across the globe. These 'Design Dynasties' generously shared the personal stories and experiences behind their success with our writer Laura May Todd. They spoke of their longest-serving pieces and the dynamics that have emerged from being both a family and a business. Through her photographs, Bea de Giacomo captures glimpses of their familial settings and their most cherished designs.
Writer Laura May Todd
A new era for Iittala
‘Imperfect’, ‘disruptive’ and ‘unpredictable’ are not words often associated with Finnish design, least of all with Iittala, one of its founding fathers. But new creative director Janni Vepsäläinen is not afraid to use all three and apply them to the 143-year-old company. Iittala now hails a new era, led by Vepsäläinen, and marked by a new logo and collections that pay homage to Aino and Alvar Aalto's heritage.
During Stockholm Furniture Fair 2024, Vepsäläinen unveiled her first collection, within a former nuclear reactor in the city. It wasn't your average debut; London-based composer and artist Damsel Elysium performed a piece using glass ‘instruments’, ranging from 2m-long horns to bells and bottles, all hand-blown in the Iittala factory near Helsinki.
Writer: Emma O'Kelly
Ikea and Raw Color's vibrant crafts
‘Tesammans’ means 'together' or 'in company' in English. It is also the name of the latest collaboration between Ikea and Raw Color, a studio based in Eindhoven and founded by Christoph Brach and Daniera ter Haar. The collection is full of playful designs, vibrant textures and an eye-catching colour palette.
Ikea’s creative brief to the pair was direct yet liberating – reveal the potential of the spectrum. ‘Raw Color possesses a distinctive grasp of colour’s potency, its emotional impact, and its role in shaping our living environments,’ Maria O'Brian, creative Leader at Ikea of Sweden told us. ‘We aim for this collection to spark creativity and empower individuals to craft vibrant and cheerful living spaces in their daily routines.’
Writer: Yoko Choy
David Lynch presents 'A Thinking Room' at Salone del Mobile
Visitors to Salone del Mobile 2024 were offered a new cinematic experience. The revered director David Lynch – known for cult films like Mulholland Drive, Inland Empire and Wild at Heart – designed an exhibition entitled 'Interiors by David Lynch. A Thinking Room' on the grounds of the Rho Fiera. The exhibition marked a new kind of venture for the Oscar-winning auteur, but according to its curator, Antonio Monda, former artistic director of the Rome Film Festival, it came not totally out of the blue.
'A few years earlier I presented Lynch the lifetime achievement award at the Rome Film Festival, and when I visited him in Los Angeles I found him polishing a desk. I asked him, what are you doing? And he told me he designs furniture now,' recounts Monda. 'So when the Salone del Mobile invited me to commission a filmmaker for this special event, I knew he was the real deal.'
Writer Laura May Todd
Rimowa and La Marzocco’s compact espresso machine
Rimowa, globally known for its premium luggage, united with La Marzocco, an expert in espresso machinery, to present a carefully crafted Linea Mini espresso machine celebrating German and Italian design and engineering.
Merging Rimowa's signature grooved aluminium with La Marzocco’s engineering, the Linea Mini is a compact design accessorised with bespoke compartments, and packs an artistic punch with your morning shot of espresso.
Ido Yoshimoto's sculptural pieces
Ido Yoshimoto's workshop in Inverness, California
We visited sculptor Ido Yoshimoto at his California studio, where he spoke about his work with wood, from his beginning as an arborist to his sculptures and furniture made with local reclaimed material – whether salvaged cedar, walnut or cypress, or old-growth redwood downed by disaster.
For Yoshimoto, making art is a way to figure out how things work, and how to fix what is broken. Sometimes it’s just repairing an old pepper grinder or cleaning a fish. But it’s also about living as nature, not with nature, an expression of curiosity and connection. Making art makes the world feel less mysterious because it’s tinkering in its highest form.
Writer: Shonquis Moreno
50 years of the Rubik’s Cube
Hidden away in Budapest’s Buda Hills stands Hungarian inventor Ernő Rubik’s minimalist five-storey abode. Adorned with multiple scenic terraces, it stars an elevator that conveniently glides between levels and furniture of Rubik’s own design. 'Yes, I made other things, too,' he told Wallpaper* on a tour through his comfortable rooms, 'but people only want to talk about the cube.’
The cube, of course, is the Rubik’s Cube, the bestselling 3D combination puzzle that the inventor dreamed up back in 1974. Twisting and turning into some 43 quintillion permutations, the six-sided cube is clad in vibrantly tinted squares that beckon enthusiastic problem solvers.
Fifty years after its birth, we spoke with Rubik about the history of a design classic.
Writer Alia Akkam
Air Play Moon Safari
While the ‘Air Play Moon Safari’ tour was in full swing across Europe, the USA and Mexico during 2024 (they're playing 2025 dates too), we explored the design of the French band's White Box stage. They played their intimate, retro-futurist classic album, in full, from a five-sided, white-walled, 21:9 aspect-ratio letterbox that faced its voyeuristic audiences like Hitchcock’s Rear Window property as reimagined by Californian modernists. 'It could be a home, it could be our world, our head… our architectural concept,' they said of the project.
Writer Simon Mills
Designing the Olympics
How do you begin to design the Olympics? On the eve of this year's event, we pulled up a pew with Joachim Roncin, the director of design for Paris 2024, to learn more about gender-free mascots with a genital likeness and medals made from the Eiffel Tower.
This had been a five-year assignment with a sprawling, impossibly broad scope, a hard deadline, a global audience and – ideally – a positive legacy that will span generations of future citizens. The heat was real.
Writer Hugo Macdonald
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Sharon Smith's Polaroids capture 1980s New York nightlifeIDEA Books has launched a new monograph of Smith’s photographs, titled Camera Girl and edited by former editor-in-chief of LIFE magazine, Bill Shapiro
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A multifaceted Beverly Hills house puts the beauty of potentiality in the frameA Beverly Hills house in Trousdale, designed by Robin Donaldson, brings big ideas to the residential scale
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The most whimsical hotel Christmas trees around the worldWe round up the best hotel Christmas tree collaborations of the year, from an abstract take in Madrid to a heritage-rooted installation in Amsterdam
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The future of Salone del Mobile: new report quantifies impact of the world's biggest furniture fairFor the first time, Salone del Mobile reports on its size and impact. ‘Milan Design (Eco) System’ puts Salone into numbers, allowing its future and challenges to be addressed
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Human gestures shape Milano Cortina 2026's Winter Olympic lookItalian spirit is at the heart of the upcoming Winter Olympic games with pictograms, emblems, and mascots called the 'Vibes'. The idea is to celebrates the Italian way of communicating through expressive movements and gestures
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Teruhiro Yanagihara's new textile for Kvadrat boasts a rhythmic design reimagining Japanese handsewing techniques‘Ame’ designed by Teruhiro Yanagihara for Danish brand Kvadrat is its first ‘textile-to-textile’ product, made entirely of polyester recycled from fabric waste. The Japanese designer tells us more
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Design showcase Alcova announces its 2025 locations in MilanAlcova, the roving design exhibition, will expand its footprint with two new locations in the northern Milan suburb of Varedo – a former factory and ancient greenhouses
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Behind the scenes: how the Paris 2024 Olympic and Paralympic Torches, Rings, and Agitos came to lifeArcelorMittal’s three-part video series offers a first look behind the scenes of how the Paris 2024 Olympic and Paralympic creative vision was ignited
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Take off: Mathieu Lehanneur's Olympic Cauldron rises into the Parisian night skyThe Paris 2024 Olympics’ opening ceremony was closed with a soaring cauldron spectacle that will go down in history
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Postcard from Paris: Olympic fever takes over the streetsOn the eve of the opening ceremony of Paris 2024, our correspondent shares her views from the streets of the capital about how the event is impacting the urban landscape.
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Designing the Olympics: Wallpaper* interviews Joachim Roncin, director of design for Paris 2024How do you begin to design the Olympics? We pulled up a pew with the director of design for Paris 2024 to learn more about gender-free mascots with a genital likeness and medals made from the Eiffel Tower
