Flensted Mobiles are beautiful, humorous and reflect a more modern approach to accessories.

Originally Flensted Mobiles were sold in bookshops and craft centres. Today, they are sold predominantly through museum and gallery gift outlets, contemporary furniture and design stores and children’s shops, and enjoy an international success.

All Flensted Mobiles are hand-made in Denmark, and offer high quality at a moderate price. Elements are assembled and packed by about 50 skilled home-workers and their families. Many of the original Flensted Mobiles are still in production, but the contemporary designs are now the bestsellers. Ole Flensted is the chief designer, but for introducing new ideas often works in conjunction with artists.

Flensted Mobiles are modern yet timeless, often abstract, brightly coloured and unaffected by fashion, qualities which enable them to hang and give inspiration for many years.

In the coming months, our blog will be featuring products from Alessi’s list of their 100 best products. Stay tuned!

A couple prefix notes.  One from Alberto Alessi – “Decipher your own Modernity”:

Alberto Alessi - Alessi CEO

Since time immemorial, my family has been firmly established on Lake Orta.  In this poor, narrow valley in the Italian Alps, close to Switzerland, a long-standing tradition in wood and metal handicraft has survived up to this day.

Within the Alessi Company, design in the current sense of the term began to gain a foothold under my father Carlo, who drew on his training aas an industrial designer in order to develop virtually all of the products which appeared in our catalogues bewteen 1935 and 1945.  In the 1950s, my father replaced my grandfather (who fonded the factory in 1921) as corporate general manager, giving up altogether his activity as a designer and increasingly relying on the contributions of freelance designers, in accordance with the practice which was to become typical of all “Ittalian Design Factories”.  To this day, Alessi products are still considered as being handicraft items made with the aid of machines: by this I mean that, even though we rely on contemporary, industurial, technology and processing equipment, at depth of price – the one I beleive we ought to stick to – our inherent attitude is still rooted in handicraft culture.

When speaking about the “Italian Design Factories” I am referring to a historical group of companies for whom design is a mission, an activity which has become a sort of overall philosophy, a “Weltanschauung”, undelying all of these companies’ operational steps: we believe that our true nature comes closser to a “Research Lab in the Applied Arts” than to an industry in the traditional sense of the term: A Research Lab in the Applied Arts, the role of which is to mediate contrinually between the most advanced and stimulating expresions of international creative culture on the one hand, and the public’s requirements and dreams on the other.  A lab that should be as open and dedicated to the world of creation as possible.

The right type of contribution that an industry such as Alessi can make to the cilised devlopment of the consumer society is to be an artistic mediator, attemping to create new ojects, introducing a touch of transcendency, helping us decipher our own modernity.

Alberto Alessi

And one from Francesca Oldrini – “Design Classics”:

Some people have them in their homes and don’t even see them.  Some people find them in the attic, amongst old junk, and out of nostalgia, inpired by fond membories, clean them up and put them in the living room.  We are talking about household goods or to be precise tableware: objects which form an essential part of our daily lives…

Humble, unpretentious, so familiar they have become prosaic.  Yet the Alessi family, who have been producing them since 1921, have managed to transform these jugs and trays into design classics, and some are even beginning to hail them as works of art…

Francesca Oldrini

All content is copyright Alessi and contributing writers.

I walked around the showroom for months not noticing this lamp, and then one day I saw it, and I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it.  It’s quiet and understated, but in a powerful and poetic way ( like a haiku).  I love all the different forms it can morph into and it slightly reminds me of an old school Star Trek model (just for the record, I am not a Treki, not that I have anything against Trekies.  Naoto Fukasawa (say it out loud, it feels beautiful in your mouth) distilled something magnificent here.

mymodernistlife

I love the new children’s size ‘modern’, mid-century design furniture pieces that are being manufactured! The Junior Panton’s originally designed by Verner Panton in 1999 and manufactured by Vitra are kid friendly with soft edges, durable material and seven fun colours! Kartell manufactures the Lou Lou Ghost chairs which are so, so adorable in transparent colours or solids. Philippe Starck designed the Louis Ghost chair in 2002 and was an instant furniture fashion hit! Kids and parents will be excited to decorate their homes with these additions!

Junior Panton

I just received my monthly copy of the Fritz Hansen E-News and thought I’d pass this along. As a subscriber, you will not only receive the latest updates from Fritz Hansen, but you will also be automatically enrolled for a chance to win free merchandise from them. They will be drawing four times a year. The current draw will be April 10, 2007 and the prize is 4 VicoDuo chairs by designer Vico Magistretti.

How cool is that. Of course if you win and you don’t have room for them, let me know and I’ll see if I can free up some space. 

Well, what to talk about today? This one is a no brainer. In all the years that we have been a Herman Miller for the Home retailer, I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been asked whether I think that HM will ever make the Eames Lounge chair and Ottoman in Rosewood again. My response, "probably not in my lifetime". Well, the next best thing has happened. In what is the 50th anniversary year of the creation of the Eames Lounge Chair and Ottoman, HM has not only released a 50th anniversary edition in any of the current veneer options (Natural cherry, Cherry, or Walnut) , but they have also made available a new version in "Santos Palisander" which is a sustainable type of Rosewood.

"The 50th anniversary year is also the occasion for the introduction of a striking and richly grained veneer called Santos Palisander, a sustainably sourced tropical wood from Forest Stewardship Council certified forests."

So, to see the whole story, go the following link:  http://www.hermanmiller.com/CDA/SSA/News/Story/0,1585,a8-c407-n398,00.html

We are excited to bring our first model of this new veneer in to our showroom, as we can start to order this now for the showroom and early in May for clients, at which time it will be available on-line as a completely separate chair on gabrielross.com

Another option that makes this chair even more luxurious is the optional upgrade to Edelman leather.  Wow!!