I just came back from Spain after attending Habitat Valencia Fair -- a showcase of the Spanish furniture industry. Everyone involved said that this year the attendance, as well as the number of exhibitors, have dramatically diminished and that whoever was there truly showed courage. I also heard a few...

According to Einstein, "not everything that counts can be counted." Teaching children how to look at the world with a designer's eye definitely counts at Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum's new educational space located in Park Heights / Harlem neighborhood of New York City.

Recently, I had first-hand experience with the...

You may wonder: "Architecture classes for children ... hmm ... Why would I subject my child to any kind of professional training at this stage of her development? I could be steering him in a direction of a career path that is totally wrong!"

The authors of...

I am invited by Jo Lauria, the exhibition curator of Golden State of Craft: California 1960-1985 to tag along on a formal tour of the show -- a 45min. talk about the genesis, development, and overall conceptualization of the exhibition, along with "chats" about specific objects on...

Week nine & ten of the Saturday High Architecture class at Art Center College of Design: we are finishing up and presenting, summarizing what we have learned together. One of the insightful "rules" I came across recently, postulates: "Every now and then take something that you see everyday...

Week eight of the Saturday High Architecture class at Art Center College of Design: we leap into master planning. Enticing each one of the students to think of their project from a new point of view, as an integral component of a larger system/a neighborhood/a community is what...

Week seven of the Saturday High Architecture class at Art Center College of Design. I am starting the lesson with a pop quiz. My students quickly begin responding.
• What is parti?
• What is human scale?
• What is circulation?

I ask them...

Week six of the Saturday High Architecture class at Art Center College of Design. Last time I ended the class with a quote from Virginia Woolf: "The success of the masterpieces seems to lie not so much in their freedom from faults... but in the immense persuasiveness of...

Week five of the Saturday High Architecture class at Art Center College of Design. The theme is "orchestrating experience on a different scale: 10 ways to prepare for success." Peter Lawrence said: "Design is the term we use to describe both the process and the result of giving...

Week four of the Saturday High Architecture class at Art Center College of Design. Today we are starting to tackle one of the key concepts: Orchestrating Experience. My goal is to add yet another layer, to broaden understanding of the design process for each teen in the room....

Serendipitous sequence of events that always accompanies seeing my friend Mikel Orbe, head of the interior furnishings department within the Trade Commission of Spain in New York, brought me to LA's Dwell on Design. As Mikel's job is to promote Spanish talent, he immediately took me to the main attraction...

Week three of the Saturday High architecture class at Art Center College of Design. Today I want to concentrate on the concept of shaping, defining space. The quote by Louis Kahn: "Architecture is the thoughtful making of space" is very appropriate. In addition, I need to introduce the...

I gather materials to make available for my high-schoolers learning about architecture at Art Center's Saturday High. Along with paper towel cardboard carcasses and egg containers, wood blocks are ideal, and a trip to House of Hardwood is in order. It turns out that there are people rummaging...

"Fresh off the boat," an émigré from the Soviet Union, I decided to study architecture at sixteen ... Who could have known that I had it in me! First year of Architecture School at USC was pivotal. It's easy to connect the dots many years later. Well, I doubted my...

Art Center College of Design prepares students for "an ongoing exploration of design as a positive force for change in society." That's the premise of Mariana Amatullo's talk. Mariana opens her remarks by stating: "It is an interesting moment in time, a moment of change, when creative community...

When Iris Regn invited me to the opening of a truly thrilling exhibition, BROODWORK: It's About Time at the Otis Ben Malz Gallery on April 30 (through June 11), she wrote: "We think (Iris Anna Regn and Rebecca Niederlander are the presenters) the topics in the show are right up...

Talk about connecting seemingly irrelevant things together and seeing things from different angles! Last week it was my privilege to lead two workshops for children at the Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum. They were titled "Toying with Transformation" and inspired by the current exhibition "Set in Style: The Jewelry of Van...

IDEO appeared on my radar three times the other day. First, it was an email with a forwarded article on the Toolkit. Then I noticed the name in the Contributor Directory of the book 1000 Product Designs along with my own. Then, as I was multi-tasking in my studio listening...

I just came across a video recording of a talk by Dr. Brene Brown, Ph. D., a social worker-researcher-author, exploring the meaning of vulnerability.

I watched and took notes. Dr. Brown argued that it takes courage to accept ourselves for who we are, to feel compassion -- not shame...

The Journal of Consumer Research reported a recent trend that many consumers are attracted to "unusual and novel consumption experiences" and choose vacations, leisure activities, and celebrations that are predicted to be "less pleasurable and enjoyable."

For instance, ice hotels, where a visitor sleeps on a bed of ice, are...