Design Awards 2013 - the winner!

The results are in! Congratulations to Simon James and Scott Bridgens, whose 'Hex' pendant light takes top honours in our furniture and lighting Design Awards 2013. 

The 'Hex' pendant is a sleek, minimal beauty designed for Resident Studio that combines cutting-edge LED lighting technology with an elegant aluminium frame suspended from three slim wires (two of which, rather miraculously, also supply electricity for the light). It was launched at Milan Design Week in April and is already attracting serious international attention - deservedly so.

See this and our stellar lineup of Design Awards finalists in our new issue, on newsstands from Monday June 3. The photo is by Toaki Okano, and was styled by Sarah Conder and Juliette Wanty. Thanks also to Blum, our Design Awards partner, for their support. 

Our new cover

Here's the cover of our special Design Issue, featuring a group of our stunning furniture and lighting Design Awards finalists. The photo is by Toaki Okano, and the shoot was conceptualised and styled by Sarah Conder and Juliette Wanty. 

We don't like to brag, but we think this issue's an absolute peach. It focuses on the homes of product designers like IMO's Sam Haughton and Hannah Brodie and their enviable inner-city Auckland pad, or industrial designer Ross Stevens, who worked for Philippe Starck in Europe and is building an amazing Wairarapa home out of recycled coolstore panels. 

In this issue, we also travel to Canada's icy Fogo Island to visit artist Kate Newby, who's on a residency in an incredible studio there. And we go to Antarctica to see the restoration job on Robert Falcon Scott's rudimentary huts.

Also! We check out typographer Len Cheesman's lovely Greytown garden, our correspondents report back from Milan Design Week, we inspect a delightful dessert restaurant in Auckland by Cheshire Architects, and much more....

We hope you enjoy it. The issue's on newsstands from Monday June 3.

We like: Wellington's Six Barrel Soda Co.

In our current issue, we visit Six Barrel Soda Co in Wellington's Dixon Street. The cafe was also designed to sell delicious soda made on the spot, in a space masterminded by Matt Smith of Wellington design firm Common. Here's Juliette Wanty's interview with Matt and some more of Russell Kleyn's photographs of one of our favourite new spots in the capital.

Designer Matt Smith of Common

HOME What was the brief for this job?

MATT SMITH We wanted to create a space that could function primarily for the production of soda syrups and secondly as a cafe. The existing space [the former home of Eva Dixon's cafe] had a history of failed cafes and restaurants. We first gutted the space, removing any trace of past ventures, and unified the seating and kitchen areas by removing all internal walls and running the cork-tile floor through the entire space. We also ran a peg rail the length of the space to display items, hold customers' coats and bags, and hang utensils and baskets of fruit in the kitchen. The large central table was positioned so that customers look down the length of the table to the kitchen. A quarter of the table is utilised as the service area, so that customers are engaged with the cocktail-like making and presentation of the sodas.

Customers are able to view the production process in action.

You designed [with Caspian Ievers] the logo and labelling system before embarking on the design of this space. How did you want the space to feel?

Soda bars first conjure up images of Americana, red vinyl, chrome and jukeboxes. We wanted to avoid this and focus on the freshness and quality of the ingredients, and the honesty of the production method. The colours are light and fresh yellow and green. We brought elements of the branding across, most notably Hugo Mathias' illustrations from the labels on the chalkboard wall, while avoiding creating a space that was too branded. The materials are good-quality and durable: cork, american ash and red brick. The almost-primary-school aesthetic of Six Barrel Soda Co - with its cork tiles, chalkboard, peg rail and stamps for labelling - is accidental, but often reminds people of their first encounter with sodas or 'pop'.

Labels are hung on the wooden peg rail that plays both a decorative and functional role in the space.

What has the response been like so far?

People seem to love it. It's been referred to as the most Instagram-able cafe in Wellington!

Six Barrel Soda Co Factory Cafe

Level 1, 33-35 Dixon Street, Wellington

www.sixbarrelsoda.co

See more of Matt Smith's work at
www.commongoods.co.nz

Design Awards 2010 - Behind the Scenes

Our June/July issue - which will be on newsstands on June 7 - features our annual furniture Design Awards. We were delighted with the individuality and all-round pizzazz of this year's finalists, and can't wait to show them to you in the magazine (where you'll also be able to find out who the Design Awards 2010 winner is).

For this year's Design Awards shoot, we had all the finalist pieces shipped to Auckland and photographed at the Union Fish Company building in the Britomart area, where the rough concrete floors and exposed brick walls made a fine backdrop for the very polished entries. Our stylists Tanya Wong and Jessica Allen worked with photographer Toaki Okano and his assistant Lorna to photograph the pieces.

Here's Toaki behind the camera, with Jess and Lorna setting up a group shot of the finalists (Tanya took these pics). In this shot, you can see Jamie McLellan's yellow 'Flyover' table, Andy Irving's 'Matchstick' stools (at left), Nathan Goldsworthy's 'Historian' bookshelves, Stephanie Donald's white 'Tangent' coffee table, and Sam Lennon's red 'Inverted Cube' coffee table:

And here's Toaki again, this time photographing Tim Wigmore's 'Pil' light:

The chair in the image below is the 'Starling' by Cameron Foggo:

Here's Toaki in a lighter moment:

And some more of the finalist objects, waiting for their close-ups. The pink 'Hostess' table at right is by Katy Wallace, and is made of pieces of junk-shop furniture. Beside it, the blue 'Table/Cloth' table is by Juliette Wanty.

The Design Awards 2010 winner was chosen by designer Humphrey Ikin and Michael Lett (of the eponymous Auckland gallery). Remember to watch out for full award coverage in our June/July issue - we just sent the final pages to the printer yesterday, so it won't be long until it hits the shelves.