Issue # 8
Archive stories

A walk-in sketchbook Zurich: Beda Achermann is one of the first creative directors from the Alps to become internationally known. He revolutionised fashion during his time at the German Männer Vogue in Munich in the ‘80s. Later, he transformed boring annual reports into stunning narrative picture books. Up to this day, Beda is working non-stop, jetting around...

Things: Speakers made by my dad when I was a teenager. A sheep skull found on a grass verge in Cornwall next to an abandoned train carriage, somewhere either near a dam or a motorway flyover—it’s hard to remember. A cast of my girlfriends teeth when she was a teenager before she had them fixed....

Brazilian Sunshine on the Lower East Side New York City: Brazilian born Marcelo Krasilcic is a passionate man. He loves fun, friends, hosting parties, family, travel, Rio, New York City, interior design, open floor plans, tropical plants, abstract ceramics, colourful pillows, balance, beauty, bodies, sex, his boyfriend, his two cats, yoga, vegetarian cooking, collaborating and...

I never thought making things for my son, Elia, would be something that could bring us so close together. It all began when he was turning two years old, I just did a box so he could go in it pretending it was a bed. He is four now and I am still making them...

The world in a suitcase London: Faye doesn’t like titles, she doesn’t like to be placed in a box, she would rather put all of us inside her magic suitcase, together with the fantastic world of collections, atmospheres and obsessions she has been dreaming of creating since she was a little girl growing up in the...

Arranging things Milan: In the early ’80s French born Nathalie Du Pasquier was one of the young founding members of the Milan-based Memphis collective, led by veteran Ettore Sottsass. After their groundbreaking debut in 1981, Memphis pretty much dominated the design scene for years with their postmodern, rebellious pieces. Nathalie’s pattern designs, with their mix of...

Home schooled Buenos Aires: One afternoon I went to a small library of some friends of mine and, upon entering, a new bag they had made caught my eye. In the centre it had a drawing of a girl reading a book that covered her face. When I asked who the illustrator was, they said, ‘Pilar...

Useful accumulation New York City: When I arrived to interview Brian and Elizabeth at their place in Boerum Hill, Brooklyn, a string of activities was in progress. Nuala, who’s 16, was doing her Latin homework on the conversation pit/island of a couch. Ona, who’s two and a half, was opening every board game and puzzle onto...

I come back from the overflowing archives in which I was quickly snooping around in to find Javier Mariscal has gone back to painting the world. The world has a diameter of around 70cm and is the new idea in progress for the furniture design company Magis, a ball for kids aged two to six...

Buying a piece of furniture is a commitment that goes beyond the simple idea of decorating your own place. That’s why we asked New York based editor Ken Miller to sit down at the Tribeca gallery Mondo Cane, with its owner, antiques dealer and blogger Patrick Parrish, interior and furniture designer Rafael de Cardenas and Phillips de Pury’s Director...

            Retouching by Lacrin Studio We’ve all enjoyed the childish game of making a stack out of seemingly inappropriate materials, and though it might be more for kids, it’s nevertheless a lot of fun. For most of us it’s an occasional pastime, but for Apartamento it’s a duty, involving serious...

I work and sleep in Cambridge, England for what has come to be about six months of the year, but I don’t live there. It is becoming increasingly unclear where it is that I do live, however, and I find the question distressing enough to have left the ‘lives in’ section of my Facebook profile...

Although anyone can own a poster, there is no doubt that they are more commonly found on the walls of 13-25 year olds than those of any other age group. One simple reason for this, of course, is that posters are a cheap form of ornamentation and so, more suited to the teen market than...

This is a house in the countryside of Quinto, a small village that’s near Venice, Italy. It’s light brown with a big window on one side and a small porthole on the opposite side. There is also a trapdoor in the floor and a ladder that goes from the trapdoor to the ground below, which...

From 2006 to 2008, I spent many Saturday evenings lying prone on the carpet of American minimalist composer La Monte Young’s Manhattan loft—repurposed for the last 18 years as a sound and light installation—listening to the steady drone of electronic sine waves tuned in a system wherein each note is related to every other note...

Violet, yellow, red, black, and blue—we like colours at our loft in central Eastern Berlin. The multicoloured space is situated in the former Jewish brewery Königstadt that used to be in a rough and ambitious area only for the adventurous. But, alongside the rising hipness factor of the area, it got greyer and more civilized....

Humming the chant of the motor. The radio is off, the windows up and the wind is unnoticeable, just a constant aummmm and my eyes fixed on the horizon. Right in the centre of my vision, a point spits asphalt and white lines. The rest is fuzzy; a dusty and dry landscape funnelled through the...

My story about life with objects starts with a Malcolm McLaren 12” maxi-single Madame Butterfly (1984), recently found in a record shop somewhere in the Rocky Mountains, Canada. The single in question could be replaced by any given meaningful piece of music—or something else worth surrounding oneself with—this one will play in the background, as...

It was love at first sight. Under the bridge, close to the water, an old abandoned chandelier factory with its trash on landscape. Mountains of old wires and electrical dust. Paint lakes. With one big skylight. A tiny toilet and a huge iron sink. Brick walls, wood-beam ceilings and concrete floors. We got together with...

The afternoon I handed the keys to the new homeowners, there was a certain sadness I felt as I stood on the back porch, gazing off into the dense foliage, as the rain began to fall. In California, I’ve always welcomed the rain, as the sun is often in abundance. But there are always a...

It was April 1998 I was on a trip to Paris from Tokyo I discovered a garage in an apartment’s courtyard There was only a big shutter Not very good conditions to live in but I quickly and deeply fell in love I’m not interested in a common French apartment in a touristic area This...

There are three choices to be made when leaving: what to take, what not to take, and what can’t be taken at all. Of course, this last one is not actually a decision. This last one refers to immovable things: parks, houses, beaches, rooms, bridges, vistas and so on. Structures and spaces are heavy in...

I met Valentine pressed up against a bin in East London at around one in the morning. Actually, that’s not quite true. It was up against a bin I first kissed Valentine. It was in a pub—the Globe and Artichoke—after a fashion show, us both wearing summer hats twinned with big gin grins, I first...

Athena travels light, but you would never guess this from looking at her closet! Moo moos are her favorite kind of fashion. The bigger, the brighter, the better. For her there’s nothing more comfortable, and Athena is all about comfort. Another favorite is a blue 1940s dress with flowers that she fell in love with, and had...

A few years ago we found our home abroad. A place on a hill in the south of Mallorca. A simple architectural block, pure and essential. The perfect retreat with a magic view into the valley. Only sky above. We love to spend the summer there. Always July and August, the time when our kids have...

Spherical, and elongated. Bruised. A mixture of colours: black, white, purple, green, yellow or red depending on the variety. Smooth and shiny skin and, on the inside, white or green with a thick, sponge-like texture and soft small seeds. Its taste is delicate with a touch of bitterness. AUBERGINE MARMALADE Ingredients 600g aubergines, 400g brown...