Design Miami 08: Dezeen has teamed up with Design Miami and Fendi to present a series of live chat shows with leading international designers in Miami next week.

Dezeen's Marcus Fairs and Rupinder Bhogal will host and film short interviews with nine designers including Tom Dixon (above) and Ross Lovegrove (below). The edited interviews will be broadcast on Dezeen in the following weeks.

The interview format, developed by Dezeen and Design Miami, is My Design Life in Five Photos - each designer will select five images representing important milestones in their life or career, and talk about each one.

The other designers involved are Arik Levy (above), Fernando & Humberto Campana, Julia Lohmann, Paul Cocksedge, Ted Noten, John Maeda and Benjamin Aranda & Chris Lasch (below).

Each interview will last fifteen to twenty minutes, with three interviews a day from 5.30 to 6.30pm on the 3rd, 4th and 5th of December. The venue is the Collins Building in the Miami Design District. The talks are free to attend.

The talks schedule is as follows:

December 3rd:
Fernando & Humberto Campana
Arik Levy
Tom Dixon

December 4th:
Julia Lohmann
Paul Cocksedge
Ted Noten

December 5th:
Ross Lovegrove
Dr. John Maeda
Benjamin Aranda & Chris Lasch

Below is the full press release from Design Miami complete with speaker biographies:

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Design Miami/ announces schedule of Design Talks supported by FENDI: “My Design Life in Five Photos”

Design Miami/ is not only the pre-eminent international fair for limited edition design, but an important international forum for design and architecture, drawing designers, architects, artists, gallerists, collectors and journalists from around the world to Miami’s Design District in early December.

A highlight of the fair is the series of design talks featuring both established stars and up and coming talent. Participants represent a range of disciplines and styles, underlining Design Miami’s role as a catalyst for discussion and platform for the exchange of new ideas.

This year marks several changes to the structure of the talks, introducing a talk show format that promises to be fast-paced, revealing and entertaining. For the first time, the talks will also be filmed and subsequently broadcast on the internet, extending their reach by making the talks available to those unable to attend.

Over three days, nine designers will be interviewed in front of a live audience and filmed by Marcus Fairs and Rupinder Bhogal of Dezeen.com. The interviews will be structured under the title “My Design Life in Five Photos.” Each designer will discuss with Fairs five evocative images that encapsulate the most significant concepts, attitudes, forms and approaches that have influenced their careers or even inspired specific works. The images promise to be unexpected and diverse and will offer the audience a fresh insight into the designers’ creative processes.

Each interview will last fifteen to twenty minutes, with three interviews a day from 5.30 to 6.30pm on the 3rd, 4th and 5th of December. This year’s participants include designers who are involved in this year’s Design Miami/, such as Designer of the Year Award winners, Fernando & Humberto Campana, and outside guests, such as the legendary Dr. John Maeda who has recently been made President of the Rhode Island School of Design.

“The talks will be engaging but also personal,” Design Miami/ Curator Wava Carpenter comments. “They mark an important aspect of our events progamme which is to engage the creative community and give the audience a privileged insight into their creative processes. By broadcasting these films over the internet, we aim to create an online archive of interviews with designers which will evolve and become a reference over the years.”

“Design Miami/ has always been really forward thinking with their curatorial programme and it’s fantastic that they’re willing to try something new with this medium for the Design Talks,” Marcus Fairs comments. “We’re experimenting with a format which has to work both for the audience present at Design Miami/ and for an online audience watching the films at a later date. By using an established TV chat show format we’re working with a structure that is entertaining and engaging and should be equally fresh in the studio as on the web.”

Silvia Venturini Fendi comments; “The universe of design is a never ending passion and a source of continuous inspiration. It is a fascinating world, made of individuals with extraordinary personalities and invigorating, personal styles that shun the conventional. It provides a stimulus to dare, to experiment, to free our creativity and push ourselves beyond established limits. Fendi and Design Miami are two “brands”, but also two “concepts”, united by an affinity founded on shared values such as creativity, experimentation and the desire to support new talent. It is in this spirit of the boundless flow of cultures linked by a unique soul that Fendi has decided to support the Designers Talks.”

Design Miami/ Director Ambra Medda comments; “We are thrilled to have the support of FENDI for the first time this year, a company whose appreciation of creative endeavour perfectly compliments our series of Design Talks which celebrate and investigate the creative process. The Design Talks are really a daily, informal meeting place where designers can come together and discuss their ideas. FENDI’s support allows us to be ambitious in inviting an international ‘A’ list of speakers, and present design discussion and exchange in a dynamic way which is both inspiring and approachable.”

The schedule and participants are as follows:

December 3rd
Fernando & Humberto Campana
Arik Levy
Tom Dixon

December 4th
Julia Lohmann
Paul Cocksedge
Ted Noten

December 5th
Ross Lovegrove
Dr. John Maeda
Benjamin Aranda & Chris Lasch

Hosted and filmed by:

Marcus Fairs and Rupinder Bhogal
Cited as the most influential design website in the world, www.dezeen.com is an online architecture and design magazine read by around a million unique visitors a month. Prior to launching Dezeen, Marcus was founding editor of Icon magazine while Rupinder worked as a TV production manager, working on documentaries for the BBC and independent production companies.

About the participants:

Benjamin Aranda & Chris Lasch
Aranda\Lasch is an award-winning New York architectural studio established in 2003 by Benjamin Aranda (b. 1973) and Chris Lasch (b. 1972). Through computational exploration, Aranda\Lasch makes discoveries in the realm of structure and space, resulting in exquisite crystalline designs for buildings, installations and objects. The firm has an alter-ego practice named terraswarm, which produces urban-scaled interventions as short films and video installations. Their early projects were the subject of the critically acclaimed book, Tooling, published by Princeton Architectural Press. Aranda\Lasch and terraswarm have exhibited their work internationally in galleries and institutions dealing with design and architecture. Objects and furniture designed by Aranda\Lasch are represented by Johnson Trading Gallery in New York. In 2008 they were commissioned by the MoMA in New York to produce a large-scale installation for the design exhibition, Design and the Elastic Mind. Currently they are working with the artist Matthew Ritchie and arts institution T-BA21 on the first “anti-pavilion” – a large and ruined, three-dimensional drawing of the universe, partially installed at the 2008 Venice Biennale first, and fully realized at the Seville Biennale in October. Aranda\Lasch was selected as the 2007 United States Artists Fellow in Architecture & Design. Aranda\Lasch is designing the temporary structure which will house the main body of the fair at this year’s Design Miami/.

Fernando & Humberto Campana
The Design Miami⁄ 2008 Designer of the Year Award winners Fernando & Humberto Campana were born in 1953 and 1961, and trained respectively in law and architecture. They began working together in the mid-1980s, designing furniture inspired by their home city São Paolo. Combining high and low tech processes, the Campana brothers trawl the flotsam and jetsam of Brazilian city life, using ‘poor’ materials to create expressive and sumptuous objects. Their unique designs have been manufactured by leading Italian companies, including Edra, Alessi and Cappellini. As winners of this year’s Designer of the Year Award, the Campana Brothers are creating a major installation which will be a central focus of the temporary structure housing this year’s fair. They are also creating the VIP lounge hosted by sponsor HSBC Private Bank.

Paul Cocksedge
Born in 1978 in London, Paul studied Industrial Design at Sheffield Hallam University but returned to London for his MA in Product Design at the Royal College of Art, where he studied under Ron Arad. In 2003, he founded Paul Cocksedge Studio with fellow RCA graduate Joana Pinho. This internationally acclaimed design practice undertakes in-house design, accepts commissions and provides occasional consultancy work for a veritable panoply of clients and sectors, including the British Council, Conran & Partners, Droog, Swarovski and the London Design Museum. The studio’s reputation has been built on lighting designs and installations, however Paul and Joana have recently expanded their focus to include furniture designs, currently in development.

Tom Dixon
Tom became a designer through a series of unexpected events. Several brief careers took him through the music and nightclub sector as well as short spells in the cartoon, film and graphics industries. He came to prominence in the early 80s with a chaotic series of innovative metal furniture. In the early 90s he worked extensively for Italian furniture companies such as Cappellini. In the late 90s, he initiated his own plastic design, manufacture and distribution company Eurolounge, which brought Tom international acclaim as well as the Millennium Mark Award. Tom became Head of International Design for Habitat in 1999, working as Creative Director for 5 years. Design Research Ltd was created in 2002 in collaboration with Proventus as a platform for the development of furniture businesses. The company manages both Artek and Tom’s eponymous label, which produces light and furniture products. In 2000, Tom was awarded the OBE by the Queen for services to British Design. His work is found in many permanent collections, including MoMA (New York), V&A (London), Design Museum (London) MAK (Vienna), and Centre Pompidou (Paris). Tom is working on a project for the Nature-themed exhibition curated by Design Miami/ that will be held in the Collins Building.

Arik Levy
At the age of 27, Arik (b. Tel Aviv 1963) leaves behind his graphic design studio and surfboard shop and moves to Europe. In 1991, he graduates with distinction in Industrial Design from the Art Center Europe in Switzerland.

After winning the Seiko Epson Inc. competition, Arik begins his career as a professional designer and participates in several design exhibitions in Japan. Upon returning to Europe, Arik introduces his ideas, innovations and installations to contemporary dance and opera set design around the world.

From his Paris based company L design, together with his partner Pippo Lionni and their team, Arik develops projects in industrial, interior and graphic design for the European and international market. Arik participates in many exhibitions and shows in museums, alternative spaces, galleries and fairs worldwide and several of his products can be found in the permanent collections of the most prestigious museums and institutions. He works both as a scientist and a poet. Through innovation, simplicity and experimentation he translates concepts into products, space and experience. Arik will be exhibiting at Kenny Schachter’s ROVE gallery at this year’s Design Miami/ as well taking part in the Nature-themed exhibition curated by Design Miami/ that will be held in the Collins Building.

Julia Lohmann
Born in Hildesheim, Germany, Julia Lohmann became interested in design on childhood walks with her father, on which they collected abandoned objects to create small figurines of strange, imaginative creatures. This dual interest in both the natural world and overlooked items led her to investigate the contradictions inherent in our relationship to animals as sources of food and materials. By working with offal, leather and other meat industry waste products, she probes these contradictions while conferring value onto ‘leftovers.’ In Flock and Ruminant Bloom, sheep stomachs are used to create glowing lighting fixtures. Her recent work includes The Catch, a vast ‘ocean’ of used, empty fish boxes arranged into a towering wave of a stormy sea, which confronts the viewer with the consequences of over-fishing as well as promotes the ongoing development of kelp as a viable design material. In 2008, Julia was a winner of the Designer of the Future Award at Design Miami/ Basel.

Ross Lovegrove
Ross was born in 1958 in Cardiff, Wales and graduated from Manchester Polytechnic in 1980. He received his MA from the Royal College of Art in 1983. In his early career, Ross designed for Frogdesign in West Germany, working on projects such as Sony Walkman and Apple Computers. Later he moved to Paris to consult for Knoll International and, around the same time, he was invited to join the legendary Atelier de Nîmes along with Jean Nouvel and Phillipe Stark. Returning to London in 1986, Ross has completed projects for Airbus Industries, Kartell, Ceccotti, Cappellini, Idée, Moroso, Luceplan, Driade, Peugeot, Issey Miyake, Vitra, Motorola, LVMH, Tag Heuer, Hackman, Alias, Herman Miller, Japan Airlines and Toyo Ito Architects.

Winner of numerous international awards, his work has been extensively exhibited throughout the world at venues including MoMA (New York), Guggenheim Museum (New York), Centre Pompidou (Paris) and Design Museum (London). Ross Lovegrove will be doing a project for Swarovski at this year’s Design Miami/.

Dr. John Maeda
John is a world-renowned graphic designer, educator, artist, and computer scientist, who now adds the title Rhode Island School of Design President to his diverse credentials. His early work redefined the use of electronic media as a tool for expression by combining skilled computer programming with sensitivity to traditional artistic concerns. This work helped to develop the interactive motion graphics that are prevalent throughout the internet today. At MIT since 1996, John was the Associate Director of Research at the MIT Media Laboratory, where he was responsible for managing research relationships with 70+ industrial organizations and has developed advanced projects for an array of major corporations including Cartier, Google, Philips, Reebok, and Samsung among others. He is the recipient of the highest honors for design in the USA (1999 Chrysler Design Award; 2001, National Design Award), Japan (2002, Mainichi Design Prize), and Germany (2005, Raymond Loewy Foundation Prize), and his early work in digital media design is in the permanent collection of MoMA (New York). John is the author of four books. His most recent book, The Laws of Simplicity has been published in 14 languages and has become the reference work for discussions on the highly elusive theme of ‘simplicity’ in the complex digital world.

Ted Noten
Ted was born in Tegelen, The Netherlands in 1956. In his early adult life he explored various jobs, such as bricklaying and nursing, before finding his way to the Academy for Applied Arts in Maastricht in 1983 and the Gerrit Rietveld Academie in 1986. From there he built an international reputation for jewelry design, and since 2005, has created unique, often controversial designs from his Amsterdam-based studio Atelier Ted Noten. Ted holds a Senior International Research Fellow position in the School of Jewellery at Birmingham City University in England, and his wry and witty work has been presented in a variety of museums and galleries around the world. Ted will be represented by the Jewellery Gallery Ornamentum at this year’s Design Miami/.

Notes to Editors
The Design Talks Chat Shows are supported by FENDI

Design Miami/ 2008:

Public Hours of Admission
December 3-6, 2008
11:00h–19:00h

Opening / December 2, 2008

Press Conference/ 12:00h-13:00h
Press Preview / 13:00h-14.30h
Registration Required

Collectors Preview / 15:00h-18:00h
Invitation Only

Vernissage / 18:00h-22:00h
Invitation, Design Miami/ or Art Basel VIP Card Only

FENDI
The house of FENDI was established in Rome in 1925 with the opening of the first FENDI boutique – a handbag shop and fur workshop. Soon winning international acclaim, FENDI emerged as a brand renowned for its elegance, craftsmanship, innovation and style. 1965 began the collaboration with Karl Lagerfeld as creative director of the women’s and fur collections, and this collaboration continues today. In 1992 Silvia Venturini Fendi was appointed FENDI’s accessories creative director and in 2000 she created the menswear line. The LVMH Group acquired FENDI in 2000, becoming its majority shareholder by 2004. In the same year Michael Burke was appointed FENDI CEO and managing director. Today FENDI is synonymous with tradition, experimentation and creativity.

In 2007 FENDI was the first ever fashion house to stage a catwalk show on the Great Wall of China. FENDI’s involvement in the arts has included supporting a major exhibition of Loris Cecchini, held at the Palais de Tokyo in Paris as well as touring to Peking, Shanghai and New York. To celebrate the 10th anniversary of the Baguette, FENDI commissioned leading artists including Jeff Koons, Rachel Feinstein, Tom Sachs, Sylvie Fleurie, Matali Crasset, Michelangelo Pistoletto and Subodh Gupta to create one-off pieces reinterpreting the Baguette. FENDI has more than 160 boutiques in 25 countries around the world.

About Design Miami/
Design Miami/ is the most prominent and substantive forum for international design, representing a convergence of commerce and culture. Its annual shows in Basel, Switzerland (June) and Miami, USA (December) bring together the most influential designers, collectors, dealers, curators and critics from around the world. For more information please visit
www.designmiami.com.

Design Miami/ is presented in partnership with HSBC Private Bank, whose dedication to innovative international design is an example of its emphasis on the value of connections. HSBC Private Bank is committed to supporting the forum in Basel and Miami until 2010 and to continuing to explore new opportunities together with Design Miami/ into the future.