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Shiro Kuramata's work is recognized as some of the most representative and creative of international design from the mid-1960's until his untimely death in 1991. Born and raised in Japan, Kuramata received traditional training in the woodcraft department at Tokyo's polytechnic high school, and then went on to work in a furniture factory, the Teikoku Kizai Company (1953). He then pursued his studies in interior design, first at the Kuwasawa Design School, Tokyo (1956) and then at the interior design department of Matsuya Department Store (1964). The following year he opened his own design office in Tokyo (1965), and his reputation as a pioneer in contemporary design was made.
In the many interiors, lighting and furniture pieces that he designed, Kuramata revealed a very personal vision and sensitivity. His conceptual, poetic effects are readily identifiable, regardless of which medium. He created whimsical yet functional pieces of furniture out of arrangements of seemingly contrasting industrial materials. Other times, Kuramata produced boldly irregular forms, apparently precariously supported on cone-shape legs or little rubber bullets, or constructing them entirely of airy steel mesh or illuminating them in such a way that they appear to float. The interior spaces he designed were as experimental and novel as his furniture, for example the series of boutiques he created for the fashion designer Issey Miyake in Tokyo, Paris and New York.
In his lifetime, Kuramata produced more than 180 furniture forms. He is said to have designed a piece per day, during Japan's headily enduring "bubble economy" years. Kuramata is known for persisting to the extreme, developing new materials, daring to ignore the common sense of scale and finally breaking through the confines of pre existing industrial logic by setting his own, new standards of design.
The French government awarded the dedicated artist the distinguished Ordre des Arts et des Lettres (1990). Shiro Kuramata died the following year at only 56 years of age; he is survived by his wife and their daughter.
Body: acrylic, artificial roses Legs: aluminum pipe, stained alumite finish Manufacturer: Ishimaru Co., Ltd. Collection: Kuramata Design Office; Ishimaru Co., Ltd.; The Museum of Modern Art, Toyama; Kokuyo Co., Ltd. (currently on exhibit at MOMA, NYC)
"Miss Blanche" derives its design from the dress Blanche Dubois wore in the movie A Streetcar Named Desire. All kinds of artificial flowers from all over Japan were collected, and models were made over and over again to achieve the illusion that the flowers were floating in space. During the final stages of production, the acrylic was cast into its mold and the roses were held in position with tweezers.
Body: laminated plywood base, matte finish Front: melamine board, white matte finish Casters: steel ball caster Manufacturer: Furnishing and Decorating Department of Fujiko Manufacture and Sales: Cappellini International Interiors (Italy) Collection: Aoshima Shoten Co., Ltd.
With his oddly shaped "Furniture in Irregular Forms," Kuramata ventured to change the functional shape of recognizable daily furniture, giving an aesthetic to subjects that were difficult to manufacture. In transforming his shapes, he created work that expanded the established concepts of furniture.
Body: steel mesh, nickel chrome finish Manufacturer: Terada Tekkojo, Ltd. Sales: IDEE (Kurosaki Trading Co., Ltd.); Vitra International AG (Switzerland) Collection: Ishimaru Co., Ltd.
While offering an outline, the wire mesh denies volume and produces a sense of disengaged space. The technical focus of this chair seems to be to erase the frame's presence. In production, the edges of the surfaces were welded to rods three millimeters in circumference in order to let the planes merge.
International Design Network Foundation
E-mail: idnf@designnet.org