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New York Design Week— or month is more like it— felt different this year. To start with, Collective Design and Sight Unseen Offsite were on hiatus, while the week’s biggest fairs felt slightly quieter than previous years. But there was still plenty of talent to discover as we ambled down the aisles of the expansive ICFF and the smaller but equally major Wanted Design Manhattan and Brooklyn editions. Keep scrolling and you’ll find our 20 highlights from New York’s two big shows, and stay tuned for our round-up of the month’s independent shows.

ICFF

Bend Goods

Based out of LA, Bend Goods creates durable pieces suitable for indoor and outdoor settings and commercial spaces. We loved the energy at their stand, and their pieces are as functional as they are colorful. bendgoods.com

Eny Lee Parker

Eny Lee Parker is a spatial designer that uses clay as her main medium. She has said she enjoys the slowness, intention and respect for natural resources used in traditional craftsmanship, and her contemporary objects promote awareness and presence. While some have dubbed Parker’s the best booth at ICFF for the second year in a row, we are mesmerized by her hand-built, blob-like pieces that flaunt asymmetry and imperfection. enyleeparker.com

Mexa

Young Mexican company Mexa always adds a pop of color to ICFF, with its 100% handmade, multicolored pieces that evoke the Mexican outdoors. mexadesign.com

Raíz Project - A Collective of Brazilian Furniture DesigN

Raíz Project is a collaborative effort by Apex- Brazil and Sindmóveis that this year, took 16 Brazilian furniture design talents to ICFF New York. To follow, we’ve highlighted our four favorites: Jader Almeida, Guto Indo da Costa, Sergio Matos, and Guilherme Wentz. raizproject.com

Jader Almeida

Jader Almeida develops unique products for Brazilian and foreign industries, and has said, “I look for rationality, simple geometry, in pure forms with timeless aesthetic. I seek to create products with durable values. Approaching the legacy of the masters, but looking ahead, thinking that the choices of today will be the reflection of tomorrow." jaderalmeida.com

Guto Indio da Costa

Guto Indio Da Costa is a Brazilian designer, best known projects for the Spirit ceiling fan, created at the request of a company that manufactures video tapes and wished to diversify its product range. Pictured is the sleek, sculptural, solid wood Ava armchair. indiodacosta.com

Sergio Matos

Designer Sérgio Matos hails from the Mato Grosso state of Brazil, from where he collects inspiration in the form of Brazilian landscapes, folk manifestations, street fairs, and sacred and profane rites of popular religious celebrations. sergiojmatos.com.br

Guilherme Wentz

Brazilian designer Guilherme Wentz is moved by the search for a simple, casual, yet refined lifestyle through design. His products combine raw materials with organic shapes and technology, resulting in elements that mix style, substance and a deliberate handmade quality. guilhermewentz.com

Wanted Design Manhattan

Tu taller Design

Inspired by colonial Caribbean architecture, and described as having been ‘built to allow the ocean winds to pass through,’ the Caribe table by Tu Taller Design combines a plethora of materials including metallic, acrylic, frosted glass, transparent and marble surfaces. It was once again part of the collective of talents representing Colombian Contemporary Design at Wanted Design Manhattan. tutallerdesign.com

Tucurinca

Plastic is the main material in the production of Colombian brand Tucurinca’s signature rocking chairs. Each of their furniture pieces generates heaps of plastic waste, and the remaining plastic is recycled and reprocessed to create new plastic in a unique and original color blend. This is used to create the Zero Waste Tucurinca, a chair completely woven in recycled synthetic cords. tucurinca.com.co

Co.lectio

This new brand presents a collection of objects that highlight the traditional weaving techniques of the indigenous Wounaan community of the Colombian Chocó region. The pieces are constructed from the leaves of a native palm, plus copper and natural pigments, and feature a variety of textures, graphic patterns, and colors. colectio.shop

Platalea Studio

The Arcoíris wool rug by Platalea Studio is part of the studio’s Happiness Collection, a range that comes as a result of the designers’ childhood memories in the aftermath of Mexico’s 1968 Olympic games and the country’s subsequent modernization and country-wide optimism. plataleastudio.com

Onora Casa

Onora’s pre-hispanic collection of burnished black pottery is entirely handcrafted by a family-run pottery workshop in the town of San Bartolo Coyotepec, Oaxaca. The small spikes reference the aesthetics of pre-hispanic Mexican pottery once used in religious ceremonies and rituals. onoracasa.com

Peca

Mexican studio Peca collaborated with artist Luis Rodrigo Medina to create these Trazo stools, while the subtle geometry of the Verso table inspires limitless possibilities and contexts. peca.com.mx

Duco Lab.

Menguante by Duco lab. is a collection of ambient lighting pieces inspired by the waning phase of the moon. The studio combines technology and specialized manufacturing with traditional Mexican craft to create its unique lighting. ducolab.com

Indo-

The Ikat credenza by Indo- is a low-rise storage unit inspired by the process of dyeing Ikat fabrics. The uneven quality of the dyed lines creates an enhanced sense of movement as the tambour turns a corner, creating the illusion of unrolling fabric. indo-made.com

Wanted Design Brooklyn

Ana Buitrago for Whatnot Studio

Students of the Designed Objects program at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago created objects exploring the concept of obsolescence. Inspired by the carbide lamp–portable headlamps worn by gas miners– Ana Buitrago’s Ignito Lamp explores coal as a material extraction and as an increasingly obsolete energy source. Employing both neon and coal slag, Ignito speaks to an evolution of energy. whatnotstudio.design

Instituto Campana + Central Saint Martins, UAL + WantedDesign + Industry City

Design Transforms is a unique collaboration that marks the 35th anniversary of the Campana Brothers’ design studio and the 10th anniversary of the Instituto Campana, highlighting the brothers’ outstanding work using design as a means of social transformation. In tribute, the entities invited students and guests to co-create a live making space to transform participants’ experience of design, production and connection to a place. campanas.com.br

Elyse Graham & International Glass Art Center (CIAV)

As part of the Transatlantic Creative Exchange— a program pairing French and American designers and manufacturers to explore new techniques— Los Angeles-based Elyse Graham experimented for the first time with glass in her collaboration with France’s International Glass Center. You can see the result for yourselves: a vase that combines pops of pastel tones and pops of yellow with the glass’s translucent properties. elysegraham.com

Rodolfo Agrella & Procédes Chenel

Venezuelan-American designer Rodolfo Agrella collaborated with international paper manufacturing company Procédés Chénel to create this innovative lighting concept, using non-flammable paper to add volume and produce a color blocking effect. rodolfoagrella.com

“Un Banquito Más” by Tecnológico de Monterrey

Un Banquito Más, or One More Stool, is a project by the undergraduate students of Mexico’s Monterrey Institute of Technology, which emphasizes the process of conceptualization and production in adding meaning to the design of any type of furniture.