When approaching their designs for a new pot collection with traditional Austrian enamel company Riess Email, young Vienna-based design duo POLKA chose to reimagine the ways in which we interact with this common object. Asking questions like “How many handles does a pot need anyway?” and “What makes a functional object?” the pair created a new form of pot, one in which the idea of the pot is mutated and modified, rearranging our expectations for interactions with daily-used objects. The resulting collection of creatures entertain the user, allowing one to handle them as he or she sees fit, and encourages all of us to think about our daily routines and expectations.

Describing their playful approach to design, POLKA partners Marie Rahm and Monica Singer say:
“We like to observe, we like to surprise, we like to discover, we like to irritate, we like to find solutions, we like to tell stories, we like to entertain, we like to change the point of view . Above all, we like to create. And we like things.”

POLKA Pots are made on order.

POLKA product pleasure
Mariahilferstr. 9/7, 1060
Vienna, Austria
polkaproducts.com

* Photographs by Michael Stelzhammer. Images courtesy of POLKA.

Ezri Tarazi's installation of bamboo totems moves the dense landscape of China’s bamboo forests indoors, creating a domestic forest that supports a range of living arrangements. Photo: Udi Dagan

Round sections of bamboo hang from a metal structure to create a chair. Each section is suspended from a metal rod that allows the rings to turn.

Using FSC-certified plywood from Bolivia, Abbott Miller designed a chair whose components can be shipped flat and dry-assembled with a rubber mallet. Photo: Jay Zukerkorn

The chair design highlights the beauty of Bolivian wood, while also yielding three chairs per sheet of plywood, with a minimal amount of waste. Photo: Jay Zukerkorn

New York fashion designer Issac Mizrahi during a fitting session. Mizrahi used salmon leather to create an ensemble that includes a dress, jacket and shoes. Photo: Mackenzie Stroh

Yves Béhar meets with indigenous women who run an organic chocolate cooperative in Costa Rica. Photo: Serge Beaulieu

Béhar’s final design calls for stainless steel and sustainably-harvested Costa Rican hardwood. His chocolate shaving tool is designed to rest on the lip of a mug and resemble a twig. Photo: Dan Whipps

Not to be missed: Design for a Living World at the Cooper-Hewitt, organized by The Nature Conservancy, through January 2010.

Ten leading designers have been commissioned to develop new uses for sustainably grown and harvested materials in order to tell a unique story about the life-cycle of materials and the power of conservation and design. Projects include:
- Swedish industrial designer Yves Béhar’s chocolate shaving tool, designed to rest on the lip of a mug and resemble a twig, to benefit a Costa Rican women’s organic chocolate cooperative.
- Abbott Miller’s Bolivian wood chair design, which yields three chairs per sheet of plywood, with a minimal amount of waste.
- Stephen Burks Australian raspberry jamwood piece that allows for easy collection and processing of plant-based materials for use in the skincare line. He also created a complementary suite of jamwood containers to hold the cosmetics.
- fashion designer Issac Mizrahi’s unexpected Alaskan salmon leather-made dress, jacket and shoes.

The designers’ prototypes, drawings and finished products are all on display, along with video revealing their work behind-the-scenes. Design for a Living World is co-curated by graphic designer Abbott Miller and Ellen Lupton, curator of contemporary design at Cooper-Hewitt. This is the debut venue in a national tour of the exhibition, organized by The Nature Conservancy.

The full list of featured designers and locales includes:

Yves Behar/Costa Rica; Stephen Burks/Australia; Hella Jongerius/Mexico; Maya Lin/Maine; Christien Meindertsma/Idaho; Isaac Mizrahi/Alaska; Abbott Miller/Bolivia; Ted Muehling/Micronesia; Kate Spade/Bolivia; and Ezri Tarazi/China.

Images courtesy of Cooper-Hewitt.