often employs biomorphic forms in the creation of a new
kind of household experience, especially that of bathing.
The capacious free form tub, of wood, shown this year
at ICFF, restores to bathing the aura of ritual, even
ceremony; its massive wooden composition—almost a
cradle—evokes the ancient baths of Japan. Indeed, its
organic contours remind me of works by a more recent
Japanese-American sculptor, Isamu Noguchi.
A quite different but equally rarefied bathing experience
is offered by the Hastings Tile & Bath Collection, whose
showerheads and other accoutrements reveal the Spartan
beauty of well-designed mechanical items. Their large
steel showerhead seems to reinvent the wheel, its aper-
tures akin to spokes.
Hastings Tile & Bath
HYLAND
