Cola Index - November '24
A monthly catalog of noteworthy updates in the world of Interiors & Design. We’ll release one each month rounding up Business + News, Happenings,, Products + Collaborations, and Project Spotlights!
Good Morning! Back with this month’s COLA INDEX, – Last weekend we were invited by Sprüth Magers Gallery to Montauk for the opening reception of artist Lucy Dodd’s THE END at a really incredible place, The Ranch. It is an active horse farm that has added ART GALLERY to its identity. They have so many things in the works acquiring a more permanent collection of outdoor sculptures too. Mamoun Nukumanu’s "Earth and Sky" (2024) is The Ranch’s first permanent, site-specific sculpture and it’s going to be insanely cool to see it grow and evolve by next year. He used native trees like red maple and sycamore shaped over a bamboo scaffold supported by living footings that he hand-bent and made himself. Can’t wait to picnic under here!
Business + News
The Four Seasons reopens TODAY! The iconic Hotel, once the most expensive hotel in NYC, designed by I.M. Pei, is reopening on after a four-year hiatus. The Ty Warner Penthouse could be yours for $80k a night :)
UPDATE: The Raf Simons Personal Collection Auction we mentioned last month’s results are in. This amazing wool tapestry by Le Corbusier sold for 416,000 €. Here you can view the 131 Lots.
DO NOT ORDER FROM BURKE DECOR!!! It is official, we filed a bank claim against Burke Decor for never delivering multiple orders or providing refunds after months and months of empty promises. Seems like thousands of people have been dealing with this as well.
Amazon wants to sell a $20 couch to rival Temu.. We’re at a loss for words. Furniture is not a disposable napkin. WHO IN THEIR RIGHT MIND THINKS IS A GOOD IDEA?! Bridget Read for Curbed writes
The specter of the $20 couch makes me want to take even longer to actually buy one. Buying a couch with your boyfriend used to be a rite of passage, something you agonize and fight over, and now Amazon wants to make it a throwaway activity, at the price point of a work salad with extra protein. This cannot stand.
What will potential tariffs mean for the furniture industry?
Home Depot co-founder Bernie Marcus passed away last week at the age of 95.
Mark Rothko's Untitled (Yellow and Blue) sold for $32.5 million at Sotheby’s Hong Kong, making it the third most valuable Western artwork ever sold in Asia. Formerly owned by US banker Paul Mellon and French luxury executive François Pinault, the nearly 8-foot-tall 1954 painting previously sold in May 2015 for $46.5 million, before coming into the possession of disgraced 1MDB financier Jho Low.
No More Broker Fee for Renters? The New York City Council approved a bill that prevents brokers from charging fees to renters when representing landlords. While supporters argue it helps tenants, real estate groups warn it could lead to higher rents as landlords offset costs. Ugh, can’t winnnn
Brooklyn based home staging company Staged to Sell Home was on an Elle Decor cover this month. Staging gets a bad rap, but we really admire how they have elevated this part of the industry. Initial reaction to the cover was not great, but idk..we’re all for disrupting the industry a little bit.
The first ever Future Perfect Prize, launched to celebrate the gallery’s 20th anniversary, has been awarded to Anina Major. A visual artist from the Bahamas, Major's work blends ceramics and weaving. She recently also won the 2024 Pommery Prize At The Armory Show!
WHATS HAPPENING
The Future Perfect NY Gallery presents Figures in an Interior, a collection by architecture and design studio Charlap Hyman & Herrero. This collection is so fun and whimsical, created using recycled Japanese kimonos and French tapestries, and builds on the duo’s series of pillows and hand-painted lanterns. On view from November 6 to December 24.
Danny Kaplan Studio opened its showroom at 417 Lafayette St in New York! You may know them for their beautiful ceramic lighting, but they also make incredible furniture. This bed with the ceramic inlay..omg.
The Chelsea Hotel is hosting an Art Fair, it’s FREE! Saturday, Nov 23rd 11am-6pm.
NYC-based art gallery Visionary Projects' is a great community oriented gallery making contemporary art more accessible and approachable by working with emerging artists. They had an Open Call this week for their first public art initiative and will be showcasing 16 artists around various stations across Manhattan for the holiday season.
"Luna Luna: Forgotten Fantasy" at The Shed opens Nov 20th. An art exhibition celebrating the first art amusement park. Initially launched in 1987, the installation features works by iconic artists like Jean-Michel Basquiat, Salvador Dalí, and Keith Haring, revived after being forgotten in storage for 36 years.
We need to check out this new restaurant in Hudson! The restaurant sources produce from the owners’ nearby farm, @manorrockfarm. Co-owner Zack Nussdorf, formerly a line cook at the Michelin-starred Four Horsemen, teams up with chef @josediegoromo (formerly of Gem and Estela) to create seasonal, simple dishes. Designed by Charlap Hyman & Herrero, the space features porcelain sconces, cream walls, and a red-oak bar made from trees on the farm.
Gem Home, just opened, located at 181 Mott Street. It’s a new home goods store with a café and grocery section, created by Flynn McGarry. We saw both contemporary and vintage finds, fresh produce, and homemade preserves, the store also features a café with a rotating menu!
Ceramic artist Laurent Nicholas ‘s first solo show opened last week at dobrinka_salzman’s gallery in NYC. Very cool.
Products - Collabs
…and stuff that brings us joy.
The Brownstone Boys launched a lighting collection with Blueprint Lighting named after the boroughs of New York. If we had to pick, the Bronx Sconce seems to be the most successful at $1500.
Kohler has launched a $15,000 luxury cold plunge in collaboration with Remedy Place (Kohler fitted out Flatiron’s Bathhouse as well) What’s intriguing is that Kohler, known for appliances like toilets and sinks, is entering the wellness market, traditionally dominated by specialty brands. This move suggests that cold plunges might gain mainstream appeal, potentially making them a common household appliance in the future.
Have a thing for stainless steel coffee/tea mugs. This IG soft_servings is a really fun account we follow for vintage kitchens and wares.
You may know Studio HAOS for this coffee table. This year they experimented with some really interesting materials to make furniture. Japanese paper, steel grids, fiberglass, resin, pigments, rebar, burnt bamboo were used in their latest collection displayed in Paris together with @garce_dimofski and @mnjaekim last month. This new series will soon be on display in Miami during Art Basel.
Nordic Knots released yet another new collection called RYYA, this time 70’s Scandinavian shags. Not so sure about this one..need to go check these out in person.
Kind of obsessed with California-based lighting company HENRII (pronounced ohn-rē) particularly the tobacco glass color omg.
More lighting! Lindsay Addleman’s New oil lamp sconce with amber glass and Michelangelo quartzite for @tiwa_select is insane. Excited to see her focus on creating and experimenting again after announcing a change in production and manufacturing for her studio’s next chapter.
Project Spotlight
Lauren Santo Domingo’s home designed by our favorite designer and inspiration, Andre Mellone, sparked some controversy over having a fake tree in this gorgeous mountain house. IDK, we prefer real, but some greenery is better than none..it looks so real. We appreciate that this doesn’t feel like a cliche ski house.. no animal horns and furs. Wow. The fireplace is everything.
AI and Art: Art has always evolved hand-in-hand with technology. We really love the images artist Marius Troy has created eliminating boundaries between sculpture and architecture.
Miu Miu’s new holiday campaign photographed by Lengua, is STUNNING. Referencing antiquarian festive portrait postcards, in a hand-tinted look the way old portrait photography did. They describe it as “The environment is reduced. Walls and floors are wrapped in pale silk. A rich canvas background emphasizes variation in light and shade. Furniture - a brocade sofa, an armchair, a grand piano, a single, heavy drape - punctuates an abstract and elegant space.”
Should we paint our interiors instead of photographing them?! Referring to a recent post we wrote on how Interior Photography is Stuck! Marc Jacobs commissioned Anna Weyant to paint a portrait of Kaia Gerber for Vogue’s cover. This was a unique choice of painting over photography for a fashion editorial. —could offer a fresh perspective.
Studio Tali Roth designed a beautiful store at 301 W 4th St, for Trove Box - An artisanal lacquered jewelry box company with candy colored boxes ranging from $178-$979.
Neptune Papers is another magazine (Last time we told you to look at Scenery magazine) that we really love their storytelling through photography. Had this post saved with photography by Jesper Damsgaard Lund of Green River Project.
Shop Where We Shop
The Parlour…
Moodboard by: Cola Studios
Shop our selections below!
This rare mid-century bookcase is designed by C.M. Varos for Casa Moderna and crafted in 1959. The defining qualities of this piece lie in the intricately carved details on the front doors, creating a striking composition of vertical lines.
Mod. 3052 wall lamps by Franco Albini and Franca Helg for Arteluce, 1962. Black lacquered metal and opaline glass bring timeless Italian style.
Designed by Bruno Mathsson for Dux Sweden in the 1970s, the Pernilla armchair boasts a curved beech structure with leather upholstery and linen canvas.
The Chamfer Table 3 by Christopher Stuart merges sculpture and furniture, crafted through a systematic process of division, rearrangement, and assembly to create sculptural forms at a furniture scale.
Christopher Farr's Blade rug for The Future Perfect lives up to its name, slicing through the visual plane with precision and offering a sharpened sense of sensuality in its imagery.
We wanted to start this because we found it impossible to consume news and happenings in one place! You could say this is helping us as much as it is helping you :)
We get hundreds of emails for events, listen to podcasts, have access to countless design publications, and save folders and folders of content that we love to reference, and thought..why wouldn’t we share this?
So give it a read, go to events, and check out the amazing products and artists we’re inspired by. We’ll be back next month with more! - xX Sam + Olya
There’s a Facebook group called “Burke Decor Scammed Me” where people share tips and advice in case your bank doesn’t come through