On Oct. 25, Surface hosted the 39th installment of its Design Dialogues series. This edition featured Paola Antonelli, senior curator of architecture and design at The Museum of Modern Art, and took place at MoMA Design Store in SoHo, where select pieces from the “Items: Is Fashion Modern?” collection are currently available for purchase. Bailey and Antonelli discussed the influence of fashion on design, the ideas behind the exhibition, and why specific pieces were featured.
Notable guests at the talk included West Chin, Jenny Dixon, JiaJia Fei, Danu Hassik, Jeremy Levitt, Patrick Parrish, and Christian Wassmann.
Antonelli began creating her list of items for the exhibition more than a decade ago. “When you have a list, people want to critique it. And that’s exactly the point,” Antonelli said. “You can’t tell the history of modern design without fashion.”
Antonelli also discussed the ways in which fashion influences design, and how “Items: Is Fashion Modern?” was a natural show for MoMA to mount. “What we are interested in at MoMA are the kind of objects that influence the world,” she said. “That’s what I love about design: when an object is really great, you can read the idea in it.”
Browse pieces inspired by the collection here.
Read more about the “Items: Is Fashion Modern?” exhibition here.
(Photos: Ilya Savenok/Getty Images for Surface Media)
