Description/
Mexico City-based designer Fernando Laposse describes his practice as ‘endemic design’, in which materials and their historical and cultural ties to a particular location and its people take center stage. The result of extensive research, each discrete project is informative and educational, touching on topics such as sustainability, the loss of biodiversity, community dissolution, migration, and the negative impacts of global trade on local agriculture and food culture in Mexico. As a part of this research, his work often engages, and then imaginatively transforms, overlooked plant fibers, such as corn leaves, avocado skins, and sisal. Agave sisal, the discarded by-product of the tequila and mezcal industry, has fast become one of Laposse’s signature materials. Laposse has enlisted the medium to create an animated armchair, its rounded back and body, coated with the fiber, hugging a cotton-linen upholstered seat.
Agave fibers, upholstered cotton, plywood
Fernando Laposse
designer
Fernando specializes in transforming humble natural materials into refined design pieces. He has worked extensively with overlooked plant fibers such as sisal, loofah, and corn leaves. He often works with indigenous communities in his native Mexico to create local employment opportunities and raise awareness about the challenges they face in a globalized world.
His projects are informative and educational addressing topics such as the environmental crisis, the loss of biodiversity, community dissolution, migration, and the negative impacts of global trade in local agriculture and food culture. He does so by documenting the issues and announcing possible resolutions through the transformative power of design.
His projects have been exhibited in the Triennale di Milano, Cooper Hewitt Design Museum, The Design Museum in London, Victoria and Albert, the World Economic Forum, and Miami Basel to name a few. His work is held in the permanent collections of the V&A and SF MoMA.
Color/
Pink
Edition/
Limited
Dimension/
100.0 x 69.0 x 119.0 cm (39.4 x 27.2 x 46.9 in)
Heritage/
Mexico
Ships from/
USA
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