Hallmarks included laboratory sinks and fittings, functional—but still aesthetic—ladders, factory lighting, and exposed pipes and hardware. We’ve already clocked some early signs of a resurgence: the return of track lighting and a vogue for stainless steel kitchens. But as production delays become par for the course and prices of both goods and labor continue to rise, there’s a motive for designers and clients alike to lean into industrial minimalism, a relatively off-the-shelf look that doesn’t sacrifice nuance.
We anticipate more hardware store staples—easy to get and less expensive than their bespoke cousins—will be entering the home. Metal blinds, for example, looked startlingly cool in some recent scouting shots of a SoHo loft, where they were used on an interior glass wall. You’ll see that one soon in the magazine.
“It’s the aesthetic of problem-solving,” Cat Snodgrass, who recently created a high-tech-y backdrop for an exhibition built around a similar concept, tells AD PRO. “Make-Do”—curated by Marta gallery and Catalog Sale—was a show of 24 ad-hoc chairs from the past and present, exhibited during NYC x Design. For the scenography, Snodgrass responded to that DIY ethos as well as the unconventional venue—a disused neoclassical 1980s medical imaging center in Chinatown—incorporating prefab materials like aluminum blinds and fluorescent lighting and letting the guts of the space remain exposed.
“Recently we’ve seen a renewed interest in studio craft; an interest in tradition, process, and bespoke design,” Snodgrass says. “I wonder if the use of prefab commercial and industrial materials is coming as a response to that maximalist style. I personally love the contrast of the two styles used together—the parallel is that they both have a focus on found objects and materials that are recontextualized through the lens of the designer.”
For a great example of that contrast, see Sarah Burns’s new furniture collection at Marta in LA. Called Prairie’s Edge, the series’ main material protagonists are birch plywood and cold-rolled steel, delivering a look of rust-belt refinement.