Terrific Design

There has been a shift in contemporary design, something hazy like a summer rainbow and hard to label. It is not kitsch, something that has always taken a side swipe at beauty, because it does not have popular connotations. Rather, it appears to be a high and virtuous manifestation of creativity applied to objects of everyday use. It feeds off a variety of different abilities - woodwork, sculpture, carving, assemblage, collage, recycling, transformation, embroidery, knitting - and crosses a variety of trends, from Surrealism to Dadaism, from Zoomorphism to Anthropomorphism. It uses the most disparate of materials, with a focus on recovery. Functionality becomes optional; the objective is wonder, and perhaps disgust: that healthy jolt that strikes the stomach before it strikes the mind. 'Terrific Design' celebrates some of the most bizarre objects to be found in the design world today. AUTHOR: Cristina Morozzi is a journalist, critic and art director on the border between art, fashion and design, she led design magazine Modo for 9 years. A fashion and design consultant and author, she contributes to a variety of newspapers and plans and curates exhibitions, and is visiting professor at the Domus Academy in Milan and at the Ecole Cantonale d'Art in Lausanne. SELLING POINTS: An illustrated volume dedicated to the most disturbing, curious or ironically repellent pieces of modern and contemporary design A brand new perspective on the creativity of the great masters of design, analysed for its most visionary and imaginative elements A critical analysis with popular appeal and lively illustrations that sets out in search of objects straight out of the most unbelievable fairytale world 250 colour illustrations