Tokujin Yoshioka Design

The First Major Book on one of Japan's Most Radical Designers;Renowned Designer of theHoney-pop Chair."This ability to create something that moves us, using simple tools, is atthe root of his talent; he is superbly gifted in capturing people's heartsin this way. . . . With his enthusiasm and vigor, it is impossible topredict just how far he may push himself in the future."Issey Miyake,from Tokujin Yoshioka DesignTokujin Yoshioka (b.1967) is one of the most important young Japanesedesigners working today.Yoshioka's client list includes shop design forIssey Miyake; space design for Nissan, BMW, Shiseido; exhibition design forIssey Miyake, Herm+s, Muji and Peugeot; and product design for Driade. His work ranges from constructing a chair solely out of honeycomb sheets ofpaper to transforming and re-locating a 150-year-old rice barn into hisTokyo studio.Experimenting with a sophisticated interplay of materials,shapes, freshness, and creativity, his approach continually astounds.TOKUJIN YOSHIOKA DESIGN by Ryu Niimi, and with contributing essays by PaolaAntonelli, Elisa Astori, Kozo Fujimoto, Ross Lovegrove, Ingo Maurer, IsseyMiyake and Ryu Niimi, is the first book to present the designer's entirebody of work.From his early projects and well-known designs for the IsseyMiyake shop in Tokyo, and the iconic Honey-pop chair, to his products todayfor Driade, this lush monograph combines a major a survey of his careerwith essays by contemporary designers and critics.The book includes notonly color photographs of the finished product, but sketches and snapshotsof the manufacturing process, showing the processes at work behindYoshioka's design from conception to culmination.After graduating from Kuwasawa Design School in Tokyo, Yoshioka studieddesign under Shiro Kuramata and Issey Miyake.Yoshioka created the hatsand other accessories worn in the Miyake's fashion shows as well asdesigned the boutiques' window displays.The motivation behind all of hiswork focuses on how the act of design is expressed and experienced. Technically excellent with a superb appreciation of light as a designmaterial, his designs use fiber optics, stunning light installations, andreflective-transparent materials in a way that leaves the observer with theimpression that the future has arrived.In 2000 Yoshioka established his own design studio where he produced hismost famous designs including the Honey-pop chair, a chair made completelyout of paper.Flat-packed, until it is opened out into a 3-D form, thechair is custom molded by the weight and body shape of the user. Consistent with Yoshioka's design ethic, the interaction between humanbeings and materials is central.Materials grow, alter, sculpt, and eventransform a chair into an intriguing living system.The Honey-pop chair isin the permanent collections of the Museum of Modern Art, New York and theVitra Design Museum, Berlin, among others. For Tokujin Yoshioka design means communicating something fascinating,surprising, joyful, and unexpected and with the release of this monographwe are now able to witness this exciting dialogue first-hand.