Adam Kimmel was fashion’s new big thing until he decided not to be. Now he’s back, recharged and redirected, as creative chief at desk space disruptor WeWork
As second-act professional re-routings go, Adam Kimmel’s is an attention grabber. In the late noughties, the native New Yorker was the next big thing in men’s fashion. Kimmel’s designs reimagined and outfitted his kind of American hero, from cowboys to SoHo bohemians, Jackson Pollock to Snoop Dogg. He also helped revolutionise the way fashion brands communicated what they did and who they were. Circumnavigating the conventional catwalk show, he used film – a tuxedoed David Blaine swimming in a tank of sharks – and theatre, including a casino full of models wearing oversized masks designed by George Condo.
His now much-sought-after lookbooks were born of loose drop-in sessions and his clothes were modelled by everyone from hotshot young photographer Ryan McGinley to LA art eminence John Baldessari and actor/artist/photographer and counterculture totem Dennis Hopper. Kimmel, in a way nobody else quite had, suggested fashion was an integral part of the larger creative enterprise. But, in 2012, he shocked the industry by cancelling his spring/summer 2013 show. He wanted to take a year off, he said, to spend time with his young family, to experiment, to learn and grow. That year came and went and Kimmel all but disappeared from view (his reputation as a designer of contemporary fashion grew in his absence). Last year, though, he reemerged as the new chief creative officer of desk space disruptor WeWork.
Founded in New York in 2010 by Adam Neumann (now CEO) and Miguel McKelvey, WeWork has grown from niche darling of MacBook and backpack freelance hot-deskers to very serious supplier and manager of office space around the world, as disruptive in its market as Airbnb has been in hospitality. A new round of funding this spring from its largest investor, the Japanese SoftBank, will push WeWork’s valuation to at least $40bn, making it one of the world’s most valuable private companies.
Denne historien er fra March 2019-utgaven av Wallpaper.
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Denne historien er fra March 2019-utgaven av Wallpaper.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
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Guiding Light - Designer Joe Armitage follows his grandfather's footsteps in India, reissuing his elegant midcentury lamp and creating a new chandelier for Nilufar Gallery
For some of us, family inheritances I tend to be burdensome, taking up space, emotionally and physically, in both our minds and attics. For the London-based designer and architect Joe Armitage, however, a family heirloom has taken him somewhere lighter and brighter, across generations and continents, and into the path of Le Corbusier. This is the story of a lamp designed by Edward Armitage in India 72 years ago, which has today been expanded into a collection of lights by his grandson Joe.
POLE POSITION
A compact Melbourne house with a small footprint is big on efficiency and experimentation
URBAN OASIS
At an art-filled Mexico City residence, New York designer Giancarlo Valle has put his own spin on the country's traditional craft heritage
WARM FRONT
Designer Clive Lonstein elevates his carefully curated Manhattan home with rich textures and fabrics
BALCONY SCENE
A Brazilian island hotel offers a unique approach to the alfresco experience
ENSEMBLE CAST
How architect Anne Holtrop is leaving his mark on the Middle East
Survival mode
A new show looks at preparing for a post-apocalyptic landscape (and other catastrophes)
FLASK FORCE
A limited-edition perfume collaboration between two Spanish craft masters says it with flowers
BLOOM SERVICE
A flower-shaped brutalist beauty in Geneva gets a refresh
SECOND NATURE
A remodelled museum in Lisbon, by Kengo Kuma & Associates, meshes Japanese and Portuguese influences to create a space that sits in harmony with its surroundings