WALLPAPER* AND JAGUAR CARS ANNOUNCE THE WINNERS!

In case you hadn't noticed, I've been posting the shortlist nominees for some of the categories for the fabulous Wallpaper* Design Awards all week. Now the winners have been announced and below are the results.

Well, not only did they announce the winners to the Wallpaper* Design Awards last night, but they had a rockin' party to do so. This is the fourth year of the annual Wallpaper* Design Awards. The first awards were launched in the January/February issue of Wallpaper* in 2005.

The international design, fashion and lifestyle magazine, Wallpaper,* and headline partner Jaguar Cars have dramatically transformed the Old Sorting Office on New Oxford Street, London, into a spectacular venue to host a dinner and drinks party celebrating the nominees and winners.

This year the Design Awards are bigger and better than ever with 63 categories ranging from ‘Best City’ to ‘Best Stationery’ – a first peek at Tony Blair’s new graphic identity.

In true Wallpaper* style they’ve gone one step further than simply opening an envelope to reveal the winners. Instead, they’ve teamed-up with digital animators, Mainframe, to produce animations for each winner of the Judges’ Awards.

Click on the winners below to see the animations.

Best domestic appliance
‘Katamari 01’ speaker by Giyanze

Best furniture designer
Tokujin Yoshioka

Best new restaurant
Mathias Dahlgren, Stockholm

Best new hotel
Riva Lofts, Florence by Claudio Nardi

Best new private house
Ring House, Karuizawa by TNA

Best new public building
New Museum, New York by SANAA

Best city
Los Angeles

Best fashion
Jil Sander A/W 2007 by Raf Simons

Best grooming product
TweezLight

Most life-enhancing item
$100 laptop by Yves Behar

Other winners include Apple’s iPhone, John Pawson, Arik Levy, Martino Gamper, Tamara Salman, Ralph Pucci and OMA.

The full list of categories and winners are announced in Wallpaper’s Design Awards issue, available on 10 January 2008 and on www.wallpaper.com.

Judges Profiles:
André Balazs
Patricia Urquiola
Tadao Ando
Wong Kar-wai
Donatella Versace
Langlands & Bell

Below is the press release- straight from the ultra hip digital director of Wallpaper* magazine, Kay McMahon, to yours truly complete with some pics of the bash.

Tony Chambers, Wallpaper* editor-in-chief, says:
“It is always a pleasure and a privilege to give the Wallpaper* stamp of approval to the experimentalists, innovators and dreamers of the past 12 months. From the $100 laptop to the €200,000 cashmere carpet, we’re celebrating great design wherever and however it appears. With the assistance of our panel of international judges (see their profiles above) – Tadao Ando, André Balazs, Wong Kar-Wai, Langlands & Bell, Patricia Urquiola and Donatella Versace – and with Jaguar once again as our associate, it has been a stellar year.”

Now, about that party:



Venue
Wallpaper* and Jaguar have dramatically transformed the Old Sorting Office on New Oxford Street, London, into a spectacular venue to host a dinner and drinks party celebrating the nominees and winners. Production of the event was managed by My Beautiful City, headed up by Robin Scott-Lawson.



Guests
250 guests accepted invitations to the dinner. Guests included the winners and nominees of all categories, the international panel behind the Judges’ Awards, as well as fashion designers, architects, interior designers and friends of Wallpaper*.

Best cocktail menu:
Cocktail 1 – Ten Fresh Martini
Tanqueray No 10, lemon juice, gomme, shaken with ice and strained into a martini glass, garnished with lemon peel

Cocktail 2 – Rosie Ten Collins
Tanqueray No 10, lime juice, elderflower cordial, apple juice, topped up with soda, built with ice into a cocktail glass, garnished with slivers of apple

Cocktail 3 – Red Heaven
Wallpaper* Design Awards: Best cocktail
A unique blend of chilli, cucumber, apple, sugar, lime juice and fresh mint added to Smirnoff Black, pomme verte and apple juice, shaken with ice and a secret ingredient

Goodie bag contents:
Wallpaper* Design Awards issue
Wallpaper* Los Angeles City Guide
Jaguar pen and magazine
Givenchy Rouge Interdit lipstick
Prada Infusion d’Iris miniature
TweezLight tweezers
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
My personal big thanks to Kay McMahon and the following people and companies who continue to support, encourage, promote and reward great design in all aspects:

Wallpaper*
www.wallpaper.com
Jaguar
www.jaguar.com
Production:
www.mybeautifulcity.com
Drinks sponsors:
www.tanqueray.com
www.smirnoff.com
www.icelandicglacial.com
Goodie bags:
www.wallpaper.com
www.jaguar.com
www.parfumsgivenchy.com
www.prada.com
www.tweezlight.com

Apple Outperforms Tiffany & Co, Best Buy and More

How productive are Apple’s (AAPL) retail outlets?

“Out of this world” according to a report issued this morning by Toni Sacconaghi of Bernstein Research. In fiscal year 2007, he estimates, Apple stores generated an average of nearly $4,500 in sales per square foot — a figure far higher than any other consumer electronics or luxury retailer. That’s nearly five times the productivity of Best Buy, for example, one of the most efficient consumer retail outlets, and nearly 12 times that of Saks. Only Tiffany & Company comes close, with sales of $2,750 per square foot. (see charts)

The findings were part of a follow-up to the in-depth report on Apple’s retail strategy that Bernstein Research issued a year ago. Since then, Apple has opened 20 new stores (total: more than 200) and reportedly has plans to expand to China, France, Germany and elsewhere.

Among the report’s other findings:

• Mac sales per store grew 26 percent year-to-year in fiscal 2007. Apple’s brick and mortar stores sold an average of 8,000 Macs in 2007, or a “stunning” 21.4 per day.
• Apple Stores boosted the company’s total revenue by at least $1.35 billion (5.6 percent) during the year, with gross margins of 42 percent (versus 34 percent for Apple overall)
• Despite the high gross margins, the stores have somewhat lower profitability than the company overall because of high operating expenses. The average Apple Store has 40 full-time-equivalent employees, double the number four years earlier. All told, Sacconaghi estimates that the retail segment’s operating margin was 16.9 percent for the year, compared with 18.4 percent for Apple overall.

source: Fortune Magazine

A Porsche That Runs On A Battery: The P'9521

Luxury mobile phones.
A growing category in the market of mobile communications.

We have the Prada cell phone by LG, the Armani-Samsung Phone, the Goldvish diamond encrusted Vertu cell phone, the Bang & Olufsen Samsung cell phone, diamond studded cell phones, gold plated cell phones, even Ferrari and Lambourghini additions to the luxury mobile market.

So, what's next to enter this market of luxury communication devices? The Porsche of cell phones. Or rather, the Porsche Cell phone. Below are pics and an in-depth is a review of this newly released collaboration between the Porsche Design Studio and Sagem Communication.




Reviewed by JULIAN PEH
Photography AHMED ZULKAMAL

An instrument wrought out of aluminum and glass, the Porsche Design P'9521 phone is an intriguing new entrant to the burgeoning luxury mobile phone market.

A collaboration between Porsche Design and Sagem Communication, the phone’s features include a fingerprint scanner and accelerometer, a music player (with a 2GB memory card) and a 3.2-megapixel camera.

However, as we have observed in the past, companies attempting to break into this market often emphasize on build quality, materials and design, rather than engage in the more-features-is-better specifications war.

It is within this context that we shall review the Porsche Design P'9521.

The P'9521 is undoubtedly a striking phone. With its glossy mineral glass cover and brushed metal skin, it is instantly distinguishable from other clamshells.

As befits an established design house, Porsche Design did not choose to integrate cues from Porsche sports car design into their phones but adopted a futuristic yet minimalist design theme, consistent with its other products.

The phone is made rather thick and heavy for a clamshell, but these traits are a forgiveable trade-off, considering the company's innovative use of materials in the design of the phone.

The phone's casing is milled out of a solid aluminum block. The use of aluminum gives a unique sensation of quality to the phone – the hinges turn with satisfying mechanical resistance and the brushed aluminum has a texture that delights the fingers. The mineral glass used on the cover is simply gorgeous and possesses a sheen that plastic simply cannot replicate.

The only letdown in the phone's construction is the battery cover, which is a simple piece of rubber-coated plastic. For a phone that exhibits excellent build quality everywhere else, the design of the battery cover is somewhat incongruous and puzzling.

Start the phone, and an animation simulating the view from the cockpit of a speeding Porsche rolls on the phone's screen. The display utilizes AM-OLED technology and the colors are extremely vivid and the images sharp from all but the most extreme viewing angles.

The menu interface is beautifully designed, and its use of a light-on-dark color scheme and Porsche Design's trademark typography exudes functional elegance.

A unique feature of this phone is the fingerprint scanner located just under the display. The scanner can also be used to scroll through the menu like a vertical touchpad if one does not wish to use the keypad. The keypad itself is almost totally flat and the keys do not have much travel. However, this is something we got used to easily after a few hours of use.

The P'9521 boasts excellent sound quality for both voice calls and music.

Save for the fingerprint scanner, the Porsche Design P'9521 does not really contain any groundbreaking technical features. However, its elegant design and high build quality enables it to stand out in a sea of clamshell phones. A guaranteed conversation piece.

P´9521
The new P’9521 cell phone from Porsche Design blends purist style with the latest in communication technology from Sagem.
Available from spring 2008 in North America. Not available in Korea and Japan.
Specs below:

General functions
- Photo/video camera: 3.2 Mpix, autofocus camera with flash and digital zoom
- Screen rotates through 180 degrees
- Sensitive touch/fingerprint reader [phone security, direct calls, menu navigation]
- Dimensions: 91 x 48 x 18.4 mm
- Weight: 139 g
- Charging time: 3 hours
- Communication time: 3 hours 30 minutes talk time/240 hours standby
- MP3 playback: 7 hours
- Phone materials: Mineral glass and aluminum
Interface
- Screen: AM-OLED 262,000 colors QVGA 320x240 pixels, 2.2"
- Second screen: AM-OLED 65,000 colors 128x96 pixels, 1.15"
Data transmission
- Bluetooth: v1.2 with AADP, AVRCP & FTP profiles
- USB: USB2.0, USB Data Cable
Network standards
- GSM: GSM-GPRS/EDGE: 900 – 1800 – 1900 MHz
- Automatic frequency transfer
Multimedia
Messages: SMS / EMS / MMS
- Email: e-mail on internet
- Internet: Mini-Opera[tm] / browser WAP2.0
Video & photos
- Camera: 3.2 megapixels
-
Autofocus
Image formats: BMP, GIF, PNG, JPEG
- Zoom: digital [photo & video]
- Flash
- Video recording: MPEG4
- Video player: H264, 3GP, MPEG4
- Video streaming
Music
- Recording
- Playback: MP3, AAC, AAC+, eAAC+, stereohttp://www.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gif
- Formats: iMelody 1.2, Midi, Wave, AMR NB [recorder and player] and WB [player]
Background mode
- Playlists: automatic, by theme/interpreter/most played/download date
- Fast forward/rewind/play/pause
- Visual effects: bar display, equalizer
- Special FX sounds : 3D, reverb, chorus, flanger


For more information, click here.

To see seriously luxed up cell phones; gold-plated, gem-encrusted etc, visit the following sites:
Goldvish,
Goldstriker
Gresso
Amosu
Mobiado

Check Out The Places To Check-In: Wallpaper's Nominees For Best New Hotel

As the Wallpaper Design Awards wind down (the winners will be announced thursday, the 10th) I share with you the shortlist for Best New Hotel Category with lots of fun additional pics.

1.The Bowery, New York, by Sean MacPherson and Eric Goode:Thanks to charmingly old-world styling by the owners, this is the first boutique hotel to pop up in the formerly gritty Bowery neighbourhood. The interior is all mahogany, worn-in leather and open fires, easily recalling elegant 18th-century living. With service to match the styling, the comfort and nostalgia of the Bowery put it way ahead of its rivals in the boutique market.

More pics:

2.Le Bellechasse, Paris, by Christian Lacroix:Christian Lacroix's second boutique jewel is a visual interpretation of Paris's seventh arrondissement. The history of the famously literary area has been transformed into a decorative scheme for 34 rooms in two adjoining buildings. Fantastical frescos adorn the walls and ceilings, while simple white fixtures and linens reinforce the contemporary luxury.

More pics:

3.Fasano Rio de Janeiro, Ipanema Beach, by Philippe Starck:The long-awaited Fasano Rio de Janeiro has arrived on Ipanema Beach, along with the Fasano Al Mare, its centrepiece Italian seafood restaurant by Michelin award-winning chef Luca Guzzoni. Starck designed the building and its interiors with a surprisingly Brazilian flair, maintaining the sophistication of the São Paulo original, but with a nod to its new Rio environs.

More pics:

4.Haymarket, London, by Kit Kemp:The latest launch of Firmdale hotels is housed in a stunning Regency building built by John Nash. The 50 individually designed rooms and suites are among the largest in London; the Shooting Gallery, a private event room, is decorated in hand-painted jungle wallpaper by de Gournay; and the 18m basement pool has a ceiling covered in fibre-optic lights.

More pics:

5.Riva Lofts, Florence, by Claudio Nardi:Consisting of nine suites in architect Claudio Nardi's former studio, a historic factory complex, Riva Lofts' emphasis is on detail. Each lofty, light-filled suite is a chic ensemble of heritage and modern pieces. Mies Van der Rohe armchairs cluster round tropical wood tables in the breakfast lounge, while the bedrooms boast unique, artist-designed touches.

More pics:

Don't forget to come back and visit on Thursday, January 10th when I post the winners of all the categories of the Wallpaper Design Awards(in conjunction with Jaguar).

Wallpaper Whittles It Down To The 5 Top Furniture Designers

There are so many amazing furniture designers out there I don't know how Wallpaper even managed to cut it down to 5 finalists for the Wallpaper Design Awards but they did, and here they are:


Alfredo Häberli:

A unique ability to mix up a form-follows-function base with creative flair and a large dash of humour has made Zurich-based Alfredo Häberli sought after by a host of international clients. As well as designing the Camper store in Paris, and a line of men’s shoes, the versatile Häberli has this year launched new creations for Luceplan, Alias, Moroso and Kvadrat.

Barber Osgerby:

Jay Osgerby and Ed Barber are at the top of their game. Not only has this year seen them launch high-calibre products for Established & Sons, Cappellini, ClassiCon, Flos and more, their interior architecture firm Universal Design Studio, lauded for creating the furniture for the De La Warr Pavilion, is working on the retail space for the Battersea Power Station project.

Jaime Hayon:

Jaime Hayon's flamboyant style has won over even hard-nosed minimalists, while his willingness to try his hand at most things has companies fighting to get him on board. His installation for Bisazza at the Milan Furniture Fair was the talk of the town, as were his products for BD Barcelona, his ceramics for Bosa and his complete overhaul of Lladró porcelain.


Marcel Wanders:

Marcel Wanders' fame seems only to fuel his creativity. Taking over a huge space in the Zona Tortona during the Milan Furniture Fair, the Dutch designer blew everyone away with a magical installation. Part of the Wanders Wonders collection, the giant lamps and bells were mixed with elaborate rugs and cabinets. Equally splendid was his 'Skygarden' lamp for Flos.

Tokujin Yoshioka:

An apprentice to Shiro Kuramata and Issey Miyake, Yoshioka set up on his own in 2000. He’s behind the Issey Miyake shop in Tokyo, as well as exhibition space for Miyake, Hermès, Muji and Peugeot. While his furniture for Driade is acclaimed, it was his design of Moroso’s showroom in Milan this year, incorporating work such as his 'Panna' chair, that got the cognoscenti going.