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Isamu Noguchi Spotlight

For our projects, design doesn’t stop on the outside of our buildings. We carefully curate each and every interior to be an activating space that is at once beautiful and inviting. As part of that careful curation, many of our spaces feature furniture designed by Isamu Noguchi, a Japanese American artist, landscape architect, sculptor and furniture designer.

The Mid-century Modern “Airplane” Bimorphic Coffee Table, designed by Isamu Noguchi, at 7120 Optima Kierland.
The Mid-century Modern “Airplane” Bimorphic Coffee Table, designed by Isamu Noguchi, at 7120 Optima Kierland.

The Style of Isamu Noguchi

Born in 1904, Isamu Noguchi became one of the 20th century’s most critically acclaimed and important sculptors. His sculptural work covered a wide range of creations, spanning from sculptures, gardens, furniture and lighting designs, ceramics, architecture and set designs. Midway through his career, Noguchi became inspired by the idea of a more reduced form, focusing on an abstract and Modernist approach to create intriguing designs that elicited emotional reactions.  

“Everything is sculpture,” Isamu Noguchi once said. “Any material, any idea without hindrance born into space, I consider sculpture.” Noguchi believed that as a sculptor, he could shape space to give it order and meaning, contextualized by the surroundings in which it existed. 

It was only natural that furniture fell into his wheelhouse. Perhaps his most popular work, Noguchi designed a glass-topped table in 1947 to be produced by Herman Miller. The base of the table is made up of two identical wooden pieces, reversed and connected, and topped with a heavy plate glass top. When first sold, the table was marketed in the Herman Miller catalogue as “sculpture-for-use” and “design for production.” Noguchi strongly believed in producing his designs for mass market in order to bring fine art into the home. 

At Optima, we are proud to showcase Noguchi’s furniture within our own spaces, designs which serve to amplify and activate the evocative Modernist exteriors and interiors of our buildings.

 

The Playful Work of Alexander Calder

It’s no secret that we love color at Optima, and we carefully curate our interior furniture, textures and designs to reflect the vibrancy of our spaces. Our curated artwork is no exception, and throughout the halls of projects such as Optima Signature, Alexander Calder’s bright works greet residents with bold tones and distinct shape. A multimedia artist whose influence spans across decades, Calder’s work creates a meaningful connection to a rich piece of art history.

Alexander Calder holds up one of his mobiles.
Image courtesy of Sotheby’s.

Calder’s Past

Born in Pennsylvania in 1898, Calder came from a family of artists; his grandfather and father both had rich careers as sculptors and his mother was a professional portrait artist. Though his family had artistic roots, they supposedly did not want him to follow in their footsteps. Calder began studying mechanical engineering in New Jersey, bouncing between jobs all while still being inspired by create. By the 1920s, Calder had moved back to New York to pursue a career as an artist. 

Calder’s Artistic Career

After studying in New York, Calder moved to Paris where he studied, established a studio and met his future wife. While living in Paris, Calder joined the ever-growing network of avant-garde artists, including Fernand Léger, Jean Arp and Marcel Duchamp. Throughout his life, Calder maintained a strong connection to France, naming many of his works in French regardless of their location. After a lifetime of impactful creativity and exploration, Calder died unexpectedly of a heart attack in 1976, leaving behind an expansive and far-reaching legacy. 

Calder’s Legacy

Over his career, Calder produced a wide range of work, spanning from sculpture, to stage sets, paintings, prints and jewelry. Like previous generations of Calders, he was also a recognized large-scale sculptor. Flamingo, one of his more notable works in Chicago, adorns the Federal Plaza with beautiful form and the famous “Calder Red” color. We’re thrilled and honored to have the works of Alexander Calder throughout our buildings, and hope they bring a bright source of inspiration to those who view and enjoy them. 

 

Optima Sculpture Spotlight: Kiwi

A subtle but enhancing feature of many Optima projects, our sculptures adorn courtyards, amenity floors and common spaces. David Hovey Sr’s devotion to space and form translates from architecture to three-dimensional pieces, which are placed throughout our buildings to add a distinct aesthetic flair to our Modernist spaces. 

Greeting both residents and visitors at the entrance of Optima Signature, the sculpture Kiwi was named after the same bird native to New Zealand, where David Hovey Sr was born. Although the sculpture is reminiscent of an animal, Hovey’s vision was something much more abstract. Starting out as a handful of freehand drawings, the sculpture was layered until it formed a tall, stacked piece. Set against the bold red of Optima Signature, Kiwi’s bright yellow color pops amidst the neutral-toned buildings within downtown Chicago. 

A yellow abstract sculpture, Kiwi, stands before Optima Signature.

The finishing touch on Kiwi’s Optima Signature location was installation; the base was carefully cemented into the ground to protect it from the bustle of downtown and the intense Chicago weather. Aside from its prominent location at Optima Signature, Kiwi is also featured at Relic Rock and Whale Bay House

David Hovey Sr’s passion for sculpture reflects our collective passion for enhancing the spaces we build and exploring new interpretations of form, color and design. Stay tuned for more features on our other sculpture pieces. 

Live Colorfully: How Color Influences Design

Optima buildings are distinguished by our Modernist design, and by our signature pops of color. Because color can influence design, and in turn, influence those that experience our design, the color decisions we make are purposeful and serve to enhance and activate our architecture and the spaces around it. 

Theory and Psychology

Color is fundamental to the Modernist tradition. Much of color theory was born out of the Bauhaus modernist art school, where four artists changed the way we talk about color today: Johannes Itten, Wassily Kandinsky, Paul Klee and Josef Albers. Itten, particularly, created the color sphere with primary, secondary and tertiary tones, was the first to determine warm and cool tones, and was a pioneer in associating different colors with emotions. 

Today, the study of color and their relationship to human emotion is called color psychology. In the first 30 seconds of viewing an object, our brains make a quick judgment and react to what we see. Color plays a large part in this response; for people, tones and hues are tied to specific emotions and feelings. On a biological/physical level, when we see colors, that vision is transferred over to the brain, which in turn signals to our endocrine system to release specific hormones that create a correlating feeling or mood to what we’ve seen. Armed with this insight, we integrate color into our design solutions to create an emotional impact. But our use of color goes beyond.

Because color can influence design, and in turn, influence those that experience our design, the color decisions we make are purposeful and serve to enhance and activate our architecture and the spaces around it. 

Color in Optima Design

In our Arizonian desert residences, we select hues to complement the vegetation of the desert, seamlessly blending our architecture with its environs; indoor with outdoor. At Sterling Ridge, concrete walls merge with the earth, making the home an extension of the land. The result is a harmonious design, one that enhances our building and the land around it. Orange and red color details serve to give an exciting pop of color against a cohesive, blended pallet.

Because color can influence design, and in turn, influence those that experience our design, the color decisions we make are purposeful and serve to enhance and activate our architecture and the spaces around it. 

In many of our condos and multifamily residences, we use color in the exterior facade to compliment the surroundings of the building. At Optima Sonoran Village, orange, yellow and green details are drawn from actual colors found in the surrounding lush landscaping. The hues were inspired by the area’s desert flowers, serving to draw out the naturally occurring colors of the terrain.  

Color isn’t just important in our building design we incorporate color into all of our design practices, including experimental color play with our sculptures. Often executed in different colors depending on the surrounding space, sculpture is another facet to Optima in which we experiment with shades and hues. Color has a long and storied history, but for us, it’s a continuing exploration that has us learning more each day.

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