Color

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Year of Glass: Specialty Glasses with Special Effects
Laminated glasses have many practical and aesthetic uses, and, when combined with modern applications of ancient technologies, can have dazzling effects.
Image features a rectangular four-panel folding screen decorated with a large, bright orange abstracted flame-like design against a tan ground; a wide blue, and narrow green band surround the perimeter of the screen. The reverse decorated by four green spirals, one on each panel. All four panels connected with striped orange border on tan ground. Please scroll down to read the blog post about this object.
Art into Life. A Life into Art.
Flowing forms of bright orange spread upwards, flickering across the four panels of this folding screen. The work, Fire-Orange, is one of a series of folding screens the American artist Jack Youngerman made beginning in 1978. Fire-Orange exemplifies how Youngerman, who passed away on February 19th at the age of 93, thoughtfully and creatively explored the nature and boundaries...
Image of three women on stage at cooper hewitt, from the left, Ezgi Emiroglu, Laurie Pressman, Jennifer Cohlman Bracchi
Nature of Color, Color of Nature
exploreing the evolution of colors in design, the role of color in the natural world, and the inspiration designers have long drawn from nature.
Image features a low, stepped rectilinear typewriter,the; top section and paper support in light blue, yellow knobs on left and right ends of platen, and gray base with gray "QWERTY" keyboard and function keys. Linear indented banding in wedge-shaped base visible in profile.
A Dexterous Touch
By the 1980s, the drive to miniaturize electronics had advanced so far that industrial designers were no longer obliged to create forms that had to accommodate large internal mechanisms and parts. Mario Bellini and his contemporaries could use their creativity and skills to appeal to consumers on practical, visual and experiential levels. His ET Personal...
Image features group diamond-shaped glass vases of different heights and colors in overlapping arrangement reminiscent of a cityscape. Please scroll down to read the blog post about this group of objects.
Color Landscaping with Glass Vases
Ruutu, Finnish for diamond or square, is the theme that is carried across the five sizes and seven hues of these modular glass vases. The vessels, created by French designers (and brothers), Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec for the Finnish glass firm, Iittala, share a minimal, rectilinear style. Like other works by the Bouroullecs, the Ruutu...
Image features book cover of Silk Dyeing, printing and finishing by George H Hurst. Please scroll down to read the blog post about this object.
Technological Handbooks
The museum as “practical working laboratory” that sisters Sarah and Eleanor Hewitt envisioned for the study of the decorative arts, could not have been realized without the extensive collection of books and supporting materials found in the library at the Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art. Numerous books about process, such as the...
Image features a laptop computer with a rectangular body with rounded corners, the housing of translucent clear and blue plastic with blue pull-out handle at back. The hinged lid opens to reveal a screen and an inset keyboard with function keys, a touch pad, power button and a small speaker. Separate disk-shaped clear plastic and metal power adapter contains windup cord. Scroll down for the blog post related to this image.
Think Different
Today’s Object of the Day celebrates the winners of Cooper Hewitt’s National Design Awards. Honoring lasting achievement in American design, the Awards take place annually during National Design Week, with festivities for all ages celebrating design creativity and innovation. Today’s post was originally published on September 9, 2015. “When was the last time someone offered...
Image shows an upright erector set of filing units, shelves and other components in yellow, light green, and purple, plugged into freestanding cream pegboard screens. Please scroll down for the blog post related to this image.
Plug and Play for Modern Storage
Today’s Object of the Day celebrates the winners of Cooper Hewitt’s National Design Awards. Honoring lasting achievement in American design, the Awards take place annually during National Design Week, with festivities for all ages celebrating design creativity and innovation. This inventive prototype for a storage system is at once playful, inventive and multifunctional. Blu Dot,...
a pale grey espresso cup with a square handle and scored with vertical lines to reference a cardboard prototype, plus saucer, designed by Scholten & Baijings and now on view in Scholten & Baijings: Lessons from the Studio. Click on the image for more information about the installation.
“The Color World of Scholten & Baijings”
Scholten & Baijings are acutely sensitive to color.
Image features book cover showing a colorful flying bug on a fuchsia background. Please scroll down to read the blog post about this object.
Colorful Pop-Ups!
Design comes in many forms and the elaborate paper constructions developed in the world of pop-up books still amaze and surprise children and adults alike. Combining both color and senses, the Cooper Hewitt Library houses several of these gems–most notably works by David A. Carter. A master paper engineer, he has created over 90 books,...
Image of Richard Landis, a silver haired man wearing a white and blue checkered shirt, in his studio.
Color Decoded: Richard Landis’s Inspiration
Landis describes his inspiration for becoming a weaver and his process as a maker. 
The Morse Lecture | Local Quality, Global Scope–Saving Color Through Tacit Knowledge
Designer Claudy Jongstra presents the in-depth knowledge of experimenting and working with products from the land.
Image features a cube made up of eight smaller, gridded cubes that display color gradients. Please scroll down to read the blog post about this object.
Aesthetics of the Color Plotter
To celebrate the opening of Saturated: The Allure and Science of Color (May 11, 2018-January 13, 2019), Object of the Day this month will feature colorful objects from the exhibition. Today’s post was originally published on October 29th, 2016.    A cube split into eight floating blocks, situated in isometric perspective. Each block comprised of 49...
grid like format with various shades of blue
2,592 All Natural Colors
To celebrate the opening of Saturated: The Allure and Science of Color (May 11, 2018-January 13, 2019), Object of the Day this month will feature colorful objects from the exhibition. Before Pantone, there was the Wiener Farbenkabinet (Viennese Color Collection or Complete Book of Samples of all Natural, Basic, and Combined Colors). This manual is...
Image features tall, bright green symmetrical urn form of ovoid body with neck flaring into circular mouth, two angled handles at shoulder, and short circular foot. The nylon structure consisting of, rigid radiating and crossed strands that create both surface and interior patterns. Please scroll down to read the blog post about this object.
Historical Inspiration, Revolutionary Manufacturing
To celebrate the opening of Saturated: The Allure and Science of Color (May 11, 2018-January 13, 2019), Object of the Day this month will feature colorful objects from the exhibition. For more than 20 years, Michael Eden has been a professional potter, often working in a traditional slipware technique. In 2006, he enrolled in a...