Here, we ask designers to take a selfie and give us an inside look at their life.
Age: 57
Occupation: Designer of lighting and furniture.
Instagram: @gentnerdesign
Hometown: Chicago.
Studio location: Chicago’s South Side.
Describe what you make: I love to make functional objects that are over-engineered, wonderfully crafted, and esoteric in their nature.
The most important thing you’ve designed to date: It may not be the most important thing I’ve designed, but the Circle Candle brings me the greatest joy. This piece started with the hare-brained idea to have a candle that burned from the bottom. Needless to say, there were some issues with that concept. In the end, this piece is a fully functioning work that never lost its ridiculousness.
Describe the problem your work solves: Two problems of functionality: First, how to place your body, your things, or light in the physical world. Second, how the piece places joy and wonder into your mind.
Describe the project you are working on now: A new light that requires me to pit two light sources off against each other, thus creating a visual tension—trying to keep them from continually getting in an argument that simply devolves into a bicker match.
A new or forthcoming project we should know about: The current launch of the Mock collection of furniture for Kelly Wearstler.
What you absolutely must have in your studio: My studio couldn’t function without espresso, CNC machines, and brass bar stock.
What you do when you’re not working: Likely hunched over my watchmaker’s bench rebuilding a vintage watch. I find working on watches a wonderfully myopic world that’s totally absorbing and relaxing.
Sources of creative envy: I’ve been wonderfully enthralled with the creations of Cormac McCarthy for a long time now. The more I delve into his books, the more they reveal and his writing opens my mind to another world.
The distraction you want to eliminate: The anxiety of having to run a business.
Concrete or marble? “A glass marble rolling under a grand piano.”
High-rise or townhouse? May I suggest 7 Eccles Street?
Remember or forget? I would much rather remember than forget.
Aliens or ghosts? I’m reminded of a dream that I had where it was revealed to me, by a talking cat, that what we think are ghosts are really aliens.
Dark or light? Outer Dark.
