Dezeen Magazine

Stone-powder wallpaper features in Fragments exhibition at Design Miami

Design Miami 2015: Dutch designer Lex Pott and US wallpaper brand Calico have created products that highlight the qualities of stone, including marble furniture and wallpaper covered with stone powder (+ slideshow).

Fragments exhibition at Design Miami by Lex Pott and Calico

The Fragments exhibition features tables, bowls, a vase and a shelf by Pott, and wallpaper by Calico's New York-based owners and designers Nicolas and Rachel Cope.

Fragments exhibition at Design Miami by Lex Pott and Calico

The exhibition was commissioned by New York's The Future Perfect gallery, and will travel to its Great Jones Street venue as an expanded version in January.

Fragments exhibition at Design Miami by Lex Pott and Calico

At Design Miami, Pott is showing a series of tables with roughly quarried marble bases paired with smooth, honed tops made from the same material. His collection includes side, coffee and dining tables.

Fragments exhibition at Design Miami by Lex Pott and Calico

"I've been really interested in how stone is taken out of the ground, how the uncontrolled quality of the rough surface contrasts with the honed," Pott told Dezeen.

Fragments exhibition at Design Miami by Lex Pott and Calico

The craggy surfaces are crystallised while the smooth surfaces reveal fossils, and more varied colours and striations.

Pott also hollowed out the bases of the tables to reduce the weight.

Fragments exhibition at Design Miami by Lex Pott and Calico

The shelf uses five different types of marble, each with a distinct colour, with each shelf using fewer layers of the material.

Fragments exhibition at Design Miami by Lex Pott and Calico

"I took my inspiration from architecture," he said. "The way buildings are heavier on the bottom with thinner walls on the upper floors."

Fragments exhibition at Design Miami by Lex Pott and Calico

Also for the exhibition, The Future Perfect asked Calico to create coordinating wallpapers that would help create an environment for the booth.

Fragments exhibition at Design Miami by Lex Pott and Calico

The brand used finely woven Belgian linen and crushed stone pigments, including mica and marble, to create the patterns.

Fragments exhibition at Design Miami by Lex Pott and Calico

Calico's wallpapers could evoke landscapes or the striations of a quarry or of stone itself, according to the Copes.

Fragments exhibition at Design Miami by Lex Pott and Calico

"It's up to the viewer to decide," Rachel Cope told Dezeen, though she said that both the Blue Ridge Mountains in West Virginia's coal country and to Chinese landscape painting provided inspiration in creating the papers.

Fragments exhibition at Design Miami by Lex Pott and Calico

Rachel Cope typically creates a hand-painted paper that Nicolas translates into digital form for larger scale production. Given the fine quality of the materials used in Fragments, Calico plans to offer the series in hand-painted versions only.

Fragments exhibition at Design Miami by Lex Pott and Calico

Design Miami runs from 2 to 6 December 2015 in Miami Beach, Florida. Projects and installations on view include an illuminated crystal sphere by Fernando Romero for Swarovski and a pavilion of made of architectural models by students at Harvard.

Fragments exhibition at Design Miami by Lex Pott and Calico

Fragments will open in New York on 7 January 2016 at The Future Perfect in Manhattan, with additional pieces by Pott.

Exhibition photography is by Lauren Coleman.