Dezeen Magazine

Dezeen's top 12 architecture and design movies of 2019

For our review of 2019, Sebastian Jordahn selects the best videos produced by Dezeen Studio, including an interview with Norman Foster about high-tech architecture, our Glastonbury Festival design highlights and a profile of Frida Escobedo.

Frida Escobedo explains how she fell into architecture

In March Dezeen interviewed Mexican architect Frida Escobedo for a series of videos about her career, the Mexican architecture scene and her early work.

In the first video of the series, Escobedo explained how she became an architect and gave Dezeen a look into her small practice based in Mexico City.

Find out more about Frida Escobedo ›


Nendo designs recyclable chair for Fritz Hansen

Nendo founder and chief designer Oki Sato talked about his chair, which is made from recycled household plastics, for danish furniture brand Fritz Hansen.

The Japanese designer took visual queues from folds in pieces of paper to create the chair, which can be recycled when it reaches the end of its life.

Find out more about the N02 Recycle chair by Nendo for Fritz Hansen ›


Junya Ishigami says his 2019 Serpentine Pavilion was designed to be "part of surrounding landscape"

In this exclusive video, Dezeen interviewed Japanese architect Junya Ishigami about his design for the annual Serpentine Pavilion.

The 350 square-metre cave-like refuge covered by a slate canopy is designed to blend into the surrounding landscape by emulating a stone hill.

Find out more about Ishigami's 2019 Serpentine Pavilion ›


Joep van Lieshout tells Dezeen why he likes "to get his hands dirty" in his workshop

As part of our Design Dreams series in collaboration with Dutch design brand Moooi, Dezeen visited artist Joep van Lieshout at his studio in Rotterdam.

In the video, Van Lieshout tells the story of the Liberty Lounger chair and the Statistocrat lamp that he designed for Moooi.

Find out more about Joep van Lieshout ›


Norman Foster tells the story behind his first high-tech building

Dezeen interviewed British architect Norman Foster about his first high building Reliance Controls and how its design "dissolved traditional boundaries" in office space.

The video is part of Dezeen's series about high-tech architecture, an architectural style that emerged in the UK in the late 1960s and was led by architects Foster, Richard Rogers, Nicholas Grimshaw, Michael and Patty Hopkins and Renzo Piano.

Find out more about Reliance Controls ›


Vans opens exhibition space in Covent Garden store

In this video produced by Dezeen for Vans, Dave Bell from KK Outlet unveiled a new exhibition space at the streetwear brand's new boutique in London's Covent Garden.

The exhibition space is designed as a creative platform to showcase art and design projects by London-based artists and creatives.

Find out more about the new Vans concept store ›


Olafur Eliasson walks us through his Tate Modern exhibition

In this video, artist Olafur Eliasson gave Dezeen a preview of his blockbuster exhibition at London's Tate Modern, which comprises around 40 works from the last 26 years of his career.

The works on show included a natural indoor rainbow, a fog-filled tunnel and a 15 metre-high waterfall – all of which, Eliasson hopes, allow visitors to "step closer to reality".

Find out more about Eliasson's In Real Life exhibition ›


Dezeen interviews Thomas Heatherwick live at Second Home Hollywood

This year, Dezeen's editor-in-chief Marcus Fairs spoke to British designer Thomas Heatherwick at Second Home Hollywood. In the talk, Heatherwick explained his studio's "human-centred" approach.

The talk was held inside the 2015 Serpentine Pavilion designed by Spanish architecture firm SelgasCano, which has been rebuilt at the La Brea Tar Pits in Los Angeles.

Find out more about the talk ›


Álvaro Siza describes the difficulties of designing his Expo'98 Portuguese Pavilion

In August Dezeen interviewed Pritzker Prize-winning architect Álvaro Siza about his past and present projects. In this video, he talked about the difficult task he faced when designing the Portuguese Pavilion for the 1998 World Exposition in Lisbon.

With its use beyond the Exposition unknown, the building had to be adaptable enough to be an office or even a museum.

Find out more about the Expo'98 Portuguese Pavilion ›


Nike designs a record-breaking marathon running shoe

In this video produced by Dezeen for Nike, designers explained the engineering behind a shoe meant to improve the performance of marathon runners.

The Nike ZoomX Vaporfly NEXT% was worn by the winners of the 2019 London Marathon, one of which set a new record for the course and ran the second-fastest marathon in history.

Find out more about the Nike ZoomX Vaporfly NEXT% ›


Dezeen visits Glastonbury 2019

This year Dezeen Studio visited the world-famous Glastonbury music festival to interview the creative partnership Block9 about their monolithic IICON stage.

The stage was a temporary installation built for the festival, taking the form of a huge head intersected with a cube-like visor.

Find out more about the IICON stage ›


The designers of the Potemkin Theatre explains their "two-faced structure"

In this video Dezeen interviewed Paul Maich and Ted Swift of Maich Swift Architects, who designed the 2019 Antepavilion – an annual architectural pavilion organised in collaboration with the Architecture Foundation.

The pavilion is a double-sided, three-storey theatre which hosts public events like talks and performances.

Find out more about the Potemkin Theatre ›