The Collectible design fair, established in Brussels in 2018, opened its first New York edition to VIPs on Wednesday (until 8 September). With around 100 exhibitors stretched across two gutted levels of Water Street Projects, an office building in Manhattan’s Financial District, the fair manages to conjure a picturesque industrial aesthetic despite the corporate setting. Presentations range from conventional stands to curated and thematic presentations devoted to outdoor furniture, for instance, or pieces designed by architects. Objects on offer range from lamps and tableware to chairs, beds and entire environments.
“The fair walks this fine line between design and art, while also being very experimental, which is what attracted us,” says Ana Curiel, a co-founder of the Miami-based space Casa Ankan. “We knew the fair’s reputation in Europe and it felt like the right fit for our programme.” For the gallery’s first-ever fair stand, it too is straddling art and design, including a relief painting by the American Mexican artist Monica Curiel, Recuerdos (2024), and a sculptural chair by Los Angeles-based studio Big Moon, among other pieces.
The Otras Formas stand at Collectible New York Photo by Simon Leung
Another first-time fair participant working at the intersection and design is the Paris-based outfit Colaab, which helps artists realise editioned design objects. “We ask artists to develop functional objects and we work with them, artisans and fabricators to make it happen,” says Susan Tomlinson, Collab’s head of sales. “This is our first fair, but when we heard that Emily Marant was launching Collectible’s New York edition, we jumped at the opportunity.”
Colaab’s stand includes ornate tables by the Chinese artist Xiao Fan Ru made with hoops of bronze shaped to resemble bamboo, replete with delicate leaves and intricate cicadas working their way along the stalks. Also on view are rope-wrapped benches by the French sculptor Morgane Tschiember, who also contributed a window-shaped light fixture, Everybody gets lighter (2022-23), whose glowing gradient of colour resembles a more domestic version of a James Turrell light installation. Available in different shapes and variations, Tschiember’s window light fixtures are priced around $12,000 to $14,000.
Glass works by Lucie Claudia Podrabska on view at Collectible New York Benjamin Sutton
Other notable presentations include a stand of seats in wide-ranging styles from the New York-based Lyle Gallery, a pair of elemental screens and a richly detailed wooden bench depicting a gharial (a type of crocodile) by the Bangalore-based design studio The Vernacular Modern, a series of lamps made with beeswax and flowers by New York’s Jack Simonds Studio and a vibrant, candy-hued stand from New York-based Tuleste Factory.
In addition to sculptural seating and inventive lighting, this edition of Collectible has a strong selection of glass artists. The Montreal-based glass studio Fusion F is showcasing vessels in a range of organic shapes on its shared stand with the design studio Fomenta. Three glass artists who are either based in Czechia or have their pieces fabricated there split the cost of shipping their wares to Collectible, allowing visitors to peruse Anna Jožová’s colourful and biomorphic works, Elis Monsport’s richly textured and monochromatic tableware and sculptures, and Lucie Claudia Podrabska’s display of mouth-blown glass flowers (priced around $90 apiece) and ornate goblets and glasses (priced from around $130 to $200 per pair).
Jack Simonds Studio's stand at Collectible New York Photo by Simon Leung
The Brooklyn-based artist and designer Nicholas Devlin is showing just one work on his stand, a new sculptural installation, The Alchemist’s Folly (2024), that was commissioned by a client seeking a backyard gazebo. The resulting work—something between a giant aquarium ornament and cloth-wrapped pagan shrine—was inspired by Hieronymus Bosch and the Surrealists, especially Remedios Varo.
“What if these fantasy worlds could be actual places you could inhabit,” Devlin asks. “I wanted to capture this feeling of being in a transitory space.” Throughout the fair, artists and designers are offering a plethora of ways to bring unexpected pieces of the beautiful and fantastical into the everyday.
- Collectible New York, until 8 September, Water Street Projects, 161 Water Street, Manhattan