Design duel
It’s like our road show!” quips David Monn, perhaps the finest event designer in the world, as he addresses the guests of a tasteful thanksgiving dinner hosted by cultural cognoscente and maritime maven Doris Magsaysay-Ho, among which are the who’s who in the country’s design industry.
“Today, I have found a new partner!” says Calvin Tsao, architect to internationally renowned mixed-use development projects, referring to David.
This unlikely meeting of design talent was due to the crafty ways of US-based Filipino designer Josie Natori, a common friend to both, who invited these prestigious design practitioners to witness — and share their varying aesthetic views as resource speakers — in the Philippines’ largest design exhibition, Manila FAME.
Known for his masterful execution of the most prestigious social and political events in the US in recent years — from the Metropolitan Museum’s Costume Institute gala to the White House state dinner for Mexican President Felipe Calderon—David Monn is known for the sheer magnitude and monumental degree of his event designs, usually highlighted by groundbreaking, multi-sensory décor experience and equally landmark production costs, earning him the repute, as christened by no less than former Vogue style editor Billy Norwich, as the “Architect of Style.” While David Monn’s superbrand of modern living may earn the ire of some notable tastemaker, like, say, one Anna Wintour, Monn is still the authoritative figure in corporate America’s most expensive — and impressive — social events.
On the other end, Harvard-trained and currently Shanghai-based architect Calvin Tsao is most notable for his developmental design with a conscience. Serving as president emeritus of the Architectural League of New York, Tsao, alongside his architectural and design firm Tsao & McKown, has been known for environmentally, economically, and culturally sustainable public and private developments. His original and thoughtful take on functional aesthetics has earned Tsao acclaim from the industry, particularly his induction into the Interior Design Hall of Fame in 2001 by the eponymous international interior and lifestyle magazine, and the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Award for Interior Design in 2009. Yet, amid all these distinctions, Calvin, with Tsao & McKown Architects, are best reputed for offering pro-bono projects that don’t skimp on the firm’s aesthetic value of holistic design, integrating architecture, furnishing, and even product innovations in their developments, whether paid or not.
So how could two designers of varying disciplines, derivations, and dogmas actually start finishing each other’s sentences? Perhaps that is the lasting effect of Manila FAME and Philippine design in general, relaxing design differences to make way for more rewarding aesthetic affinity and accord, or maybe it’s just the wonderful wine, courtesy of Manila’s most gracious host.
PHILIPPINE STAR: You are two of the world’s most highly acclaimed designers, and Manila FAME is quite lucky to have you in as resource speakers and audiences. What exactly did you build your aesthetic repute on?
CALVIN TSAO: I have to set the record straight, we’re not a big company. We’re not strategic. We just roll with the punches of the world. I think my partner (Zack McKown) and I have an interest in architecture, but not so much as building buildings, but creating an environment that so human lives can flourish. Sometimes, it could be a museum, a hotel, a restaurant, or a toilet (laughs). It doesn’t matter. We choose projects not so much for financial benefit for us, but I’m not saying our studio is non-profit. We, too, have to pay bills, pay our team of young creative people, but our real focus is almost like a social enterprise. We make money so we could keep going but we do things that are purposeful. We want to promote emotion, we want to promote experience. So, if a client comes to us and says, “We want something that is really meaningful for human experience,” it doesn’t matter if it serves a billionaire or a homeless person in a street. We give it the same attention. Today, people talk about branding, identity, how you have to create a look that people recognize, we haven’t done that. If you look at our website, you realize, we have no idea what our style is. But that’s intentional. We want to create an aesthetic that’s purposeful for the thing that we do.
DAVID MONN: I think the main reason why clients hire me is because I try to create a total experience on any of my events. Over-thinking removes possibilities. People give the brain so much credit, thinking that it is the one that creates information or experience. But what some people overlook is that it only facilitates the information transmitted by our senses. So, in making something memorable, one should start with the senses. First, the sense of smell, which the brain initially recognizes, so this should set the mood or the tone for the experience you are trying to achieve, or the memories to follow. Then, the sense of hearing—the music or the sound. Then we come to the sense of sight, once our brain has some other elements to associate our vision with. Then the sense of touch, triggered by our curiosity for textures. And then we come to the sense of taste, which is also brought about by the sense of smell. So we’ve come full circle. By catering to these senses, we create memory, where our mind can actually associate actual fragrant, audible, visual, tactile, and tasteful experiences with a time or an occasion, and I guess, that makes me successful in what I do.
How do you approach good design?
DM: Good design should always be pure. It has to be real. It has to have a purpose, and that becomes the balance where the magic begins. When I’m entertaining, I tell clients all the time, I can create everything except the energy of the guests. I can try to influence that with what we create, but I can’t make it be honest. And all too often, people entertain with the ideals of impressing people, trying to get something, trying to establish something, and I think, like good design, when it’s honest, it would always translate that.
CT: Aesthetic is a given. If you do something right, it should always be inspiring, it should always be elevating. I think you can go straight from, “this is a problem, let’s make it right, and, by the way, let’s make it perfect!”
Is there a certain discipline you succumb to when designing?
CT: First of all, we have to prepare ourselves, because we have a high responsibility of doing it “on behalf.” You can’t just do your thing because you’re doing it for other people. You have to understand the ways of the world and try to make sense of it on behalf of people who may or may not have the luxury and insight to focus on these things.
DM: Design has a rhythm, and it has a set of rules, but I think it’s actually very simple because when you look at the finest examples of Rococo, which, by definition in many people’s eyes, would be busy, frivolous, and over-the-top. But it follows the same discipline as the finest examples of minimalism and that every single thing has a story, has a purpose, has a need. Like an acanthus leaf that creates a balance for the puttee, sits with a shadow, and all this is in its perfect balance and in its mass, it seems like nothing. Plain folly! I think that’s the extreme of what we do, that even if it looks very simple, it’s actually complex because in order to get simple, you must layer it to such complex degree for it to seem effortless.
If there would be one piece of advice you could give the future generation of designers, what would it be?
CT: Don’t lie to yourself. We delude ourselves in our own lives, every day. But in design, there is a direct outcome, and when you are not being true to yourself, the work will definitely show it. That’s why design is such a raw profession. People think it’s all about fabulousness, in fact, it’s really tough. When I close the door, and I’m by myself, I am very brutal in my own assessment. Have we succeeded or have we failed? Have I cheated or have I not? I may not show it in public, but I think we’re very hard on ourselves. And you need to be hard on yourself.
DM: I’d like to give you a different answer that Calvin’s but it is in fact being truthful. In fact, in my own life, my first dream was to a fashion designer. I had a very good eye, I was able to spot a trend and react to it, but I was not a good, original (fashion) designer. So, I left that to follow the quest of finding within myself, which I knew was something creative, and discovered what it is. And I think that truth of being truthful to myself of what I’m not is what allowed me to be what I am today. I don’t think about what I do. I only do what my soul says is right. I think therein lies the difference between something that’s good and something that’s not. I can tell you that’s why my work speaks what it speaks, and I can tell you why I am attracted now to Calvin’s work, it’s that I can truly understand what his work is. It’s something I can relate to because it is truthful in every step of the way. You can’t hide from the truth, that’s the most amazing thing. So when stuff in design gets really over-the-top, it’s only trying to hide some dirty little secret. (laughs)
CT: That is how people can respect others who, from a third-party view could seem, “How could they possible like each other’s work, they’re so different?”. Pure work, whether you like it or not, like Rococo—not my favorite period—but I have to totally appreciate its integrity.
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After witnessing Manila FAME, the Philippines’ biggest design showcase, what can you note about our country’s design identity, and how do we fare with the rest of the design world?
DM: Without question, it is craft that is deeply rooted in heritage. It’s not specific, but it’s eccentric in its principle.
CT: I find it very playful. It brings a smile to my face. Like this lamp made of coconut shell—I mean, how many things can you make out of coconut shells? (Laughs) Design elsewhere, the stakes are high, everyone’s so serious, very didactic, very on-trend, very this and that, but here, I find playfulness and exploratory quality.
DM: And in its playfulness, it becomes serious.
CT: Yes, it hits the jackpot! It’s very organic, because so much of the material is organic. It’s not a cyber-produced product like resin or 3-D printed. It’s the craft. Again, the hand! Most places can’t afford the hand, as a way to show character in a product.
DM: It means you have to train someone to do it, which takes a lot of time and cost.
CT: So, the key word, craftsmanship hits the nail. In the Philippines, craftsmanship is the foundation of design, but by no means its only characteristic.
DM: From looking at a raw manufacturing source, it is not a place that I’d bring something to have somebody else make because there’s actually an aesthetic sense on what can be done here, on its own. So it’s not using a labor pool, like India, for instance. It is a reliable labor pool, but it’s not somewhere you’d look for authentic craftsmanship.
CT: Yes, because, I think their culture related to craft is labor intensive. They’ve always had an upper-class—the Rajahs—who have always exploited their labor force. Intricate craftsmanship has always been marred with the knowledge that people actually suffered—even died—for it. China is the same way. I remember, and I’m astounded, I was looking at this piece of embroidery which was very fine—and ugly. It’s on a piece of translucent silk, on one side it’s autumn, on the other it’s spring. It’s a marvel of technique, but it’s nothing I want. And then the label said, “Historically, young girls are used because they have better eyesight. And historically, it has been known that some craftsmen go blind doing it.” As if that’s something to be proud of! I think it’s disgusting. So, what the Philippines has is not that kind of craftsmanship. Yours is a craftsmanship that celebrates man’s ingenuity. I think that is a definite Filipino trait!
