These Are The Best Things to See and Do at Miami Design Week 2019
Every December, the world of art and design comes together in Miami to celebrate craft, culture, and creative camaraderie. With the convergence of Art Basel, Art Miami, and Design Miami/, there are enough exhibitions, installations, pop-ups, and more to fulfill all of your design dreams—and then some. ELLE Decor is joining in on the celebration with dinner at Ralph Pucci, cocktails & canapés with Arhaus and The Green Initiative at 1 Hotel, plus an array of other events and special installations. Need help refining your own itinerary this year? Below, we’ve compiled a list of the things you don’t want to miss.
ART BASEL
December 5-8 @ Miami Beach Convention Center
Each year, Art Basel returns to Miami as one of the country’s biggest art fairs and a staple of Miami Design week as a whole. Seasoned contemporary and modern artists—plus a new generation of emerging talent—will put their most prized work on display, from paintings to sculptures, installations, photographs, film, and more.
WORTH NOTING: Virgil Abloh's “Dollar a Gallon”
December 5-8 @ Paseo Ponti
As the artistic director of menswear at Louis Vuitton, founder of the Milan-based label Off-White, furniture designer, and DJ, Virgil Abloh’s craft is as vast as it is impressive. This year, he returns to Miami Design week with a can’t-miss outdoor sculpture—Dollar a Gallon—located in Jady Alley. The sculpture, which depicts a sunken Sunoco gas sign, is an iteration of a previous work that Abloh debuted in Japan, exploring the role of commerce, commodification, and advertising in contemporary cultures.
DESIGN MIAMI/
December 3-8 @ Pride Park
With over 70,000 square feet of exhibits and more than 70 exhibitions, Design Miami/ is back for its 15th year, complete with an incredible selection of lighting, furniture, and home decor. The fair’s newest edition is under new curatorial direction by Aric Chen, a Shanghai-based design and architecture curator. Setting the theme as “Elements: Water,” visitors can expect a wonderfully diverse range of works that celebrate the future of design.
WORTH NOTING: A Boy From Texas
December 4-8 @ Miami Beach Convention Center
Gallerist Cristina Grajales will be exhibiting this solo sculpture exhibition showcasing the works of acclaimed theater artist Robert Wilson. Wilson’s work includes an installation made from cast and blown glass, designed to reflect on concepts of natural, fragility, and rebirth inspired by his Texas upbringing.
FAENA FESTIVAL
December 2-8 @ 3201 Collins Avenue, Miami
The second annual Faena Festival—created by none other than hotelier extraordinaire Alan Faena—celebrates the intersections between spirituality and food, congregation and ritual, and our shared experiences within these topics as a whole. Appropriately named “The Last Supper,” this Zoe Lukov-organized festival features a range of seminal works, installations, videos, and performances from artists from around the globe.
LOUIS VUITTON OBJETS NOMADES
December 6-10 @ 140 NE 39th St, Miami
It’s been seven years since Louis Vuitton made their furniture debut with the Objets Nomades collection, and this year the French fashion house is presenting a turquoise edition of the Bomboca Sofa by Fernando and Humberto Campana at their Miami boutique.
VERSACE’S SOUTH BEACH STORIES
December 6-8 @ 86 NE 39th St. Suites 116 & 216, Miami
After amassing international praise for her vibrant Versace installation at Milan Design Week, New York-based interior designer Sasha Bikoff has reunited with the fashion brand for yet another show-stopping presentation. Versace’s “South Beach Stories” includes six one-of-a-kid furniture pieces that draw from Versace’s vivacious—and versatile—archive, much of which is rooted in the Miami subculture.
EMOTIONAL PUZZLE
Opens December 3 @ 343 NW 25th St, Miami
Just ahead of Miami’s Art Basel, designer Ralph Pucci will unveil a mural by fashion designer Jean-Charles de Castelbajac—which depicts prints from Castelbajac’s archives—on the façade of Pucci’s beloved Wynwood showroom.
THE RALEIGH GARDENS
November 24-February 29 @ 1775 Collins Ave, Miami Beach
In honor of the late French artist duo François-Xavier Lalanne and Claude Lalanne, architect Peter Marino and landscape architect Raymond Jungles have transformed the outdoor area of Miami’s beloved Art Deco hotel, The Raleigh, with an exhibit worth wandering throughout. The tropical garden and immersive art experience incorporates Les Lalanne’s iconic sculptural animals, offering a celebration of the late artists’ lives while debuting the newly-renovated hotel.
ARTFASHION
December 7th, Wynwood
Emmy Award-winning costume designer Patricia Field—whose works run the gamut from “Sex and the City” to “The Devil Wears Prada”—is back at Basel for her annual ARTFASHION runway show, which will also include designs from other independent artists.
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