The Designer That Lives on Henry Street

October 18, 2021

In 26-year-old designer Kouros Maghsoudi’s house, the first thing you see is two brilliantly-toned red and blue Herman Miller Chiclet sofas — a decor choice that immediately clues you in to his interest in design history and its place in the world today. After that, you notice the antique prints and paintings taped to or framed on the walls (which are painted white along with the floor), the translucent orange bookcase, and the moodboard against the wall, composed of scattered images attached to a piece of wood. Duality is big here; creative tension appears in the space between classic design and ultra-specific personality pieces.

In fact, duality is a main theme in Kouros’s work. His Mehmooni collection that was released earlier this year, consisted of chairs, a coffee table, and a floor mirror, is playfully postmodern. The titles of each piece — Taarof, Doodool, and Behsheen—are Farsi words that connect the bubbly furniture back to Kouros’s Iranian-American heritage. At the same time, Mehmooni is insistently of the moment: the gentle curves and soothing colors hint at the 80s/90s revival which is popular today, while maintaining their own identity. The opening party for the collection had the energy of a high-profile art or fashion event, complete with luxury hard seltzer and DJ sets by a host of Kouros’s friends.

Text by David Eardley
Photos by Danny Roche

Kouros’s relationship with the world of design goes deeper than his 2021 collection. His background is in urban design and architecture, and he currently works at the New York office for the influential architect Bjarke Ingels. This interest and history with design combined with his strong sense of family heritage make his living space particularly important to understanding the direction of his work. I met with Kouros at his Chinatown apartment the other day to discuss his growth as a designer and the launch of his collection.

I feel like the city is a big part of the personality of your work. When did you move here?

I just reached my four year anniversary actually — I moved to NYC in late July of 2017. During those first few months, I was couch surfing between my cousin's place in the Upper West Side and my best friend's apartment in Nolita, all while looking for a job. Once I landed one, I moved into my first NYC apartment in Chinatown. I have been in the Chinatown and LES area ever since. I’ve lived in this particular spot for just over a year and a half.

You just launched your first collection — congratulations! Do you think your work is evocative of a particular historical designer or movement? Is this something important for designers to consider?

Absolutely. I would probably categorize my work influence into three buckets. The first one would be local - New York, both furniture and fashion designers. That includes, you know - Sam Stewart, Eny Lee Parker, but also some great New York fashion brands, like my friend's handbag brand RATIO ET MOTUS. It was a great inspiration for my color references.

The second bucket is really just those fabulous and famous European designers that everyone knows, like Gae Aulenti, Joe Colombo, Mario Botta, and so on. And the third would be specific movements that I’m constantly referencing in my mood boards. The Radical Design movement in Italy that happened after the mid-century modern movement and was a kind of reaction to it. Also, all those really wacky, outlandish, colorful designers, like Sottsass and Superstudio.

It's really funny because I think that cycle is happening again — obviously with the 21st-century twist. The early 21st century was dominated by MCM revival and minimalism, and now we're having a really strong reaction to that.

Since I interview a lot of designers, I think a lot about how their work is similar or different from the style of their living space. Do you see a contrast between the Mehmooni collection and your living room here?

Yeah, I think furnishing the place actually helped me to create the collection. When I moved here, we had no furniture because we didn't have room for it — all we owned was this couch. It was actually an opportunity to slow down and buy beautiful pieces that weren’t just from IKEA. As I was doing that, it really inspired me to make my first furniture collection. I've been saving tabs on my browser with furniture for years - things I never could never find or afford to buy. At some point I was like, “Wait, why don't I just start making these pieces I’m envisioning?”

My furniture search started to double as a mood board. I began to use it as an opportunity to research old designers, discover old pieces, etc. It kind of happened in a symbiotic manner.

Do you think you’ll ever live with your own furniture?

I really want to, I really want to, but I can't afford to right now. I love my objects — I design objects for my life. I have friends that come over and want to smoke, and I’d love to have the Taarof table here — it has an ashtray and compartments for anything you might need.

I think it’s important to live with stuff you make but also bring in pieces you buy that inspire you. I’m inspired by a lot of my furniture; some of it was even a size reference for the pieces I designed.

Design is certainly having a moment — you chose an excellent time to launch your collection. People are sort of thinking about the design world how they’ve always thought of fashion, the parties, the openings, the ones to watch. How do you see the New York design world-changing, for better or for worse?

I believe that the New York design scene is going through a Renaissance post-covid. Not only design actually — I think for once, after being in the shadows for many years, both New York design week and New York fashion week are making a dent in the global scene. And I think people are turning their heads away from just looking at Europe.

It's really exciting because I think New York has been frowned upon at times for being too campy and loud and colorful. And now I think that we’re actually moving towards that kind of feeling in all sectors of design and that is New York’s DNA. It's in my DNA, it's in my furniture.

I’m sure it’s been a long road to where you are today, in terms of a creative process. How have you grown as a designer?

Logistics, materials, procedures — that’s the obvious one. Beyond that, the most growth that I’ve felt is growth in my confidence, not only in my taste but my instincts and gut feeling with design. I feel like there are less obstacles with designing now because I feel very happy with my first collection, with my collection and the details of that but also with how I presented it, down to getting sponsors for the event. Doing that all on my own is something I’m really proud of and has elevated my confidence levels.

How do you want to keep growing?

I want to force myself to explore other materials - other textures and colors and patterns. My first pieces were primarily 3D printed and lumber-based, which was an obvious material. I want to branch out to materials and forms I’m unfamiliar with, like glass or a sofa.

So that’s the next challenge: stepping away from the monochromatic look and the single materials I used in my first collection and diversifying my design.

I have a few designs in my pocket that I really want to produce. One is this idea for a round coffee table, like a donut block. There will be six cutouts around the side, like little caves where you can put your feet. Like assigned seating. I'm trying to find a way to make that a reality.

Something like that would be a part of my next design week show, if I have the money by then. But right now, I’m really just selling my current pieces and working on a few commissions, like a vessel I’m working on for a show. I'm working on a dining chair as well. Yeah. But it all comes down to money and time.

Culture

The Club Is Coming to the Stage

We enter and make our way to what is approximately front left of the DJ booth, where we’re accustomed to dancing at clubs in New York. “So is this a techno club or a dance performance?” yells an uncertain participant in my boyfriend’s ear. He laughs, bouncing along to Ben UFO, and yells back, “It’s both!” The club has long been a hot topic in European contemporary dance but it is only now making its way into New York performance venues, largely through transatlantic tours. R.O.S.E. follows recent examples like Michele Rizzo’s HIGHER xtn. at MoMA PS1 (May 2024), (LA)HORDE’s Room with a View at NYU Skirball (October 2023), and Gisèle Vienne’s Crowd at BAM (October 2022).

Do these performances compromise the club’s spirit — a space idealized for its anonymity, dark lighting, and thundering music? The notion of the club as a utopian escape is admittedly just that — an ideal — because of how its intense conditions can create barriers to entry. Still, the club remains sacred for many, a place to forge connections and embrace an alternative state of being. Looking at how performances transfer this spirit to new settings reveals what aspects of the club are essential and those that aren’t.

Sharon Eyal, R.O.S.E. 2024. Photography by Stephanie Berger, courtesy of Park Avenue Armory.

Eyal’s dancers make their entrance. The lighting shifts from roving blue to yellow spotlights as Ben UFO’s tracks transition to more melodic beats. Clad in deconstructed lace Dior lingerie with dark red tears painted on their faces, the dancers move cautiously in a tightly maintained pack, slicing paths through the horde with hoof-like steps and jerky leg extensions. After around ten minutes of this controlled choreography, the dancers vanish as the lighting shifts back to blue and Ben UFO picks up his dubby beats. The club, as we knew it, resumes. This cycle of tightly executed movements and free-flowing club-goers repeats several times, each time emboldening the dancers to plunge further into the crowd.

Clubbing in a building once built for the U.S. Army National Guard on Manhattan’s Upper East Side turns out to be surprisingly successful — at least for the audience. What starts as an awkward, scattered group searching for their non existent seats gradually gels into an engaged, bouncing crowd that erupts in cheers each time the dancers enter and exit. Performance patrons who might never step foot in a club find themselves swept up in its potential for communion, moving in unison with fellow ticket holders. But it isn’t until the very end of R.O.S.E. that the dancers finally break free from Eyal’s choreography and join the fired-up audience in a brief moment of improvisatory movement with the music. By keeping her dancers at arm’s length, Eyal seems more interested in the club as a backdrop for her signature movement style than wholly as a space with meaningful stories to be told.

Michele Rizzo, HIGHER xtn. 2024. Photography by Cameron Kelly courtesy of MoMA PS1.

Back in May, I attended Wire Festival, a multiday electronic music event at Knockdown Center that had no shortage of organically united dancefloors. It attracted a crowd of seasoned ravers who were eager to celebrate the start of spring as they danced alongside DJs who played well into the daylight. I left Wire in an afternoon daze to see Michele Rizzo’s HIGHER xtn. at MoMA PS1. My sleepless euphoria only deepened as the performance unfolded, starting with a lone dancer who looked plucked out of the festival.

The dancer, dressed in sneakers, baggy jeans, and a tight tank top, shuffled slowly into the gallery, perfectly in sync with the looping bars of an understated electronic melody. Soon, other dancers, clad in the same staple rave uniform, joined him — each having traveled from Europe for the U.S. museum debut of HIGHER xtn., which premiered at the Stedelijk in Amsterdam in 2018 and quickly became a fixture at kunsthalles and festivals across the continent. As the score’s tempo climbed, the choreography locked into a 16-count sequence, which the dancers executed with precise synchrony. They remained intensely focused, never making eye contact with each other, as they sought release in the endless repetition of synthesized beats. Once the dancers reached their limit, they stopped the sequence and exited the gallery, one by one.

HIGHER xtn. used the focused daylight of the gallery to highlight the meditative release found in the repetitive movements that dominate dark dancefloors. The performance’s restraint brought more consistency and intentionality than Eyal’s all-encompassing club construction in R.O.S.E. Yet both performances offer enticing entry points into club culture for those who may not frequent raves. Rizzo’s ecstatic, hypnotic repetitions reveal how the club can mirror other meditative practices, while Eyal’s interpolation of performance and clubbing helped hesitant audience members blossom by the end. Still, both works overlook one of the most underappreciated aspects of clubbing — its potential for individual expression. HIGHER xtn.’s pristine uniformity especially risks promoting the outdated techno trope that there’s a “right” way to dance to electronic music.

Maybe this shortcoming is, in fact, a benefit. For habitual ravers jaded by one too many sunrise sets, it’s a reminder to return to the club with more intention. If you pause and peer through the darkness, you’ll see hundreds of people moving to the same beat, each with their own subtle variations. This collective choreography is a ready-made spectacle that doesn’t need validation in a theater or museum. And when the music shifts slightly, you can watch the ripple effect sweep through the crowd while feeling the new beat in your body. Maybe this small bit of magic is best left on the dance floor.

Culture

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Culture

Porsche SCOPES Brings Art, Music, and Design to Toronto

The festival was a full immersion into Toronto’s dynamic creative energy. Day one set the tone with DJ collective Living Room, followed by an experimental performance by Claire Rousay that captivated the crowd. Jewelry designer Steff Eleoff unveiled her Porsche Taycan 4S art car installation—a bold fusion of automotive and wearable art inspired by her Sedona ring—while OVO Sound’s Naomi Sharon and DVSN wrapped up the night with powerful, genre-defying performances.

We witnessed SCOPES Toronto bridging underground and mainstream with day two’s lineup. DJ Korea Town Acid’s set paved the way for Angelphroot and Dameer’s debut of BASSMATI, a track blending South Asian influences with bass-driven sounds. Chippy Nonstop’s return to Toronto and Richie Hawtin’s extended set were milestones of the evening, proving that the city’s underground scene has a global resonance.

The final day featured standout performances from local pianist Harrison, Indigenous artist Tia Wood, and hip-hop visionary Sean Leon, who elevated his set with a live choir. Moonshine Collective’s film and musical performance explored themes of African utopia, showcasing art’s power to bridge culture and technology. Rising Toronto star SadBoi, who paused her tour to perform at SCOPES, further underscored the festival’s commitment to nurturing local talent.

Throughout the weekend, we experienced installations from artists like Mitsu Mitsu and culinary creations from Bar Mordecai, capturing the multifaceted creativity Porsche SCOPES brought to Toronto. This milestone 10th edition, open to all, allowed Toronto’s vibrant arts scene to thrive, underscoring SCOPES’ mission to celebrate local talent while connecting it to a global audience.

office had the chance to connect with rising star SadBoi ahead of the event. In our conversation, she shared insights into her creative journey and reflected on what performing and growing up in Toronto means to her and her work.

How are you, and where are you at right now? You told me you were traveling.

Um, I’m good, I’m feeling really good right now. I’m traveling back to Salt Lake City. I had a show yesterday in Seattle. I’m on tour right now with Coco and Claire.

How is touring life treating you? Do you like it?

I love being on the road. To be honest, I feel like I don’t know—like I’ve had good experiences and bad ones—but this time it’s really fun, especially with the people I’m surrounded by. It’s also the longest tour I’ve been on; I have about four more weeks to go. I’m trying not to think about how many days I have left.

Do you feel homesick?

Yes, because when I start thinking about how many days are left, I start to miss my dogs. I’ve just been trying to stay in the moment—I don’t even know what day of the week it is, to be honest with you.

Oh, sweet! What are your dogs’ names?

Jillian and Winston. I know, they’re crazy names.

You’ll be performing at SCOPES in Toronto, which is where you grew up. Do you feel like the crowd is different when you perform in Toronto compared to other cities?

Yes, I mean, Toronto just feels different because it’s home. Every time I come back to perform, something in my career has changed. The last time I performed in Toronto, people just wanted to have a good time, and I’m excited to perform back home again to see everyone’s reactions. I know it’s going to be different from the last time. It’s exciting to see your own growth. Toronto is a tough crowd, though. If we’re with you, we’re really with you.

So, they’re super picky? You have to gain their respect, or what is it?

I think Toronto people are in their own world, but when something really connects with them, they’ll lose themselves in the moment. But it takes something to bring them out of that. Toronto crowds are tough because even if they like you, they won’t show it outright until they’re really vibing with you.

It’s like a vibe check, right?

Exactly. They’ll enjoy your performance, but it’s hard to explain. When people visit Toronto, they often say, “Oh, you guys are so nice,” and I’m like, “I don’t think we’re that nice, we’re just polite.” Like, you can walk down the street, and no one will say anything, but it’s just our mannerisms.

You mentioned Toronto can have a moody energy, especially at night, and that the underground night scene there really inspires you. Can you talk more about what makes Toronto's nightlife so influential for you?

Absolutely, Toronto has this unique energy that comes alive at night. Similar to New York, there are the popular clubs everyone knows, but you need to find your niche—the people who know where the real parties are. I remember going to raves in high school yards, sneaking in because I wasn’t old enough. Events like Baby, Jerk!, and Yes Yes Y’all were pivotal, exposing me to DJs blending dancehall with EDM—something I hadn’t seen before. Toronto nightlife is moody and intense, but when everyone’s out, it’s like the whole city is alive.