SHoP Architects to Install Design Miami’s 1st Permanent Entrance

Every year, we wait with anticipation to see the installation at the entrance of Design Miami’s tent, adjacent to Art Basel at the Miami Beach Convention Center. This year, it will be by SHoP Architects, an über-innovative New York-based design firm who is the recipient of the Panerai Design Miami/ Visionary Award this year.

While each installation over the years has offered something to get attendees excited, this is Design Miami’s largest commission to date. It will also be the first time that an award recipient’s work will be permanently installed somewhere after the fair. After Miami Art Week wraps, you’ll be able to find the SHoP Architects’ piece in the Miami Design District. This changes the ephemeral nature of Design Miami’s entrance usually parlays.

SHoP’s design, Flotsam & Jetsam, is using monumental 3D printed structural elements to create an environment that, they say, “evokes the past romance and innovative future of Miami.” We agree… if the past they are talking about is more ancient in nature and if the future is a bit distant as well. Either way, it will get fair-goers to dream and provide a transformative environment.

This past and present theme seems to be indicative of SHoP Architects’ work, which is varied and imaginative and ranges from smaller projects, to very large ones. Projects include a planned 1,066-foot residential tower and Domino Sugar Refinery master plan in Brooklyn, two towers on First Avenue in Manhattan which are under construction and even a public school for the Kids of Kathmandu, to help earthquake-ravaged Nepal.