The Design Line: 12 - 18 February
A California town designed by Disney, an entire neighbourhood resurrected for the Superbowl by Es Devlin, and a furore over fashion in figure skating feature in another week of The Design Line.
It will certainly be a small world after all in the Disney housing development (image: Disney).
A normal day at Disney
“Picture an energetic community with the warmth and charm of a small town and the beauty of a resort.” Did you imagine a slightly sad collection of villas clustered around an unnaturally turquoise desert lagoon, all micromanaged by long-suffering Disney staff? If not, you’re doing it wrong. This week, Disney announced that it had excitingly reinvented the concept of the company town with the launch of Storyliving By Disney, a new scheme to develop master-planned residential communities, all to be designed by the group’s theme park division and operated by Disney. The first of these communities will be built in the Coachella Valley in Rancho Mirage, California, where “Disney cast members trained in the company’s legendary guest service will operate the community association,” ensuring that all residents enjoy “the attention to detail and special touches that are Disney hallmarks.” For anyone intrigued, the corporation has already warned that “every single element of these communities will be steeped in a story.” But, really, this is just a normal town, normally designed by theme park engineers, for which any non-residents (non-normals) will have to buy a totally normal day pass to visit – just as you would if trying to visit relatives in Wakefield, Poitiers or Bloemfontein. Totally normal! So for anyone looking for “new ways to make Disney a bigger part of their lives”, why not buy a unit today? Come on in! The water is unnaturally lovely!
Buzz the monkey enjoys some enrichment in between experiments (image: Neuralink).
Monkey business
It’s sad times for our simian friends, with the upsetting news that eight rhesus macaque monkeys have died during Neuralink experiments. The company co-founded by Elon Musk is gearing up to implant AI chips in human brains to create what it terms a brain-machine interface. Because who doesn’t want to be hooked up to a computer at all times? The deaths came to light when animal rights activists filed a complaint against the company and the University of California, Davis, for its £1.4m brain experiment on 23 monkeys. Neuralink published a blog post in response, defending its animal welfare protocols with lots of cute pictures of happy pigs and monkeys. But it admitted that, while two of the monkey euthansations were planned for data collection, the other six had to be put down due to a device failure, a surgical complication and four cases of infections to do with the brain implants. Neuralink says these deaths have led to updated surgical protocols, but it doesn’t instil massive amounts of confidence in a programme that eventually wants to put a USB port in our brains. No word yet on whether Musk is still looking for a director for human clinical trials, but it poses a question over his claims that the technology is “very safe and reliable”. It’s more bad news for Musk, after 40 of his Starlink satellites just got wiped out by a geomagnetic storm. It’s hard being a billionaire.
Fury on ice
It’s been a dramatic Winter Olympics for figure skating, with serious upsets on and off the ice. Fans of the sport were particularly offended by the fashion choices made by Vera Wang for the US skate team. It should have been an uplifting moment for a top Asian-American designer to have dressed Asian-American skater Nathan Chen as he took gold for the USA in men’s figure skating. But fans were left unimpressed by what they deemed the boring, masculine attire chosen by Wang and Chen for one of the few sports that encourages even its male contestants to combine feminine costuming with technical and difficult high speed jumps. Chen skated to victory in a fiery base layer-style top that was printed with starbursts, which has been unfavourably compared to the galaxy print patterns that were popular in the early noughties. It touched a nerve, as Chen has previously had to apologise to LGBTQ athletes for suggesting that as a straight man, he is at a disadvantage in a “homesexual dominated” sport. Chen’s refusal to dress up was compounded by the devastating result for two-time Olympic champion Yuzuru Hanyu, who fell trying to perform what would have been a historic quad axel in the men’s free skate, placing 4th overall. The Japanese skater is so beloved for his ethereal costumes that don’t skimp on the glitter and gauze (and for incorporating dance moves from Kpop megaband BTS) that he even managed to transcend current frosty Sino-Japanese relations to win legions of Chinese fans bearing his favourite stuffed Winnie the Pooh toys. Hopefully with gold under his belt, Chen will feel less frightened of sequins threatening his masculinity.
The Superbowl halftime show was straight outta Compton (image: Es Devlin).
Compton takes the Super Bowl
Given that hip-hop has dominated popular music and culture for the best part of 30 years, you may think it odd that this year was the first time that the Super Bowl halftime show had given it centre stage: almost as if the NFL doesn't have the best track record at supporting Black performers and culture. Nevertheless, it was good to see rap finally get its moment in the sun, with Dr. Dre leading proceedings and stars such as Mary J. Blige, Snoop Dogg, Kendrick Lamar, Eminem and 50 Cent all taking to the stage. And what a stage it was, designed by Es Devlin as a series of neon-lit, ghostly recreations of landmark buildings from Compton – including Tam’s Burger #21, Dale’s Donuts, and the nightclub Eve After Dark – sat atop a floor cloth printed with aerial photographs of the city. It was a nice touch, with the event taking place 20 minutes from Compton in nearby Inglewood, and one that paid credit to Compton’s extraordinary impact upon culture: the number of hip hop artists who have begun their careers there is staggering, with the city a recurring reference within their lyrics. Devlin said that she wished to cast Compton as a “protagonist in the work” and use a selection of buildings from the city as “characters in the narrative” – mission accomplished. For an event as overblown and drunk on spectacle as the Super Bowl, it was nice to see more grounded architectural references celebrated as the icons of Devlin’s set: burger joints, recording studios and clubs. Compton took to the stage and not a moment too soon.
Tremaine Emory prepares to reign supreme over Supreme (image: Instagram via @tremaineemory).
All hail our new Supreme overlord
In November 2020 VF Corp acquired streetwear brand Supreme, making no secret of its plans for the cult fashion label. Supreme, VF Corp assured investors in 2021, would soon grow from its current $600m annual revenue to become a “billion-dollar brand in the coming years.” That’s all well and good, but it does pose the billion dollar question: how do you grow a brand that built its name on insider cool and exclusivity into a global money making machine? The answer, it would seem, is Tremaine Emory, founder of fashion brand Denim Tears. Emory was announced this week as Supreme’s new creative director and seems a smart choice. He has a track-record of brand collaborations with leading brands including Nike and Levi’s, and has acknowledged this form of practice as an chance to infuse political messaging and commentary on the Black American experience into fashion:“Their number one thing is making money,” he told Business of Fashion in 2020, “how can I dance their bottom line with my bottom line?” It's an approach that seems well suited to the collaboration-heavy Supreme, with Emory himself noting similarities. “Supreme has put out some really powerful garments about what Black people and other people go through in the world — but basically Denim Tears is like African-American sportswear,” he told Esquire. In 2010 “You know what I mean? So like, Supreme does every couple seasons, they’ll do like a Malcolm X whatever. My whole line is that.” It’s a line that VF Corp are clearly keen to get into.
A bit of a flake
Airbus is limbering up to defend itself in court against accusations that its A350 model is defective, which have been levelled against it by Qatar Airways. This is kind of a big deal, as the Financial Times reports, because aircraft designers would normally do anything to avoid legal shenanigans with an airline, aka their main customer base. Qatar Airways is demanding $710m in compensation, calculating that it is costing $4.2m a day to have its fleet of 21 A350s grounded. But Airbus insists there isn’t anything wrong with its design, claiming that it's Qatar Airways being cheeky and trying to recoup some of its £4bn pandemic-induced financial losses. The trouble began with football. In preparation for the 2022 FIFA World Cup, which is being held in Qatar, the airline sent its planes to get a snazzy new livery to match the matches. But when the outer layer of paint was stripped off, Qatar Airways alleges the paint was peeling and flaking off the fuselage, requiring 900 patch jobs. The airline released a video documenting the extent of the damage – which has big “complaining to a brand on Twitter” vibes – including damage around rivets and the lightning protection systems. You definitely want your anti-lightning strike bits of a plane working, to be fair. But while a few other airlines have reported peeling paint on their A350s, Airbus says the issue is only cosmetic. While its legal troubles may be causing headaches, Airbus can take comfort in the news it made record profits last year.