At Design Miami 2022 Gufram present the Shroom CACTUS®, a new edition by multi-hyphenated artist, entrepreneur, actor and fashion icon A$AP Rocky and his design studio HOMMEMADE, which will launch at the fair.
Working with a multidisciplinary artist like Rocky has been incredibly inspiring for me. He knows the Gufram brand and values very well but, more importantly, is a big collector of our pieces. This made our collaboration genuine and incredibly easy to bring to life. Since my early days at Gufram, I have constantly been looking for cross-contamination opportunities across various disciplines and feel like we reached an important goal in working with a phenomenal music artist like Rocky. I would say that developing this mushroom-based collaboration has been a good trip!
Charley Vezza, Global Creative Orchestrator, Gufram
Gufram’s space at Design Miami/ resembles a bright green and utopian forest where the Shroom CACTUS® takes centre stage. Under a blue sky with fluffy clouds and gigantic mushrooms illustrated on the walls, visitors are encouraged to walk on a grass-like carpeting which covers the ground where dozens of ceramic flowers are scattered.
Gufram’s iconic CACTUS®, originally designed by Guido Drocco and Franco Mello in 1972 celebrates its 50th anniversary this year and is being reinterpreted by the GRAMMY-nominated music artist and avid design collector A$AP Rocky for the Miami edition of the design fair. The Shroom CACTUS® comes in a limited edition run of nine pieces and features multiple hand-painted mushrooms growing on its trunk and at its feet challenging reality. The new Cactus is developed in a bespoke green colour.
Gufram is known to be playfully innovative while not losing their luxury appeal. From mid-century modifications, to contemporary collaborations, they have established themselves as a unique brand and therefore a perfect brand collaborator. This is the first collaboration from my HOMMEMADE decor studio and since I’ve always advocated for mushrooms it was only right that we made a cactus with them.
A$AP Rocky
Design Miami/ 30 November – 4 December Convention Center Drive & 19th Street Miami Beach, FL
About
Founded in Turin in 1966 and now part of Sandra and Charley Vezza’s Italian Radical Design group, Gufram was originally born as an artisanal entity and is now globally known for pushing the limits of industrial design. With its Radical Design spirit and its nonconformist experimentation linked to aesthetics, and technological and material research, over the years Gufram has created playful, subversive and desecrating pieces. Design icons that have become unique in form and value because of the cross-contamination between industrial design, artisanal creation, and imaginative flair, typical of art. The brand’s research commitment has driven the company to master the treatment of flexible polyurethane and to the development of Guflac®, a special finish patented by Gufram to have more uniform, cohesive and elastic surfaces through accurate and meticulous craftsmanship processes. Gufram’s unmistakable furniture items, such as the BOCCA® lips sofa, the PRATONE® chaise lounge and the CACTUS® hall tree, also known as domestic sculptures, represent an interpretation of the contact point between art and design, and are now displayed in some of the most beautiful houses and most renown museums worldwide.
Harlem born A$AP Rocky, né Rakim Mayers, is a multi-hyphenated artist, entrepreneur, actor, and fashion icon. Since his emergence in 2011, his music has accumulated billions of streams, and he has collaborated with G-Eazy, Cardi B, Lana Del Rey, The Weeknd, Selena Gomez, Rod Stewart, Alicia Keys and more. His acting debut came in 2015 in the coming-of-age film DOPE, and he has also cameoed in various comedies. A$AP Rocky has starred in a host of global commercial campaigns including Calvin Klein, Gucci, Courvoisier, Dior, Mercedes-Benz, and Fenty Skin. His creative agency, AWGE, has launched partnerships with Amina Muaddi, Selfridges, JW Anderson, Under Armour, along with helping kick-start the careers of notable artists and more.
