For Wallpaper*s 2024 Next Generation issue, we have rounded-up a hotlist of emerging design talent from around the world, shining a light on the newcomers paving the present and forging the future. Join us on our journey to meet ten designers from Adelaide, Tokyo, London, Lagos, Guatemala City, Mexico City, Loch Lomond, New York and Paris. Welcome to our ascending stars of 2024.
Emerging designer Federico Stefanovich, Mexico City
Stefanovich grew up in Mexico City with an industrial designer for a father and, after studying design himself, he spent a decade learning about furniture and product design in the studio of Hector Esrawe. In 2019, he exhibited work under his own name during Mexico Design Week, and last summer, he presented a full collection with Rudy Weissenberg and Rodman Primack’s AGO Projects.
Wallpaper*: How did you settle on design as your calling?
FS: My parents’ house was filled with interesting things and there’s no doubt that my father’s profession had an influence. Working with Hector Esrawe was the ultimate design education for me. It was a huge studio with an overwhelming number of projects, from commercial furniture and scenography to editorial shoots and collectible design. I learnt so much, but increasingly I felt the desire to find my own path.
W*: How do you describe your work?
FS: If I had to give it a label, it would be collectible design, though I think of it more as technical, functional mobiles and moving sculptures. The process of my suspended works is complex and stimulating; I need to grapple with weights and volumes, density, gravity centres. You have to understand the calculations and the physics to achieve something that feels poetic.
W*: What motivates your work?
FS: A lot of trial and error! I do 3D modelling and have developed a method of calculation that means I can scale my work up or down with the help of a computer. Away from the computer, my inspiration starts from nature, like the shapes of animals or birds.
W*: What would be a dream commission?
FS: I’d love to do a public installation and have people interact with a large-scale sculpture or mobile. Accessibility is something I think about a lot and I’d like to work on something that anyone can experience.
W*: What do you believe is the power of design?
FS: It builds bridges. Working in collectible design is slow and expensive, but I get to work with artisans of extraordinary skill in family workshops all over the city. It might sound grand, but I like to think that my work plays a small part in redistributing wealth. At first I was concerned that I was just designing nice things for rich people; now I like to think that I’m building cultural and economic bridges between clients in New York and workshops in Mexico City.
Federico Stefanovich, photographed by Maureen M Evans, in his Mexico City studio, with his ‘Folia’ floor lamp, and ‘Temis’ candleholder
@federico.stefanovich
