Carl Hansen & Son have re-introduced (sort of) a design by Hans Wegner, known as Chair 445. I say sort of, because the chair saw only limited production. So it never really had a fair chance.

Now it’s proudly holding its own in the world of chairs. I think it’s a real beauty. The original was unveiled in 1960. The newer version was launched in 2006. It won awards at the IMM Cologne Show and the Copenhagen International Furniture Fair.

Spring is finally in the air (well, sort of) here in Detroit. For some reason, I always get the urge to clean out the closets in the Spring. It must be due to some sort of nesting instinct. Anyway, once the closets are nicely organized, it’s time to start sprucing up the rest of the house. And I’m vowing that this year I will finally get around to overhauling my own space. As they say, the shoemaker’s children never have shoes.

For those of you who are also in the mood for a bit of refurbishment, there’s a fantastic sales event I thought I’d pass along.

 The modern furniture and home store, Mezzanine, is holding a sale to clear out excess and discontinued stock, old floor models, scratch and dent items. As owner, Joe Posch says, “I’ve lowered prices on all the things we are tired of dusting.” There will be some new and vintage furniture, lots of tabletop items, office accessories, decorative accessories and more by the biggest names in modern design. Those names include Moooi, E-15, Herman Miller, Knoll and Alessi.

Mezzanine is located in Detroit, at the corner of Broadway and East Grand River, on the edge of the Harmonie Park. For specific information on sale items, the phone number is 313-442-9000. Mezzanine is open Wednesday through Saturday, 11 to 7 and Sunday 12 to 5. Tell Joe Jennifer from Design Hole sent you.

I’m scooting out the door now - off to a client’s home to install new bedroom decor. So posts will be short today. I’ll be back later in the day with some exciting news about Design Hole. See you then.

The Casalino stacking chair was reintroduced last year by Casala. It was a popular style in the 1970’s, but since forgotten. Its path to rediscovery as an interesting one. Casalino didn’t manufacture their chairs from a central location. Instead, they shipped the molds to manufacturing locations around the world.

Eventually, as demand for Casalino waned, the molds were lost or discarded. So, when the company decided to reintroduce the chair, they had quite a hunt on their hands. An original mold was finally discovered in Turkey and Casalino began live anew.

Carpet company, FLOR, has licensed designs from the great Alexander Girard to create a bold and colorful new line of carpet squares. Girard designed textiles for Herman Miller, and created Quatrefoil, one of my all-time favorites, for Maharam.

The bold look of Girard’s graphic designs can be mixed and matched with FLOR’s other lines. to create your own, individual look. It’s a great product for a kitchen (above) because it’s so easy to clean, as I can personally testify. I have FLOR carpet in both my office and very snowy (4 more inches last night - grrrrr) side entrance. You just pick up a square and give it a scrub.

The new line can be viewed on FLOR’s site, but it’s not yet available. It will be officially unveiled later this Spring.

There’s a new paint on the market that seems primed to turn the green world on its ear. Mythic contains no volatile organic compounds (VOCs). That means it has no off-gassing from toxins. It also means it’s an ultra-low odor paint.

Low VOC paints have been around for a while. The difference here is that Mythic isn’t just a low VOC, it’s no VOC. The other thing that impressed me is their extensive color palette. It’s not limited to pastels and contain a wide assortment of mid-tone hues.

The formula was developed in cooperation with the University of Southern Mississippi. It took them six years, but they finally came up with Mythic’s ultra-top-secret paint technology. (I guess that means that any student leaking the secret gets double-secret probation.)

You can order the paint on-line, or check their site for a dealer in your area. It’s a brand new paint, so be prepared to order directly from Mythic. Their pricing is competitive with other quality paints. A quart sells for $16.49 and a gallon for $46.99.

The one glaring omission is that they don’t seem to have a fan deck or a color sample system. I hope they’ll come up with one fast, because I wouldn’t recommend choosing a paint color from a computer screen. I’m waiting to hear from them on the subject and will add an update when I do.

The Aluminum chair company, Emeco, will be introducing Nine-O, a new line of chairs designed by Ettore Sottsass at this year’s Salone in Milan (16 days and counting).

The new design reimagines the original 1006 chair Emeco designed for use on submarines during World War II. Though it seemed to have disappeared there for a while, the original has been in continuous production since 1944.

The Nine-O chair is the last chair designed by Sottsass before his death last December at the age of 90. He never stopped working, and had a particular passion for chairs. He said, “A chair must be really important as an object because my mother always told me to offer a chair to a lady.” Which reminds me that I need to have a talk with my son.

Don’t forget to mark your calendars for the week of April 16th. I’ll be reporting from the show daily.

The Kalvi chair is a modern lounge chair that dares to take up space. The wedge shape together with its “calf-like” quality makes it a cheeky individual. It was designed this year by Johanna Eliason and Ulrika Engberg for Karl Anderson.

The home accessory company, Simon Pearce is holding its first annual Audubon and Simon Pearce Birdhouse Event from March 24th through April 20th at Simon Pearce retail stores. They’ve created one-of-a-kind Birdhouse sculptures especially for the occasion. All the proceeds from the sale will be given to participating Audubon organizations.

In addition, Simon Pearce is holding an online auction of three birdhouses. The winning bidders will then designate which Audubon organization will receive the proceeds. Each birdhouse is unique and is hand-signed by Simon Pearce. They’re made from wooden forms and hand blown glass created and designed by their own master glassblowers.

The Audubon Society (I was a member when I was in high school) is one of the first organizations to dedicate themselves to the preservation of bird and wildlife habitats. They provide education on wildlife and environmental topics as well as working to create legislation the maintain natural habitats.

It seems everyone is digging through the dumpster looking for things to re-purpose. And I’m glad they are. Eco-Artware has a line of tabletop coasters, trays and platters made from recycled street signs.

I love the school crossing platter, which sells for $400. A little on the pricey side, but then it’s unique. The trays sell for a more reasonable $70. The 4-piece coaster set sell for $65. They’re also available in 6 and 8-piece sets.

Thanks go to Mandy, the write of a very funny blog about life. Thanks Mandy!

As you know, I’ll be reporting from this year’s Milan Furniture Show, which runs from April 16-21. It’s the biggest show and everyone always pulls out all the stops. Moroso is not exception. One of their most talented designers (and a special favorite of mine) Patricia Urquiola, has designed their pavilion space, along with Martino Berghinz.

Patricia is known for her beautiful, feminine designs, such as the chair shown above. Her latest work will be unveiled. She’s Moroso’s top designer.

Another Moroso favorite is Ron Aran. His designs always push materials to the extreme, both at the design stage and in production. His new Pixel Sofa is an ultra-modern sofa composed of several soft parallelepipeds of various heights. Joined one to the other and fastened to a base, the various modules form the sofa’s shape.

I’m getting very excited about the show. It’s so much fun and so inspiring. So mark your calendars for the week of April 16th so we can all share in the latest-of-the-latest from Milan.

This is the kind of chair I need to be sitting on today - nice and hard. It’s the Mary Chair, from Speke Klein. Maybe I should have said firm, but I think that gets me into worse trouble. A stiff one? No. The point is, my back hurts from sitting in the wrong chair yesterday. It was too squishy. The Mary Chair is both handsome and supportive. Like all good chairs should be.

One of my fellow Detroit-area designers, Dan Davis, sent me a very excited message about being posted on Desire To Inspire. Congratulations Dan! I’m always happy to support my fellow designers. Here’s a link to the post and here’s a link to Dan’s site.