Tipton and Octogon magazine designed a spectacle frame for the one hundredth anniversary of Bauhaus. They pay tribute together to the movement which turned 100 this year with a new limited series collection.
“The mind is like an umbrella. It’s most useful when open.” – said Walter Gropius, the father of the Bauhaus movement founded in 1919.
The teams of Octogon architectural magazine and Tipton Eyeworks think in the same way, this is why they decided to pay tribute to the Bauhaus movement turning 100 in 2019 with a new limited series spectacle frame collection. The Bauhaus100xOCTOGON collection consisting only of a hundred pieces was designed once again by the designer of Tipton, Simon Hukaya.
“Designing the Bauhaus frame was a fascinating task – said the designer. – Finding the starting point was not easy, as the trend itself is hard to define. Not a single Bauhaus designer has ever made a specs frame, so we did not have any examples to start from. There is a quite widespread but somewhat shallow aspect on the movement. Its basic forms include circles, squares and triangles, and the basic colors are red, yellow and blue. This is where I started from, however, architecture also played an important role. I also examined buildings, where semi-circles are masses of circles and squares, and I started to experiment with them. Mobility was also an important aspect; this is how the essence of design has come together. If we take a thorough look at the round frame, we can see that there is an order, a connection between the lines on it.”
Although Bauhaus officially terminated after fourteen years in 1933, its impact still persists today. The so-called “Bauhaus style” has later become one of the most dominant factors influencing modernist architecture, design, object culture, interior design and typography. Thousands of buildings designed in Bauhaus style have emerged in Western Europe, in the United States of America, in Canada, Israel and in Hungary, too. The latter was also a result of the fact that many Hungarians participated in the movement from the beginnings, including, amongst others, Farkas Molnár, Andor Weininger, Henrik Stefán, Hugó Johan as well as world-famous icons such as Marcell Breuer or László Moholy-Nagy.
The idea originates from József Martinkó, the chief editor of Octogon magazine, who knows the Tipton brand well. He was the one who arranged a consultation with Simon Hukaya, Zack Tipton and András Ferkai, Ybl Miklós award-winning architectural historian, who gave some insight into the diversity of Bauhaus.
“I did not take part in the design process, of course, but I had a deep conversation with the creators – reminisces András Ferkai. – We have a somewhat shallow image of Bauhaus, there are some concepts and names that come up regularly – abstraction, László Moholy-Nagy, circle, square, triangle, modern design, famous Hungarians – there are many buzzwords, even though it is a very complex artistic movement. We rather talked about how difficult perceiving the diversity of Bauhaus was. Bauhaus is not a homogenous phenomenon. We talk about three different eras and three different directors. Also, there were two separate periods during the Gropius era. Then came Dessau, and then the Berlin era. Meanwhile, numerous experiments were taking place and what we call Bauhaus today is an extremely narrow section of the Dessau era mainly, when they attempted to concert art and industry. The majority of design products are related to this era. However, the movement also had an expressive and a bit mystical era, then the next director in the line, Hannes Meyer shifted the movement towards a practicable direction aiming for the solution of everyday tasks, and then finally Mies der Rohe also brought a new direction. The movement included textile, ceramics, metal working – you name it, and of course design, but no one has ever made a spectacle in the Bauhaus to my best knowledge. This collection is a very sympathetic undertaking, and the work created by Simon so far fully justifies his decision to do this job.”
“These sunglasses differ from our current profile, but this is not a problem at all! – says Zack Tipton, the founder and owner of the brand. – It was a very exciting challenge, and I think the final result can fully hold its own in all respects. We were happy about this project, because architecture is a fascinating and inspiring thing, and it allowed us to get to know a totally different audience.”
At 6.00 PM on October 10, 2019, the Bauhaus100 x OCTOGON by Tipton event will be held as part of Design Week, where the uniquely designed and Bauhaus-inspired Tipton frame will debut. (You can register for the event HERE.)The Bauhaus sunglasses can already be checked out in the Budapest showroom of Tipton Eyeworks and on the website of the brand.