As a stationery brand, we are always curious how and what people use our stationery goods for. With this blog series, focusing on the hands at "work" and beyond, we ask five questions about the usage and meaning of the stationery tools to our friends in Los Angeles.
The studio's design ethos is to bridge architecture design and everyday things, which you can tell organically from their house that they have designed. As soon as you step in their studio, there are so many subtle details we could not help noticing! We peeked into their downstairs studio space first, as they chatted with us about their next project at the house: a patio deck.
Q1. How do you use your Penco Cutting Mat and the 3-in-1 Multi Pen with the Ito Bindery Drawing Pad in grey? Also curious why you wanted to choose the grey drawing pad instead of the white or Kraft paper.
Airi: The cutting mat is a multifunctional and unexpectedly useful tool in our studio! We started using a big poster size in college, but now in a studio the small size is more appropriate. At times, it's like a little coaster when I am gluing small pieces of bass wood together for a model, other times it's a cutting surface or even act as a buffer layer (下敷き) – when i'm using a thick marker and don't want the ink to bleed on to the table!
Here, Airi is cutting a thin bass wood for a model – they are building an outdoor deck behind the house.
Ryan: The Penco multi-pen with the Ito pads is the most satisfying combination. The solid feel of the steel pen with the matte finish and the crisp and smooth beauty of the paper, it’s the best. The warm colors of both also add to the uniqueness for me. My drawings almost always include notes and my notes almost always include drawings so I’m very partial to the multi pen for being able to easily create different aspects of what I’m drawing.
Ryan is drawing a design for their outdoor deck with the Penco 3-in-1 pen in ivory and the A4 Drawing Pad in grey by Ito Bindery.
Ryan is showing us the model of their house in the studio.
Airi - we see that you’ve been a loyal user of Arts & Science Hobonichi planner. It’s quite impressive to see the stack from 2018. How did you start using this Hobonichi planner?
I wish I started to use this planner when we started our architecture studio in 2011, but I didn't know about it until I discovered it in a stationary store in Tokyo. It was a good way for me to organize my everyday to-do list, and meeting notes because the planner is laid out per day, and once I have s system, I don't like to mess with it!
We love that your iPad cover matches the Metal Book-stand. What occasion would you use the metal book-stand for? Do you also take it with you?
We chose the yellow bookstand to match our yellow iPad – if we are not on a job site, we are unfortunately staring at screens for most of our work day, but we enjoy the playfulness of this color, and we will take it with us to meetings where we present our designs on the iPad. At home, it's also so useful in the kitchen to scroll through recipes or to have a video call.
Airi is using her iPad with the Metal Book-Stand in Beige in her house kitchen.
Q2. In our technology driven world, what does it mean to make things by your hand to you?
We don't get to use our hands enough to make things but we work with crafts people and trade people to create the architecture spaces that we design. It's important for us to use technology for accuracy and presentation, but often times, making things in real life is messy and less accurate. We love the wabi sabi that exists in something handmade, and we appreciate that at the end of the day smaller scale architecture is still mostly a hand built project not taken over by AI (yet).
wrk-shp's take on the "fire" place with candles in the house.
Matching rounded corners found in the studio kitchen.
Q3. Pencils or Mechanical Pencils?
Pencils － Airi
Mechanical Pencil － Ryan
Q4. What’s in your pen case? How do you organize your writing tools?
We organize our desk tools using an old prototype of our concrete planter! We developed this when we used to design small home objects out of concrete material, and loved the idea of multi-functional vessels that someone can use as a wall planter, or on stands as a desktop organizer, or as bookends even on a bookshelf. The concrete material is also very versatile, so it can be used for plants or to store things. We worked with a concrete factory in Maine that made small scale products out of concrete and a metal fabricator in LA. We lived in an apartment at the time with no garden space of our own, so it was our way to pepper in greenery in our apartment. Eventually, we licensed the design to a Danish company, and stopped our own production to focus on architecture.
The multi-functional concrete planters are placed in several places in the studio for storing the stationeries and greeneries.
Q5. What is your most favorite stationery?
Ryan: Ito Bindery Drawing Pads. Those are my favorite, all the sizes. It’s something I love that I always want to have one out on the desk and ready to use, but also because they are beautiful.
Airi: So hard to choose one, but I enjoy my Penco Perfection Pen Light that is pocket sized. I take it everywhere with me because it’s light weight and compact. Perfect for those unexpected moments when you need a pen!
Last but not least! We could not resist including their daughter's amazing personalized Penco Storage Container in beige. Here, K stores her collection of the Sylvanian Family / Calico Critters so neatly.
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wrk-shp is a multi-disciplinary design studio, run by Airi Isoda and Ryan Upton. We've known them quite some time, and have worked together. In fact, they designed all of the wooden displays including our playful clothing racks at the annex space at Hightide Store DTLA. It's a shape of "H" and "T" for Hightide. And we are continuing to work together on some exciting additions to the annex space, keep your eyes peeled for the updates.
Their newest project is designing a cafe space by a popular local business – see what's new by following their social.
wrk-shp website
Instagram
