Utility Chair U

Founded in 2004 by partners Lyndon Neri and Rossana Hu, Neri&Hu Design and Research Office is an inter-disciplinary architectural design practice based in Shanghai, China with an additional office in London, UK. Neri&Hu works internationally providing architecture, interior, master planning, graphic, and product design services. Currently working on projects in many countries, Neri&Hu is composed of multi-cultural staff who speak over 30 different languages. The diversity of the team reinforces a core vision for the practice: to respond to a global worldview incorporating overlapping design disciplines for a new paradigm in architecture. Neri&Hu’s location is purposeful. With shanghai considered a new global frontier, Neri&Hu is in the center of this contemporary chaos. The city’s cultural, urban, and historic contexts function as a point of departure for the architectural explorations involved in every project. Because new sets of contemporary problems relating to buildings now extend beyond traditional architecture, the practice challenges traditional boundaries of architecture to include other complementary disciplines. Neri&Hu believes strongly in research as a design tool, as each project bears its unique set of contextual issues. A critical probing into the specificities of program, site, function, and history is essential to the creation of rigorous design work. Based on research, Neri&Hu desires to anchor its work on the dynamic interaction of experience, detail, material, form, and light rather than conforming to a formulaic style. The ultimate significance behind each project comes from how the built forms create meaning through their physical representations. Neri&Hu has been featured widely by the press around the world, including Architectural Review, Wallpaper*, Architectural Record, FRAME, MARK, Abitare, area, Diseño Interior, Interior Design, I.D., Travel+Leisure, MARU, Perspective Magazine, ELLE Décor Italia, ELLE Deco China, Vogue China, Red Dot Year Book, Dezeen.com, Archidaily.com and countless more print and online media, as well as TV programs. Neri&Hu and their design have been recognized by a number of prestigious international design awards. Neri&Hu are named Maison&Objet Asia Designers of The Year 2015. UK Wallpaper* announced the Founding Partners Lyndon Neri and Rossana Hu as 2014 Designer of The Year. They were inducted into U.S. Interior Design Hall of Fame in 2013. They were selected as one of the I. D. Magazine I.D. Forty and one of the 40 under 40 prominent designers shaping Hong Kong and Greater China respectively. Neri&Hu’s design has been awarded by INSIDE Festival, AR House Awards, AR Awards for Emerging Architecture, World Architecture Festival, D&AD Awards, Design Vanguard, Interior Design Magazine Best of Year Awards and Gold Key Awards, Chicago Athenaeum Good Design awards, I.D. Magazine Annual Design Review, Red Dot Awards, Contractworld Awards, The Great Indoors Awards, Design For Asia Awards, Perspective Awards, Taiwan Interior Design Awards, etc. Biography Lyndon Neri, Founder Lyndon Neri is a Founding Partner of Neri&Hu Design and Research Office, an inter-disciplinary international architectural design practice based in Shanghai, China with an additional office in London. Neri&Hu are named Maison&Objet Asia Designers of The Year 2015 and Wallpaper* Designer of The Year 2014. In 2013, Mr. Neri was inducted into U.S. Interior Design Hall of Fame with partner Rossana Hu. The practice was selected as the 2011 INSIDE Festival Overall Winner, won AR Awards for Emerging Architecture 2010 by Architectural Review (UK) and one of the Design Vanguards in 2009 by Architectural Record (US). In 2006, Mr. Neri was selected by I.D. Magazine as one of the 40 designers globally who deserve more attention in the “I.D. 40”. Mr. Neri received a Master of Architecture at Harvard University and a Bachelor of Architecture at the University of California at Berkeley. Prior to starting his own practice with partner Rossana Hu, he was the Director for Projects in Asia and an Associate for Michael Graves & Associates in Princeton for over 10 years, and also worked in New York City for various architectural firms. Other than an architectural professional, Mr. Neri has been actively involved in teaching and research. He taught at Department of Architecture of The University of Hong Kong Graduate School together with his partner Rossana Hu. He served as an active visiting critic for design schools in the U.S. such as Princeton University, Harvard Graduate School of Design, University of California at Berkeley, and Syracuse University. Mr. Neri and his partner Ms. Rossana Hu were invited as the guests of honor of imm cologne to create “Das Haus” 2015. Mr. Neri and his partner Ms. Hu have been invited to speak at Mexico Design Week, World Interiors Meeting in Amsterdam, Shanghai International Literary Festival, 100% Design London, Designer’s Saturday in Bangkok, Bauwelt Panel Discussion Badgespräche, BODW (Business of Design Week), Inside Festival during World Architecture Festival in Spain, Beijing International Design Triennial 2011, The White Box Workshop at Hong Kong Design Center, Design Roulette Shanghai 2011, RIBA (The Royal Institute of British Architects), The Graduate School of Design at Harvard University, Re-inventing with Design(Red)2010, Hong Kong, The Dutch Pavilion during EXPO 2010, Shanghai and many other design, fashion, art related forums and events. 　 Lyndon Neri is also a founder of Design Republic, a retail concept store based in Shanghai that offers a unique collection of products created by the world's best design talents, many of which have never before been made available to consumers in China. The flagship store design, created by Neri&Hu, earned the Perspective Awards Best Interior Retail and the DFA (Design For Asia) Best Design of Greater China. In 2015, Mr. Neri and his partner Ms. Rossana Hu were appointed Creative Directors of Stellar Works. Aside from Architecture and Interiors, together with his partner Ms. Rossana Hu, Mr. Neri is actively working on a number of industrial design products for various brands in Europe including Moooi, LEMA, Parachilna, Classicon, Gandia Blasco, JIA, Stellar Works, Meritalia and BD Barcelona Design, the latter two were in collaboration with Swarovski’s “SWAROVSKI ELEMENTS at Work” project. At the same time, they are developing their own product line under the monicker brand ‘neri&hu’, which was honored to receive the Perspective Awards, the Red Dot Award and I.D. magazine’s Annual Design Review Awards. Mr. Neri and Ms. Hu were invited to guest edited the October issue of DI magazine in 2009, which is one of the vanguard architectural publications in China, they also published and edited a book called ‘Persistence of Vision’. The book is a beginning of a series of exploration on architecture and urban issues in major cities in China. Rossana Hu, Founder Rossana Hu is a Founding Partner of Neri&Hu Design and Research Office, an inter-disciplinary international architectural design practice based in Shanghai, China with an additional office in London. Neri&Hu are named Maison&Objet Asia Designers of The Year 2015 and Wallpaper* Designer of The Year 2014. In 2013, she was inducted into U.S. Interior Design Hall of Fame with partner Lyndon Neri. The practice was selected as the 2011 INSIDE Festival Overall Winner, won AR Awards for Emerging Architecture 2010 by Architectural Review (UK) and one of the Design Vanguards in 2009 by Architectural Record (US). In 2007, she was received the Perspective Award as one of the ‘40 under 40’ prominent designers shaping Hong Kong and Greater China. Ms. Hu received a Master of Architecture and Urban Planning from Princeton University, and a Bachelor of Arts in Architecture and Music from the University of California at Berkeley. Before establishing Neri&Hu with her partner Lyndon Neri, Ms. Hu worked for Michael Graves & Associates, Ralph Lerner Architect in Princeton, Skidmore, Owings and Merrill in New York City, and The Architects Collaborative (TAC) in San Francisco. Ms. Hu is also a Founding Partner and Creative Executive for Design Republic, a Founding Panel Member of 100% Design Shanghai, and the Regional Advisor for The Atlas of 21st Century Architecture, published by Phaidon Press. In 2015, Ms. Hu and her partner Mr. Neri were appointed Creative Directors of Stellar Works. Ms. Hu has served on prestigious professional committees such as the Princeton University President’s Advisory Committee on Architecture, where she advised the President on architectural design and campus planning issues. Ms. Hu taught at Hong Kong University Architecture Graduate School together with her partner Lyndon Neri. She has won numerous traveling fellowship awards and has been a guest design critic at Princeton University, UC Berkeley, and Syracuse University. Ms. Hu and her partner Mr. Neri were invited as the guests of honor of imm cologne to create “Das Haus” 2015. Ms.Hu and her partner Mr. Neri have been invited to speak at Mexico Design Week, Domus China Dialogue, Princeton University School of Architecture 2012-2013 Lecture Series, Bauwelt Panel Discussion Badgespräche, BODW (Business of Design Week), Inside Festival during World Architecture Festival in Spain, Beijing International Design Triennial 2011, The White Box Workshop at Hong Kong Design Center, Design Roulette Shanghai 2011, RIBA (The Royal Institute of British Architects), The Graduate School of Design at Harvard University, Re-inventing with Design(Red)2010, Hong Kong, The Dutch Pavilion during EXPO 2010, Shanghai and many other design, fashion, art related forums and events. Aside from Architecture and Interiors, together with her partner Mr. Neri, Ms. Rossana Hu, is actively working on a number of industrial design products for various brands in Europe including Moooi, LEMA, Parachilna, Classicon, Gandia Blasco, JIA, Stellar Works, Meritalia and BD Barcelona Design, the latter two were in collaboration with Swarovski’s “SWAROVSKI ELEMENTS at Work” project. At the same time, they are developing their own product line under the monicker brand ‘neri&hu’, which was honored to receive the Perspective Awards, the Red Dot Award and I.D. magazine’s Annual Design Review Awards. Mr. Neri and Ms. Hu were invited to guest edited the October issue of DI magazine in 2009, which is one of the vanguard architectural publications in China, they also published and edited a book called ‘Persistence of Vision’. The book is a beginning of a series of exploration on architecture and urban issues in major cities in China.