Market Collection: On the Hunt

Karen D. Singh, Alexia Brue, and Sheila Kim-Jamet -- Interior Design, 9/1/2008 12:00:00 AM

For those who prey on scrumptious furniture, Holly Hunt showrooms are places to bag big-game trophies. That's been true for a quarter century—a milestone that Holly Hunt and hundreds of her friends celebrated with a swank soiree in Chicago's Millennium Park during the most recent NeoCon World's Trade Fair. Simultaneously, Hunt unveiled her latest collection, featuring limited-edition collaborations with some of her longstanding partners.

Apropos of a silver anniversary, Alison Berger fused a silver band to the handblown crystal shades of her Silver Line pendant fixtures. The other two lighting designs are D.B. Kim's Crystal Sliver table lamp, a wedge of stainless steel subtly accented with Swarovski crystals, and José Solis Betancourt's Brilliante sconce, which incorporates an ogee-shape antiqued framed mirror that doubles the fixture's frosted-glass shade, nickel hardware, and leather details. Christian Astuguevieille made the collection's sole chair, the rather totemic Centur, by wrapping silver-painted cotton cord around a wood frame. Tables are more numerous. The top of Deirdre Jordan's Truffle is lacquered chocolate brown and inlaid with silver. Doug Levine's lean and leggy Nesting Egrets, sold as a pair, have tops of black hand-rubbed lacquer and bases of hand-rubbed, dark-patinated bronze. A walnut-and-stainless-steel tripod base supports the glass top of Stanley Wong's Silver Nova.

Classics from the past 25 years deserve a celebration, too. Some of our favorites, of course, are by Christian Liaigre. His loosely slipcovered Basse Terre sofa from 1993 reveals the inception of the spare aesthetic with which his name became synonymous. From 2008, his Aspre walnut sofa and chair,and Padd daybed, with its leather upholstery, prove that evolution can sometimes lead right back to the beginning. 312-799-7589; hollyhunt.com. circle 423