Opposites attract

After thinking new, newer, newest for our redesign marathon last month, I feel compelled to plant our editorial left foot back in the past. (Our right foot, in case anyone was wondering, is always planted firmly in the present.) But when I say "past," I'm not by any means implying that February is laurel time. Don't look here for the tried and true. Rather, we've been as hard at work as ever this issue, bringing you a series of outstanding projects that share a common denominator. They're all exceptional examples of how to bridge seemingly incompatible qualities: past and future, sublimely hard-edged and divinely decorative. "Thomas Chippendale, meet Patrick Norguet." And everyone else in between.

A London restaurant by Noé Duchaufour-Lawrance and Gabhan O'Keeffe and the New York gallery of Tony Ingrao brilliantly handle complex spaces, embrace wide spans of time, and resolve the conundrums of historical commissions in forging a flawless new visual grammar. Two first-class office buildings—Universal Music in Berlin, masterminded by Aukett + Heese, and CNET Networks in San Francisco, designed by Gensler—act as contemporary counterpoints to century-old industrial surroundings. Alberto Pinto's palatial villa in Brazil is virtuosity writ large; Andrew Petronio's quirky Manhattan apartment is just 550 square feet, including parking space for a Vespa and a Dubuffet. And then there's a Corbusier house in India, showing how now 50-year-old genius can be.