As we count down to the end of the year and the start of a new decade, have a look at the ten most popular posts of 2019.

As the new decade begins, it looks like we'll be rolling up our sleeves and getting to work.

We make no apologies for the number of architectural posts this year. How can we, when the offerings are as amazing as Pearns Bay House?

It's not the first foosball table we've featured, but Joie by Italian studio Giacopini Design and the Samba table could not be more different.

The Cuddle Chair by Mario Tsai for Lost&Found is part of the CO/RE collection which was created to explore the range of modern aesthetics.

You won't find bright, primary colours here, but this alphabet set by Korean designers Oioiooi is still designed for endless hours of play, storytelling and decoration.

There has been much talk and a rave reviews about the sound quality of the SYMFONISK speaker collection given its price point, but to be honest we are not 100% sold on the overall design.

We much prefer the cleanliness of a reusable glass bottle over an aluminium one, but problems can arise due to the fragile nature of glass as compared to the resilience of of metal. The makers of the Closca bottle have attempted to solve this problem by wrapping their borosilicate glass bottle in a proprietary silicone sleeve.

The Fold series of table lamps by Arnaud Lapierre for Bibelo is an inquiry into material usage.

Modernica has teamed up with Chicago-based visual artist Louis De Guzman and global music artist J Balvin and Nickelodeon to celebrate the 20th anniversary of Spongebob Squarepants with this collection of fibreglass shell chairs.

A visual representation of all things green and verdant.  

These sculptural crayons by Keetra Dean Dixon are a playful way to bring some colour into your life.

Shinola's Detrola is a fun new watch collection.

Moon Picnic have designed this adorable weather station to help teach children in a fun and engaging way.

The ingenious curved shape of these slippers mean they are cut from one continuous piece of fabric, a feature that helps to conserve material and reduce waste. The fact that they are sustainably produced as well is merely a bonus.

Leibal 

This ceramic mug is designed by the legendary designer Naoto Fukasawa with a simple plus/minus graphic and a rounded, rectangular handle that can be lifted using two fingers. The mug is dishwasher and microwave safe.

Located on a two acre stretch of Negril, Jamaica’s iconic Seven Mile Beach, is the Skylark Negril Beach Resort, the sister property to that town’s perennial favourite, the Rockhouse Hotel.

The beautifully minimalist but very versatile Wobbel board can be used as a rocker, a slide, a skateboarding ramp and more - the only limit to the fun is your child's imagination.

All the insouciance of shrobing without the problem of figuring out how to keep your coat or jacket on, designers showed an abundance of split sleeves for spring.

The simplest designs are often the most effective. Spanish designer Hugo Tejada elevates the humble bell to create this lamp featuring a simple, but well-defined, design.

One of the main reasons people sleep with their smartphones at their bedsides is, they claim, that they need to use the alarm function to get up in the morning. True or not, having the device so easily to hand can often lead to mindless scrolling at 2 am, bouts of broken rest and poor sleep habits.

One of the best ways to get off our phones in the wee hours and to be assured of a good night’s sleep would be to put the phone away and rely on an old-fashioned alarm clock. There is no need for the device to be boring either. Not when it looks like this.

Beautiful, sculptural, and stunning are all apt words to describe the Hold modular lighting system designed by Mario Tsai for Mumoon Lighting.

Enclothed Cognition is a collaborative project from Dutch fashion designer Bregje Cox of Noir Near Future and Barbadian visual artist Mark King whose line of table linens called Ulric + Arly we previously featured here.

Until there comes a time when all transactions are carried out using our smartphones, we still live in a cash-based society and I often find myself rooting around the bottom of my bag for spare change. Enter the Dango Coin Capsule, an ingenious invention that is designed to help you corral your coins.

We come across references to Vantablack from time to time in the media, usually in relation to the ongoing feud between artists Stuart Semple and Anish Kapoor, but we particularly love its application in this case.

Terrazzo, most commonly seen flooring used throughout the Caribbean in the 1970s, is making a huge comeback at the moment. The CORE collection by Cape Town-based multidisciplinary design studio Oliver Whyte, took inspiration from a piece of concrete rubble at a construction site and decided to turn something that would normally be discarded into something more desirable.

MUMOON

Needle by Venice-based DOS Signorotto Design is a coat hanger that offers a shape far different from that traditional. It can be used in various ways: by placing items inside the rings or by resting them over the soft curvature of each individual hanger.

This clock is part of a line of desk accessories that celebrates the often overlooked materiality of plywood.

This was one of the first Bermuda homes we featured almost a decade ago. At the time we were only able to find a limited number of very low res photos which really didn’t do the property justice, so we were very happy to stumble across these images recently. 

Floating Towers or Torres Flotantes by Cristián Mohaded is a vertical composition of three columns constructed of hand-woven volumes under the traditional basketry technique of northern Argentina called simbol.

Kerby Jean-Raymond, the designer behind the acclaimed fashion label Pyer Moss, took on the fashion cognoscenti recently, challenging the way in which representation and diversity in the industry is often paid lip service rather than being addressed in any meaningful way. Shortly before making his widely covered critique, he paid a visit to Bermuda to capture his most recent collection for ELLE magazine.

Donna Wilson has collaborated with SCP, one of the UK’s most innovative and internationally respected manufacturers and suppliers of contemporary design, to make this limited edition collection of chairs and mirrors called Abstract Assembly.

Finnish designer and ceramicist Laura Itkonen, brings together art and function with her Sculptural Series collection designed for Vuela. 

This reusable flask by Lund London is made from recycled metal and is available in five playful colours.

The artisan-dyed acrylic side tables that make up the Tone series from Yun Sihyun are inspired by the colours of Korea and in particular the traditional clothing known as the hanbok.

Usually worn and dirty, the highly patterned upholstery fabric used by Transport for London in its underground train carriages was specifically designed to be long-lasting and to camouflage dirt and other wear and tear as much as possible. This utilitarian item has now been given an overhaul and a long overdue acknowledgement of its pure aesthetic quality.

Things are looking sunny for spring.

We first wrote about this collaboration back in December, 2017 when it was announced and cannot believe it has taken this long for designer-of-the-moment Virgil Abloh’s collaboration with Swedish behemoth IKEA to get to market. 

Sometimes, all you need is a little inexpensive pick me up to feel better. 

Tara Ashe

This ingenious reversible glass vase by Tara Ashe is both versatile and pretty.

Solace, Catherine White

The ninth biennial Charman Prize opened last Friday in the main gallery of the Masterworks Museum of Bermuda Art with 107 Bermuda-based artists working in a variety of media on the theme ‘Where Fate Leads Us’. 

There is something about the medium of chocolate that seems to inspire the most whimsical designs. Couple this with a forward-thinking mandate and you get Future Chocolate by Jisun Kim. 

The second drop of the sacai x Nike running apparel collection and new colours of the Blazer Mid will be released globally today online and in store at Dover Street Market, sacai Selfridges, sacai Le Bon Marche and other select retailers through an electronic ticket raffle system.

Peek-a-boo pieces.

The Aaren Kulor silicone watch collection by Skagen has been giving Swatch a run for their money in terms of fun.

We have never been able to use in-ear headphones with much success. They are often uncomfortable and unwieldy, even the wireless ones. Nor do we want to look like we are walking around with twigs or broken Q-Tips sticking out of our ears, therefore we were immediately interested in the look of the Human Headphones’ wireless, over ear design.

We are wrapping up what seemed like an unusually quiet fashion month with a look at Nicolas Ghesquière’s collection for Louis Vuitton which brought the Paris shows - and Fashion Month - to a close.

At first glance, the ill-fitting sweaters seemed like an anomaly, but once it became evident that what Miuccia Prada is touting this season is resourcefulness, sustainability and a rejection of excess, it all made sense. 

Valentino presented its Spring 2020 collection at Les Invalides, and Pierpaolo Piccioli opened the show with a mini collection of dramatic all-white looks. Here, he used the humble shirt as the guiding influence and the emphasis was on the shape and volume of the clothing.

Many of the usual Thom Browne tropes were featured here. Seersucker fabric? Yes. Trompe-d'oeil? On practically every outfit. Towering platform shoes? Sure. Impeccable tailoring? Of course. But because of the way Browne chooses to dissect and recombine these elements you most certainly could never call his collections stale.