Collab Gallery 219
Main Building
With an approach to functional design that prioritizes ease of use, aesthetic simplicity, and close attention to the ways that mundane objects and environments record our everyday habits, Tokyo-based product designer Naoto Fukasawa has been a hugely influential force in design for more than two decades. Best-known for his prior work as design director of MUJI—the Japanese “anti-brand” consumer goods company—Fukasawa has designed across a broad range of categories and media. Whether shaping electronics for a global market or collaborating with artisanal firms on fine furniture, Fukasawa advocates for a design philosophy of longevity, accessibility, and subtle humor over novelty, ephemerality, or blatant commercialism.
Presenting fully-realized production designs alongside the studio’s working sketches and models for select projects, Things in Themselves offers a rare opportunity to explore Fukasawa’s design ethos—prizing an essential “fit” between objects, users, and their environments—and creative process. This exhibition accompanies the 2024 Collab Design Excellence Award, and marks the first major solo presentation of Fukasawa’s work at a U.S. museum.
Collab Gallery 219
Main Building
Member admission is always free
Free with museum admission
Pay What You Wish admission on the 1st Sunday of the month
Naoto Fukasawa (b. 1956, Japan) graduated from Tama Art University’s Product Design Department in 1980. His early career included periods of work at Seiko Epson, ID Two (now IDEO San Francisco), and establishing IDEO’s Tokyo office before founding his own studio in Tokyo in 2003. Today he designs for a wide range of manufacturers in Italy, Germany, the United States, Switzerland, Spain, China, Korea, Thailand, Taiwan, Singapore, France, Portugal, Bosnia, Sweden, and Finland, as well as prolific consulting and designing for Japan-based companies. Fukasawa is also Director of The Japan Folk Crafts Museum, vice president at Tama Art University, and one of the directors of 21_21 Design Sight Museum in Tokyo. Among his many honors, he has been accorded the title of Royal Designer for Industry (Royal Society of Arts), and in 2018 was awarded the Isamu Noguchi Award.
Naoto Fukasawa: Things in Themselves, the 2024 Collab Design Excellence Award exhibition, is made possible by The Lisa S. Roberts and David W. Seltzer Endowment Fund in Support of the Collab Design Excellence Award Exhibition. Additional support provided by Collab.
Colin Fanning, Assistant Curator, European Decorative Arts