The Australian puppetry company Erth is preparing for a new immersive dinosaur show at the Sydney Opera House. The article provides a behind-the-scenes look at their workshop in Marrickville, where a team of artists and designers hand-craft highly realistic, large-scale dinosaur puppets using animatronics, 3D printing, and traditional craftsmanship.
Chanel has unveiled the Coco Game chess set, a one-of-a-kind luxury object that doubles as a high-jewelry timepiece, presented at the brand's watch and jewelry boutique on Place Vendôme. The set features 32 pieces crafted from ceramic and gold, adorned with over 9,000 diamonds totaling approximately 110 carats, with each queen concealing a detachable watch. The collection also includes 13 watch designs and is part of Chanel's Haute Horlogerie line for 2026, designed by Arnaud Chastaingt, director of the Chanel Watch Creation Studio.
Jonathan Anderson made his debut as the new men's artistic director of Dior with the Men's Spring/Summer 2026 collection, presented in June. The collection riffs on French history while incorporating Anderson's signature gestures: painstaking handiwork, reverence for craft, and touches of the absurd. Highlights include a collaboration with textile artist Sheila Hicks on the Lady Dior bag, literary tributes on the Book Tote (featuring works by Bram Stoker, James Joyce, and Charles Baudelaire), and intricate embroidery requiring up to 3,271 hours per coat. The collection also features Brandebourg detailing, sculptural silhouettes, and reimagined heritage pieces like a 1960s-inspired cape.
An Indonesian and Australian couple, Wiyoga Muhardanto and Hannah O’Flynn, have transformed a plot of land in Central Java into an eco-resort and creative hub called Yabbiekayu. The project includes a gallery, artist residencies, and workshops, aiming to foster a sustainable creative economy by connecting local artisans with international artists and designers.
A new short film titled 'Silvesterchlausen' by writer and director Andrew Norman Wilson documents the centuries-old Swiss New Year's tradition of the same name. The film captures groups of men and boys in the Appenzell regions who don elaborate, handmade masks and headdresses made from natural materials like pinecones and moss, forming groups to yodel, ring bells, and visit homes over 18-hour days to mark the turn of the year on both the Gregorian and Julian calendars.
Interior designers Tony Walker and Max Jones have established Jones Walker of Taos, a gallery on Bent Street that emphasizes a welcoming, domestic atmosphere. After relocating from Dallas in 2018, the duo transitioned from award-winning interior design careers to gallerists, curating a diverse collection of local talent that includes descendants of Taos Pueblo and Spanish carving families. The gallery showcases a mix of modern and traditional paintings, carvings, pottery, and weaving, focusing on authentic regional craftsmanship that appeals to both local residents and international collectors.
Tiffany & Co. has released a new iteration of its Bird on the Rock collection, drawing inspiration from the Virginia estate of the late Rachel Lambert “Bunny” Mellon, a horticulturalist, art collector, and devoted patron of Tiffany designer Jean Schlumberger. Mellon, who died at age 103, owned nearly 150 pieces by Schlumberger, including one of the first Bird on the Rock brooches from 1965. The new collection, designed under Chief Artistic Officer Nathalie Verdeille, features fine and high jewelry pieces that echo Schlumberger's original motifs, with gemstones like tanzanite and turquoise chosen to honor his preferences.
Kevin Potter, a jeweler based in Tucson, Arizona, has assembled the world's largest collection of artifacts from America's industrial jewelry manufacturing era. His collection, housed in two warehouses, contains an estimated 1.2 million hubs and dies—the hand-carved steel tools used to mass-produce jewelry through die-striking—along with related machinery and ephemera, preserving a vast physical archive of a vanished craft.
Interior designer Michelle R. Smith has collaborated with Scandinavian textile maker Nordic Knots on its debut flatweave rug collection. The collaboration, born from a decade-old friendship between Smith and Nordic Knots co-founder Liza Laserow Berglund, features four rugs—three flatweaves and one all-natural jute—inspired by vintage Esprit pocket squares from the 1980s. Smith describes the rugs as subtle, flexible, layered pieces meant to complement a room without dominating it, drawing on her signature neutrals-focused palette of sludge greens, dusty blues, khakis, and browns. The collection reflects influences from designers Madeleine Castaing and Jacques Grange, as well as old-school men's suiting patterns.
The Swiss Institute in New York has opened a new exhibition titled “De Anima,” pairing sculptor Elizabeth King and painter Louise Bonnet. Curated by director Stefanie Hessler, the show explores the boundaries between the living and the lifelike, featuring King's intricate automata and stop-motion films alongside Bonnet's large-scale oil paintings of fleshy, gestural figures. The artists, introduced by Hessler at an opening last year, discovered a shared fascination with involuntary bodily movements—twitching eyes, clenched jaws—and the invisible labor of artistic craftsmanship.
Warsaw is experiencing a significant revival of interest in its Cold War-era neon signs, a movement spearheaded by the city’s Neon Museum. Founded in 2012 by photographer Ilona Karwińska and designer David Hill, the museum has rescued hundreds of historic illuminations that were once discarded as worthless relics of the communist past. Originally commissioned by Soviet-era authorities as a form of "socialist modernization," these signs were designed by leading artists of the Polish Poster School and have now transitioned from propaganda tools to beloved cultural icons.
Iris van Herpen's exhibition "Iris Van Herpen: Sculpting the Senses" opens at the Brooklyn Museum from May 16 to December 6, 2026, featuring over 140 haute couture creations alongside contemporary art, design objects, and natural history specimens. The show, previewed by designboom, is organized around natural themes from water to planetary scale, with the Dutch designer leading a walkthrough that emphasized her inspirations from micro and macro worlds and her process of turning material experiments into wearable sculptures.
The V&A has opened a new outpost in east London's Lower Lea Valley, a former industrial area transformed into a cultural quarter after the 2012 Olympics. The museum, described as looking like a 'reconstructed Toblerone', is the latest addition to the 'Olympicopolis' vision, which aimed to create a cultural legacy akin to west London's Albertopolis. The article, written by Catherine Slessor in The Guardian, offers a mixed review: praising the beauty and craftsmanship of the galleries while criticizing overuse of trendy phrases like 'lived experience' and 'transcultural identities'.
The Walters Art Museum is showcasing the intricate jewelry designs of Douriean Fletcher, the specialty jeweler responsible for the iconic adornments in the 'Black Panther' film franchise. The exhibition highlights Fletcher's craftsmanship and her ability to blend Afrofuturist aesthetics with traditional African metalworking techniques, bringing cinematic artifacts into a fine art museum context.
The Walters Art Museum in Baltimore is launching "Douriean Fletcher: Jewelry of the Afrofuture," an exhibition featuring the intricate metalwork and costume designs from the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s Black Panther franchise. The show highlights the work of self-taught artist and metalsmith Douriean Fletcher, whose collaboration with Oscar-winning costume designer Ruth Carter helped define the visual identity of Wakanda. On display are iconic pieces such as Nakia’s gold-plated brass necklace and Queen Ramonda’s silver bodice cage, alongside new works created specifically for the museum.
The Azerbaijan National Carpet Museum has launched "Images Imprinted in Memory," a solo exhibition by multidisciplinary artist Madina Gasimova. Supported by the .ART domain, the showcase features 28 works produced over the last five years, including five new carpets woven using the museum's traditional techniques based on the artist's contemporary sketches. The exhibition highlights the fluidity of artistic motifs as they transition across various media, including painting, stained glass, mosaic, and digital formats, accompanied by a sound installation of the carpet-weaving process.
The Wanda Hollensteiner Art Gallery in Kalispell is hosting a new exhibition titled "David Secrest: The Unprejudiced Silence of Things that Are," running through May 23. The show features the work of the Somers-based master metalsmith, whose four-decade career spans forged iron, fabricated steel, bronze, and woodworking. Secrest, who was named a "Master Metalsmith" by the Metal Museum in 2017, is recognized for a visual language that blends natural forms with rigorous material manipulation.
Brooklyn College Associate Professor of Art Christopher Richards is being honored with a major exhibition at the Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology (FIT). The exhibition, "Art X Fashion," is directly inspired by his scholarship on African and global fashion, exploring the relationship between fashion and fine art through over 140 objects from the museum's collection.
Buena Vista area artists Bob Gray and his daughter Jamie Gray have been selected for the upcoming exhibition "Family Ties: Continuing the Creative Legacy" at the Arvada Center Galleries in metro Denver, running from January 15 to March 26, 2026. They are one of two local families featured, alongside the Strawn family (Ben, Daniel, and their late parents Bernice and Mel). The show includes twenty creative families, highlighting how artistic identity is shaped within family contexts. Both Grays work with wood: Bob creates turned-aspen vessels inspired by local landscapes, while Jamie produces abstract wall sculptures using beeswax, pigment, and hand-carved lines.
Norwich Castle has reopened after a five-year, £27.5m renovation that reinstates long-lost royal rooms within its medieval keep. The Royal Palace Reborn project added a bedroom, chapel, kitchen, banqueting hall, and medieval toilets, recreating the spaces as they would have appeared when King Henry I stayed in 1121. Visitors can explore the rooms with period-appropriate furniture, textiles, and painted decorations, plus new animations projected onto the keep's walls. A new Gallery of Medieval Life, developed with the British Museum, displays over 900 medieval objects, including 50 on long-term loan from the British Museum.
The Art Institute of Chicago will open the newly designed Eloise W. Martin Galleries for the Applied Arts of Europe on July 11, 2025. The 4,500-square-foot space will display over 300 objects from the museum's collections of furniture, silver, ceramics, and glass dating from 1600 to 1900, with 40% more objects on view than previously. Highlights include a carved chair made by Indian artisans for a European merchant, rare Chinese porcelain vases mounted in gilded bronze, and a neo-Gothic sideboard by William Burges. The galleries, designed by Barcelona-based architects Barozzi Veiga, follow a chronological narrative exploring design, craftsmanship, and commerce amid geopolitical shifts and colonialism.
An upcoming exhibition at Tim Bessell's surfboard shop and gallery in La Jolla will showcase surf-inspired works by a group of artists connected by their shared love of surfing and the ocean. The show, expected to open in the first week of June, features painter, sculptor, photographer, and mixed-media artists, including Joel Pessoa, Tim Bessell, Robin Bessell, Shaun Donovan, and Steve Sherman. Pessoa will display wood carvings from Portugal and paintings from his time in La Jolla, while Bessell—an internationally known surfboard maker and artist—will also exhibit his own works, alongside his wife Robin's floral mixed-media pieces and informal contributions from his daughter Natalie.
Morocco will debut its first-ever national pavilion at the 2026 Venice Art Biennale, presenting a monumental installation titled "Asǝṭṭa" by multidisciplinary artist Amina Agueznay. Curated by Meriem Berrada, the project is housed in the Arsenale's Artiglierie and explores themes of traditional craftsmanship, shared memory, and the symbolic threshold (âatba). The installation, which involves 166 Moroccan artisans and two Venetian collaborators, is conceived as a porous, liminal space that engages with the Biennale's theme "In Minor Keys," curated by Koyo Kouoh.
Pandolfini Auction House is hosting a solo exhibition titled "Giardino Alchemico" (Alchemical Garden) by French artist Julie Hamisky at its Milan office during Design Week 2026, from April 22 to 26. The exhibition, created in collaboration with Mitterrand gallery, features sculptures and botanical jewelry made through electroplating—a process that preserves organic matter like flowers and leaves in metal. Key works include "La Géante" (2024), an enlarged poppy sculpture, and "Aqua" (2024), a chandelier of galvanized plant elements, alongside wearable jewelry pieces.
Antoni Gaudí’s Casa Batlló in Barcelona has undergone a €3.5 million restoration that returns the building’s rear façade and private courtyard to their original 1906 design. Led by architect Xavier Villanueva, the year-long project employed local artisans to rebuild Gaudí’s vaulted balcony support system, reinstate lost features such as planters and a pergola, and restore original colors using 85,000 Nolla mosaic pieces, ironwork, stucco, and trencadís. The work coincides with the 20th anniversary of the building’s UNESCO World Heritage designation.
Leana Hoadley has opened Hoadley Gallery West in downtown Edmonds, Washington, a boutique gallery specializing in handmade ceramics, jewelry, glass, and sculptural objects. The gallery builds on the legacy of the original Hoadley Gallery in Lenox, Massachusetts, founded over 40 years ago by her aunt and uncle, Stephanie and Thomas Hoadley. After a winding career that included studying at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston and working as a creative director for an AI company, a 2023 layoff prompted Hoadley to reassess her path and pursue opening her own gallery. The space features works including porcelain vessels by Thomas Hoadley made using the ancient Japanese Nerikomi technique, which are held in collections such as the Smithsonian American Art Museum's Renwick Gallery and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.
Central Oregon’s art scene is hosting a diverse array of exhibitions this week across Bend, Sisters, Sunriver, and Redmond. Notable highlights include Jana Charl’s mixed-media showcase "This is not a Love Story" at Art Adventure Gallery, Hilary Baker’s moth-themed "Prophets" at the High Desert Museum, and a collection of literary-inspired quilts at the Deschutes Historical Museum. The offerings span various mediums, from nomadic woven macramé and custom jewelry to volcanic science explorations and historic cartography.
The Earlville Opera House Art Galleries in Earlville, New York, will open the second round of 2026 visual artist exhibitions on Saturday, May 9, from 1 to 3 p.m. The series features three artists: Bruce E. Webster with his retrospective "A Legacy in Wood" showcasing over 40 years of fine wood furniture; Linda Kays-Biviano with "From Clay to Character: Featuring Woodland Spirits," hand-sculpted fantasy figures in polymer clay and resin; and Lawrence Kinney. The exhibits run through July 2, with free admission and an Artist Talk at 1:45 p.m. on opening day.
Lesley Green, founder of Bespoke Glass Studio, creates stained glass sculptures that break from traditional window-mounted forms. Her work includes three-dimensional pieces that project colored light onto walls, functional room dividers, and sculptural objects made using hand-cut copper foil techniques. Green aims to shift perception of stained glass from architectural feature to standalone art object, emphasizing pure color and texture.
Japanese artist Manabu Kosaka creates hyperrealistic, scale replicas of everyday and retro objects using only paper. His meticulously crafted sculptures—ranging from 35mm film cameras and vintage transistor radios to luxury wristwatches and fast food—feature functional internal components like gears, levers, and moving hatches that mimic the mechanics of the original items.