“APPARATUS was born out of necessity,” recalls the design studio’s artistic director, Gabriel Hendifar. Like many connoisseurs, Hendifar was disappointed with the interior design options available on the market when he purchased his new Los Angeles apartment a little over a decade ago. However, unlike his frustrated colleagues, he took it upon himself to start a company that would fix the problem.
APPARATUS entered the market in 2012 with a range of tasteful and atmospheric lighting – still the backbone of its offering – and then expanded into furniture and objects with a similar tenor. Most recently, the studio released an expanded modular line of its popular cylinder lights. Rather than functioning as an “adornment of the room,” as Hendifar characterizes his other statement pieces, the cylinder serves to draw the eye to a desired focal point. In Hendifar's House, the beacon is currently trained on a few statues, but its focus shifts frequently.
“I’ve always been a hobbyist,” he says casually about his foray into the world of home design. Instead of formal training, Hendifar's preparation came through studying costume design at UCLA and working for women's fashion designers such as Raquel Allegra, as well as being raised by a machinist and entrepreneur father. The question, he argues, has always been: “How do I turn this idea into a thing?”
Hendifar sees the solution in the people you surround yourself with. Therefore, over the years, APPARATUS has acquired a circle of 19 regular collaborators and friends of the studio, many of whom appear in the company's new project “Cylinder”. The sleek, talented shoot marked a departure for the brand: “Instead of doing what we traditionally do, which is focus on building fantasy worlds, we said, 'Let's leave all that stuff out and focus on this.' .' people,'” he explains.
The same set and cast, illuminated from above by a constellation of cylinders, were photographed to extraordinarily different effect by two photographers, Matthew Placek and Dina Litovsky – a living testament to the power of perspective. Stars include Metropolitan Opera conductor Yannick Nézet-Séguin, who uses APPARATUS to light his Steinway; model Debra Shaw, of whom Hendifar is a lifelong fan; and cabaret artist Justin Vivian Bond, who has performed at many of the company's events, as well as writer Camille Okhio, reveler Dianne Brill and design dealers Joel and Bianca Chen.”
“My hope is that people see that [project] as a tribute to humanity and vulnerability, especially at a moment when it feels like the world as a whole is rolling in a frightening direction,” says Hendifar. “The things I hold on to are the community around me and a certain responsibility to be the guardian of beauty. I hope people see this as the studio's goal. Ultimately, we make things that we hope people will want to live with.”
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