A New Oaxacan Retreat, Where the Jungle Meets the Beach - The New York Times

2022-03-11 10:09:05 By : Ms. Anny Lin

Plus: a collection of vibrant still lifes, high-tech humidifiers and more recommendations from T Magazine.

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There are two ways to relax at a nice hotel: by being lavishly cared for or by retreating deeper into yourself — reading old novels, staring out at a sedate landscape, sitting in a steam room for longer than is probably advisable. All of this is available at Terrestre, a new solar-powered retreat by Mexico’s Grupo Habita that’s set on a quiet cactus-heavy stretch — where the jungle meets the beach — just west of Puerto Escondido, the Oaxacan surfer’s enclave that has become a chic getaway among city dwellers. Designed by the rustically minded, minimalist Mexican architect Alberto Kalach and his firm, Taller de Arquitectura X (TAX), the property is hardly more than 14 connected villas in concrete, brick and wood that rise from the arid “Dune”-esque terrain like some kind of Brutalist encampment; the suites — each of which includes a private soaking pool, a hammock and walls and ceilings that can be left open to the sun and stars — encourage both outdoor exploration and calm introspection. If and when you feel like talking to others, you can head to the Mediterranean-inflected al fresco restaurant, any of the various plunge pools scattered throughout the hotel’s sandy pathways or down the dirt road to Casa Wabi, an arts residency created by Bosco Sodi and designed by the Japanese legend Tadao Ando, among others, the architecture of which is unforgettable. Rooms from $350, terrestrehotel.com.

In 2012, after a stint making digital collages, Hilary Pecis found herself at home with a newborn, and started sketching still lifes of her own house. Soon after, she turned to painting them in acrylic, and expanded her view to include the cluttered California interiors of friends — tables set with stacks of art books, say, or corners of rooms stuffed with souvenirs. Like Becky Suss or Jonas Wood, she seems interested in building a record of how her generation lives, with its many markers of identity and taste, from Fiji water bottles to Dusen Dusen pillows and Ottolenghi cookbooks. These objects are presented with a slight wink, perhaps, but ultimately Pecis isn’t judgmental about them. “I don’t paint things I don’t like,” she says. Instead, her canvases are infused with joy. It’s no surprise, then, that her new show at Rachel Uffner Gallery in New York is titled “Warmly,” and there’s a suggestion that what some call clutter goes a long way to making a cold world feel more hospitable. In addition to scenes of cozy interiors, the show includes paintings of the nature preserves she’s spent the past few years jogging through, as well as one that’s almost a blend of both — a record of outdoor dining that depicts the remains of a picnic set between potted cactuses. If you can’t make it to the show, advance copies of Pecis’s first monograph, which comes out May 3, are available through the gallery. “Warmly” is on view from Mar. 12 through May 7 at Rachel Uffner Gallery, racheluffnergallery.com.

Founded in New York City in 2019 by Alix Freireich and David Lê, Maiden Name is an online concept store with an in-house women’s wear line. Each season, then, the pair curate a collection of stylish, sustainably minded objects from around the world. “So much in design right now is just mindless consumerism using really expensive materials,” says Lê. By contrast, he and Freireich recently released a series of zero-waste metal objects for the home. There’s an end table and a bowl, both largely consisting of a single curved, laser-cut piece of steel supported by its own tension, by the artist Paul Coenen, who is based in Eindhoven, the Netherlands, and into these curved pieces he’s inserted smaller, flat sheets resembling fins. Tim Teven, who shares a studio with Coenen, has created a vase made of chrome with a molten, folded base, along with a gracefully curved metal table with indentations that make its surface look quilted. And then there are gleaming and hefty ashtrays made from cans of beer that were drunk and melted down by Christoph Meier, Ute Müller, Robert Schwarz and Lucas Stopczynski, a collective of European artists who displayed the ashtrays inside a vending machine in “Relax,” a recent exhibition at the MAK Museum of Applied Arts in Vienna. But wouldn’t it be nice to put one to use in your home, where, unlike the museum, you can actually smoke? From $200, maiden-name.com.

The little machine puffing away in the corner of the room doesn’t just save your throat and sinuses. “A humidifier can change your entire skin-care game,” says Dr. Shereene Idriss, a board-certified dermatologist and the founder of New York’s Idriss Dermatology. “Since heaters suck the humidity out of the air, using a humidifier will redeliver hydration and change the way your skin responds to the environment.” Cindy Kang, the co-founder of the Los Angeles-based company Hey Dewy, was working on marketing Barbie dolls at Mattel and looking for an alternative to her huge, clunky humidifier when she gave up and decided to develop her own. The resulting facial humidifier, as she calls it, which has since been made wireless, provides eight hours of mist from a full tank of 12.4 ounces of water and is petite enough to sit unobtrusively on a shelf or desk or move around with you throughout the day. What’s more, while older humidifier models were difficult to clean and thus breeding grounds for mold, some newer ones can detect remaining water and use internal UV LED lights to kill any growth. The dermatologist Dr. Dendy Engelman recommends the dishwasher-safe Canopy humidifier, which does just that. And since we’re all more familiar with air filter terminology than we once were, it’s worth mentioning that Dyson’s Purifier Humidify + Cool machine also has a medical-grade H13 HEPA filter, as well as interwoven silver strands that inhibit bacteria growth inside the evaporator.

When he created the design studio and curatorial platform Trnk NYC in 2013, Tariq Dixon’s intent was to push the boundaries of the typical showroom by producing exhibitions and collaborations that interrogated cultural bias within the art and design worlds. After the pandemic hit, he closed Trnk’s SoHo showroom but kept the enterprise going digitally and delved into projects touching on social justice and identity. In November 2020, for instance, he collaborated with the London-based designer Evan Jerry of Studio Anansi on a collection of furniture inspired by the entangled relationship between African aesthetics and Western Modernism. Now, Dixon is opening a new brick-and-mortar space on the ground floor of a 1920s building in TriBeCa. It’s divided into five separate chambers, and he hopes visitors will “meander and sit with each of the vignettes we’ve created.” One area will function more like a traditional white box gallery and show a rotation of work by different artists — Studio Anansi is up first — while another is set up like a bedroom appointed with a low-slung bed and a velvet sofa from Trnk’s house line. Elsewhere, a stairway leading to nowhere showcases ceramics by artists including AnnaLeaClelia Tunesi and Disciplina Studio. Dixon hopes, too, that the space will function as an incubator of talent and ideas. “As we discover new artists, make new friends and explore more conversations,” he says, “it’ll be great to have a home where all of our many seemingly disparate ideas become a cohesive vision.” trnk-nyc.com.