Ichiro Iwasaki calls his 2025 camera a modern-day camera obscura

Ichiro Iwasaki explained a 2025 camera with four words that predate photography by centuries, and the phrase does the whole job: a modern-day camera obscura. On the Sigma BF the lens catches the subject, and the body is the dark box that holds the shutter. Reaching for an instrument from before photography to explain a digital camera says something about how he works — strip an object back until only the original idea is left, then build it in current materials. Born in Tokyo in 1965, he started at the Sony Design Center, spent time in Milanese studios in Italy, and opened IWASAKI DESIGN STUDIO in Tokyo in 1995. His work spans tableware, watches, lighting and furniture as well as digital cameras and phones, and has been decorated at the highest grade by juries in Japan and in Germany.

The same reduction shows up in seating. Ralik, drawn for Arper in 2023, is a modular system whose entire assembly logic comes down to two transparent links per module. That is the collection US projects come to La Mercanti for.