ADORNO 2025 Wrapped: A Year in Global Design
As the year comes to a close, we want to pause and say thank you. To the designers who trust us with their work, to the collectors and clients who bring these pieces into their homes, and to the broader community that continues to support independent design across borders and disciplines. ADORNO exists because of this global exchange, ideas moving between cities, studios, and interiors, shaped by many hands and many perspectives.
This yearโs Wrapped looks back at how our community engaged with design in 2025, what resonated most, what traveled the farthest, and which pieces people returned to again and again. It is a snapshot of shared taste, curiosity, and commitment to thoughtful objects made all over the world.
As we look ahead, we hope the coming year brings more connection, more discovery, and plenty of good design into everyday life.
Piece Most Loved Among Collectors
The Six Dots Design Contemporary Vanity Chair V2 emerged as our strongest performer this year, and for good reason. Designed by Joseph Ellwood, the chair captures a moment in contemporary design where identity, technology, and material honesty intersect. Laser-cut from raw aluminum, the piece balances precision with personality, drawing loose inspiration from figures like Perriand and Prouvรฉ while deliberately unsettling those references. Collectors responded to its confidence. The chair feels current without chasing novelty, and future-minded without slipping into abstraction. A final note worth flagging: this is the last day this piece ships free worldwide, making now a fitting moment to revisit the design that defined our year.
Strong Repeat Performers
Scape Wall Light by Stem, India
Hand-sculpted in India, the aluminum Scape Wall Light reads like a landscape seen from above, with rippling contours shaped by time and terrain. Light glides across the surface, activating every ridge and hollow with warmth and depth. Produced in small batches, each piece carries subtle variations that make repetition impossible and keep collectors coming back.
Maze Lamp by Stijn van Aardenne , Netherlands
The Maze Lamp balances precision and play. Set on three stainless steel legs, its 3D-printed shade wraps a seamless pattern around a rotating form, ensuring no two lamps share the same surface. Made from recycled plastic and softly glowing even when switched off, it has become a repeat favorite for its character, adaptability, and unique ingenuity.
Artefacto Ls 16 Floor Lamp
byย LรRDAG & SรNDAG, Mexico
Designed by Lรธrdag & Sรธndag in Mexico City and hand-woven by master artisan Don Claudio in Oaxacaโs Sierra Madre Oriental, this boho floor lamp celebrates traditional wicker craft. Made from Gโnoo Xombรฉ Nisin fiber and shaped without an internal metal frame, it relies entirely on weaving technique for structure. The result feels light, tactile, and deeply rooted in local material knowledge.
Melo Sconce โ Minimalist Ceramic Wall Light
byย Catalin Filip, United Kingdom
The Melo Sconce is a ceramic wall light by BritishโRomanian designer Catalin Filip, shaped by the way raw clay reacts to gravity. Two soft stoneware forms drape over a wooden peg, frozen mid-slump, as if the material decided the final gesture itself. The surface stays warm and tactile, while the light it casts remains gentle and atmospheric.
What Caught the Eye
Based on the honorable mentions above, it should be no surprise that lighting drew the most all-around attention across ADORNO. These pieces invite browsing and curiosity, often serving as entry points into a collection or a studioโs wider body of work. Lighting continues to function as an inspiration category, one people linger with and return to.
Seating, and statement chairs in particular, stood out as the most saved category. Chairs tend to invite longer consideration. They are personal, tactile, and tied closely to how people imagine living with a piece. Many were bookmarked, revisited, and kept in mind for future projects or homes.
Decor emerged as the most purchased category overall, with a strong focus on vases and sculptural objects. These pieces feel giftable, approachable, and easy to integrate, which likely explains their steady momentum throughout the year. Small in scale, but big in impact, they continue to anchor many of our most loved purchases.
Materials that Defined the Year
Metal and ceramic dominated. Ceramic vessels and vases appeared repeatedly among the most loved pieces, while metal anchored lighting and wall objects. These materials feel grounded and lasting, familiar yet flexible across styles.
Most Unique Pieces to Ship
โKauโ Chair by Angela Damman, Mexico
The Kau Chair traveled far in every sense. Handcrafted in Yucatรกn using iron mesh, agave fiber, and henequen textiles, each piece carries weeks of labor and centuries of tradition. With more than 2,000 hand-tied fringes and materials processed entirely by hand, it stands as one of the most complex and meaningful works to leave our platform this year.
Invisible Chairs by lee hyokk, South Korea
Part furniture, part concept, the Invisible Chair crossed borders as one of the yearโs most unexpected shipments. Built into a steel fence structure, it reveals itself only when noticed, rewarding pause rather than spectacle. It reflects a philosophy of restraint and rest, offering a seat that exists almost in hiding, yet travels boldly into new contexts.
How the World Collected
This year made one thing clear. Design on ADORNO moves globally.
The United States stood out as the most active destination, with buyers returning often and collecting across categories, from lighting and seating to small sculptural decor. It continues to function as a central meeting point for international design, where pieces from many regions find long-term homes.
On the production side, Mexico and India emerged as especially strong export scenes. Studios from both countries shipped widely and consistently, with work rooted in material knowledge and craft traditions resonating far beyond their borders. These pieces traveled well, crossing continents while retaining a strong sense of place.
Across regions, one pattern held true. Studios with clear material identities and strong craft languages performed best internationally. Objects tied to process, place, and handwork continued to travel furthest, proving that thoughtful design translates across borders.
Piece to travel the furthest distance:
A Beautiful Mind Stone Mirror
byย Odditi
The A Beautiful Mind Stone Mirror by Odditi made the longest journey of the year, traveling from Indonesia to Belgium. Hand-sculpted from a composite of onyx, granite, and basalt, the mirror draws directly from sedimentary rock formations and geological erosion. Each piece carries visible variation in texture and tone, shaped slowly by hand, bringing a raw fragment of the earth into an interior context.
Heaviest piece to ship:
Mono Dining Table
by Assimply Studio
The Mono Dining Table from the MONOMORFO collection quite literally carried weight this year. Cast in terrazzo using leftover glass crystals from a factory in Minas Gerais, Brazil, each tabletop forms a unique, speckled surface shaped by reuse and chance. Supported by three solid cylindrical legs, the table balances visual lightness with serious mass, weighing in at 260 kilograms and seating up to eight.
Thank You for Being Part of It
As the year closes, we want to thank everyone who made this possible. Designers who trusted us with their work. Collectors who supported independent studios across borders. Partners who helped pieces travel far and wide. We are stepping into the new year with optimism, curiosity, and a deep belief in the power of design to connect people across places, cultures, and ideas. Hereโs to a year ahead filled with thoughtful objects, meaningful spaces, and good design from all over the world.
