August 6 2018 | By Ryan Waddoups for Interior Design
10 Questions With… Arielle Assouline-Lichten
Above: Round Placemat and Brass Oval Coasters in Royal. Photography courtesy of Slash Objects.
Arielle Assouline-Lichten may not yet be a household name, but her impact within the industry merits a nod—or perhaps 20,000. Design connoisseurs recognize her brand, Slash Objects, as a purveyor of stylish home furnishings and accessories that blend rich materials in unexpected ways. But some may also know her as an activist force whose steely resolve and diligence helped elucidate the rampant gender parity issues afflicting the architecture and design professions. While studying at Harvard’s Graduate School of Design in 2013, Assouline-Lichten launched a petition for the Pritzker Prize Committee to retroactively recognize Denise Scott Brown as a laureate. As a refresher: Scott Brown was infamously excluded from the honor despite her longtime husband and business partner Robert Venturi receiving the award in 1991. Assouline-Lichten’s petition received over 20,000 signatures, even catching the eye of some of the world’s most renowned practitioners.
Fast forward to 2018. The globetrotting designer, who cut her teeth working for such blue-chip firms as Kengo Kuma and Associates, Snøhetta, and Bjarke Ingels Group, has carved a niche within Brooklyn’s burgeoning design sphere. Assouline-Lichten founded her multidisciplinary design firm, Slash Projects, in 2013, with Slash Objects following three years later. She fabricates much of the latter’s collection using a post-consumer recycled rubber material built for high-endurance flooring, which lends each piece extreme durability. But don’t get too distracted by its functional qualities. Terrazzo-like in appearance, the material blends seamlessly with such luxurious surfaces as brass and marble, lending the entire collection a sense of understated elegance while staying on-trend with contemporary design sensibilities. The brand’s Coexist Collection even received Best in Show recognition at the 2018 NYCxDESIGN Awards presented by Interior Design and ICFF.
Headshot of Arielle Assouline-Lichten
Gem Rubber Mousepad and Brass Coaster in Royal. Photography courtesy of Slash Objects.
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