Walking into Murray Moss’s celebrated downtown Manhattan housewares store, moss, is like walking into a museum. There are pristine white walls and objects–from Delft pottery to designer toilet-paper holders–in locked glass cases. Name cards identify an item’s maker and date of origin. Handrails keep visitors at a distance. do not touch signs are everywhere. (OK, most of them are on T shirts worn by the store’s employees–a little retail-design humor, ha ha.) On the downstairs level, there’s even a giant chair by Frank Gehry made of corrugated cardboard that appeared in the Guggenheim’s retrospective on the famed architect–an actual museum piece. But then Moss slides open its case. “Wanna test it out?” he asks. “It’s surprisingly comfortable.” Try getting away with that at the Guggenheim.

When Moss opened his store in SoHo nine years ago, he put a 1958 Bruno Munari steel garbage can in the window just to make a point to gallery-hopping passersby: design is everywhere–and everything. (And that good humor is a valuable complement to good taste.) “I don’t make anything. I don’t design anything,” he says. “No one needs me to explain what a saltshaker is. It’s my job to tell you why it’s more than that.”

Give Moss five minutes and he’ll convince you that a single object can change your life. For instance, the $70 wineglass he’s holding–a 1917 design by Austrian master Josef Hoffmann, made of ultrathin muslin glass. “This is a proposal from a designer as to what the world would be like if it was more perfect: a perfect world reduced to a glass,” says Moss. “I imagine that Hoffmann felt perfection would be to have the thinnest possible barrier between your lips and the liquid–that’s why the glass is so thin. It also requires incredible delicacy. What happens when you go from a normal glass to this is, it modifies your behavior. You become more graceful. And that’s an extraordinary thing to get for $70.”

Hooked on Classics

Like any one of the 250,000 objects under his care, Paul Thompson, director of the Smithsonian’s Cooper-Hewitt design museum, looks immaculately put together. His pin-striped suit is elegant. His British accent is enviably academic. And his $40 translucent Swatch watch is totally cool. “I got it in London last year,” he says. “I just love it.”

Thompson’s one bit of flash isn’t going to have anyone mistaking him for Liberace. But it’s an apt symbol for the Cooper-Hewitt, a sanctuary for classic design. (Last year’s exhibit on Russel Wright put an overlooked American artist back on the cultural map.) Says Thompson, “We’re all about the shock of the old.” A perfect example: 19th-century English master Christopher Dresser, the subject of a 2004 Cooper-Hewitt exhibition, whose 1875 iron-and-glass hall stand is shown here. And you thought it was a chair.

Multimedia on Thames

Ask Alice Rawsthorn for a favorite example of smart design from the past year and she pauses for just a moment. “Probably Grand Theft Auto: Vice City,” she says. That’s right, the videogame. “Its design values are remarkable.” What were you expecting her to say? A sofa? The creator of Grand Theft Auto, British-based Rockstar Games, was up for 2003’s designer-of-the-year award from the Design Museum of London, a can’t-miss destination launched by Sir Terence Conran in 1989 and run by Rawsthorn since 2001. Rockstar Games didn’t win, but its nomination is a clear reflection of Rawsthorn’s eagerness to extend people’s notions of design in new directions. “I find multimedia design fascinating,” says Rawsthorn, who came to the museum after a long career as a critic for the Financial Times. “It’s no longer just theoretical stuff for an elite group of buffs. It’s changing the way we live.”

In 15 years, the object Rawsthorn is posed with here could change the way we dine. Called “The Festive Kitchen,” this prototype from the Design Museum’s collection by Frenchman Ronan Bouroullec and the Lausanne, Switzerland, design school ECAL is “an eating space of the future,” says Rawsthorn. “It’s light, portable and assembles in 20 minutes.” At 30 feet, the model is a bit large for the average kitchen, she admits, “but you can see how a smaller version would be quite useful.” Perhaps someday we will.

Reaching For Bliss

By his estimate, Rob Forbes spends two months a year on the road. He scours foreign cities for the latest design ideas, then writes up everything he sees in his trendsetting online newsletter. He also sells furniture occasionally. As founder of the San Francisco dot-com Design Within Reach (dwr.com), Forbes has become a design-world fixture in just four years. His bright idea: making high-end furnishings an option for people with not-so-high-end salaries. (Although, with its $3,500 sofas, DWR has earned the teasing nickname “DNQWR”–“Design Not Quite Within Reach.”) “We’re like Volvo or Saab,” says Forbes. “Not everyone will want us, but people who want good value and high quality–that’s where our business is.” In the past two years DWR’s business has spread from cyberspace to the real world, with 14 studios opening in the United States. As for Forbes, he spends as much time as he can on the waters of the Bay Area. That’s him with his most prized possession: a 21-foot rowing shell by Maas Aero. “I could marry this thing,” he says. “It’s like mobile furniture. It’s got everything I need.”

Isn’t It Post-Ironic?

Her criterion is simple: “I try to decide,” says Paola Antonelli, curator of architecture and design at New York’s Museum of Modern Art, “whether the space an object occupies on Earth is well used.” If that sounds like a high bar to clear, just look at what Antonelli is holding. And wearing. “Post-it notes are smart, beautiful and cheap. That’s the apotheosis of great design,” says Antonelli. “Yellow is an attention-getting color. And square is a classically rational shape.” And the Bic pen? “Its translucency is functional–you see how much ink is left. But it also looks good.”

Since joining MoMA in 1994, the Italian-born Antonelli has emerged as a star in the design world. She has a lively eye and, like Murray Moss, a gift for crystallizing ideas for those of us who don’t know our Eames from our elbow. “Just like people can tell good steak from bad, I want it to be the same with design,” she says. Someone ought to write that down. Got a pen?

Thoroughly Modern

Like all great chairs, it’s not very comfortable," says Terence Riley of his object of choice, a stretched-metal club chair named “How High the Moon” by the late Japanese design icon Shiro Kuramata. Riley knows that this sort of thing is what miffs people about modern design. If a chair’s no good for sitting on, after all, what’s the point? “Does anyone ask the Queen of England if she’s comfortable?” he counters. “There’s more to comfort than it being soft on your tush.” Light passes through gaps in the Kuramata chair (manufactured by Vitra), making it glow “like a cloud or a haze,” he explains. It may not please your tush, “but it conveys a sense of here and now.”

And anyway, Riley doesn’t need you to buy the chair, he just wants you to appreciate it. As head of MoMA’s architecture and design department, Riley is the gatekeeper of the country’s pre-eminent modern collection. (MoMA is so revered that both Riley and his star deputy, Antonelli, are internationally renowned.) His job is to draft a record of the present through its objects, meaning every choice may not be pretty. “It’s not about beauty,” he says. “It’s about a way of thinking.”

title: “Meet The Titans Of Taste” ShowToc: true date: “2022-12-09” author: “Nancy Hager”

CURATOR, MUSEUM OF MODERN ART

Her criterion is simple: “I try to decide,” says Paola Antonelli, curator of architecture and design at New York’s MoMA, “whether the space an object occupies on Earth is well used.” If that sounds like a high bar to clear, just look at what Antonelli is holding. And wearing. “Post-It notes are smart, beautiful and cheap. That’s the apotheosis of great design,” she says. “Yellow is an attention-getting color. And square is a classically rational shape.”

Since joining MoMA in 1994, the Italian-born Antonelli has emerged as a star in the design world. She has a lively eye and a gift for crystallizing ideas. “Just like people can tell good steak from bad, I want it to be the same with design,” she says. Someone ought to write that down. Got a pen?

Murray Moss

FOUNDER AND OWNER, MOSS

When murray moss opened his Manhattan store nine years ago, he put a steel garbage can in the window to make a point: design is everywhere–and everything. Give him five minutes, and he’ll convince you that a single object can change your life–like the wineglass he’s holding, a 1917 Austrian design made of ultrathin muslin glass. “When you go from a normal glass to this, it modifies your behavior. You become more graceful,” he says. “And that’s an extraordinary thing to get for $70.”

Alice Rawsthorn

DIRECTOR, DESIGN MUSEUM OF LONDON

Ask Alice Rawsthorn for a favorite example of smart design, and she pauses for a moment. “Probably Grand Theft Auto: Vice City,” says Rawsthorn, who came to the museum after a long career as a critic for the Financial Times. “I find multimedia design fascinating. It’s changing the way we live.” In 15 years, the object Rawsthorn is posed with here could change the way we dine. Called The Festive Kitchen, this prototype by Frenchman Ronan Bouroullec is “an eating space of the future,” she says. “It’s light, portable and assembles in 20 minutes.”

Rob Forbes

CEO, DESIGN WITHIN REACH

As founder of the San Francisco dot-com Design Within Reach (dwr.com), Forbes has become a design-world fixture in just four years, making high-end furnishings an option for people with not-so-high-end salaries. That’s him with his most prized possession: a 21-foot rowing shell by Maas Aero. “I could marry this thing,” he says.

Terence Riley

CHIEF CURATOR, MOMA

“Like all great chairs, it’s not very comfortable,” says Terence Riley of his object, a stretched-metal club chair named How High the Moon by the late Japanese design icon Shiro Kuramata. Riley knows that this is what miffs people about modern design. If a chair’s no good for sitting on, what’s the point? “There’s more to comfort than it being soft on your tush,” he argues.

Anyway, Riley doesn’t need you to buy the chair; he just wants you to appreciate it. As head of MoMA’s architecture and design department, he has the job of recording the present through its objects–so not every choice may be pretty. “It’s not about beauty,” he says. “It’s about a way of thinking.”