Category: Critique

Of all the forms in the canon, none is more adored and less understood than the shoebox. It is proportioned for a foot, which makes it nearly perfect for a loaf of cat. Its lid is a gift. Its tissue paper is a symphony.

And yet the shoebox is fragile. A true shoebox dwelling cannot survive a determined kneading session; the walls give way at the 400th press. We counted. This is not a weakness. It is a lesson in impermanence, and we ask our clients to meditate on it while they push their entire weight into the side panel.

The cube is the laziest of platonic solids. It offers no corner for the dramatic hiss, no curve for the lazy slide, and its six faces are all equally unimpressed with you.

We have therefore designed the Cube Rejection Series, a set of five habitations that are technically also cubes but have been cut, creased and lightly bitten until they look intentional. The hit of the series is the Chewed Corner Pavilion, whose south west edge was shaped by an intern named Pickles. ‘I saw it and I knew,’ Pickles told reporters, before falling asleep inside the lecture.