What’s Happening: Byredo founder Ben Gorham has always strived to capture memories through smell. At Milan Design Week, he teams up with Kanu to capture the essence of the scent Bal D’Afrique—and the collective memories of millions—with a pavilion that mixes the rising sculptor’s own nonconforming objects with images from Adjoa Armah’s saman archive.

The Download: In 2006, Ben Gorham founded Byredo on the premise of translating memories into smells. One of his initial scents was a mélange of sage, orange, and musk that recalled the distinct scent of his father; another fusion of temple incense, lemon, and ginger recalls the place in India where his mother was born. Since then, the Stockholm native has been bullish on pushing the cult fragrance brand out of its comfort zone with whimsical collaborations that transcend its sleekness and lineup of singular, unfussy scents.

Lately, Gorham has been reflecting on one of Byredo’s most well-known fragrances: Bal D’Afrique, a love letter to the continent inspired by his late father’s travel diaries. “This was the fantasy of arriving in Africa through somebody else’s words,” he says. “Bal D’Afrique reflects that; it’s an imaginary journey as well as a complete celebration of how I see African culture and its influence.” He recently enlisted photographer Gabriel Moses to capture this nostalgia through his distinct lens. And at this year’s Milan Design Week, he unveiled perhaps one of Byredo’s most ambitious projects yet: an architectural pavilion in Spazio Maiocchi envisioned by rising star Dozie Kanu.

In many ways, Kanu was an ideal collaborator. Born in Houston to a family of Nigerian immigrants but now based in rural Portugal, the 30-year-old talent has emerged as one of the design world’s more enigmatic figures thanks to his unpredictable objects that don’t conform to the confines of art and design. This year, he vowed to experiment with architecture and better understand the concept of home, prompting his first trip to Africa in five years. “To do the project Ben asked me, I had to reconnect with the continent,” Kanu tells Surface. “I went to Dakar and visited a lot of places—nightclubs, houses, restaurants—where people do live, where people do go. It was key for me to get a sense and a vibe of what was going on there now.”

What resulted is a meditative, cross-shaped structure evocative of Senegalese architecture and building techniques. A steel skeleton bears signs of wear, a staple in Kanu’s work; it’s topped by the same type of glass blocks used by European colonizers across Sub-Saharan Africa. Kanu’s own sculptures, many made using found objects, are sprinkled throughout. Scrapped laundry machine parts, for example, assemble into hued lamps emanating the sounds of African drums, serving as a sensorial portal to home.

But before visitors enter, they’re greeted with a vitrine of photographs from Adjoa Armah’s saman archive, a depository of negatives she collected across Ghana during a 2015 road trip. The idea, Armah tells Surface, is “to give the possibility to visitors to relate to all these images because they show true moments of life.” They depict everyday African people in celebratory settings from nightclubs to traditional festivals, fostering a mood of togetherness permeating Kanu’s pavilion. They also serve as a tribute to everyday moments we choose to remember.

The experience of entering Kanu’s pavilion gives pause—it’s both a wonderful respite during the chaos of Milan Design Week and proof that the universe of Bal D’Afrique continues to grow in compelling new ways.

In Their Own Words: “It feels more authentic for me to try and see the continent through the eyes of others, acknowledging and empowering the lives of people who were and are there,” Kanu says. “When I’m making a show, I vanish in a sense. I often say that it’s my ancestors or people that came before me that are working through me. In a way, I’m not actually conscious anymore.”

Surface Says: Be sure to add this to your Milan itinerary before it closes on April 23.

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It’s difficult to neatly categorize artist collective AES+F: with work spanning theater, photography, video, and sculpture, members Tatiana Arzamasova, Lev Evzovich, Evgeny Svyatsky, and Vladimir Fridkes choose to define their practice as “social psychoanalysis.” The group accrued international acclaim at the 2007 Venice Biennale with “Last Riot,” a darkly comedic epic that immerses viewers in a made-up world where social order has collapsed.

Since then, the group has gone on to stage a reinterpretation of Giacamo Puccini’s classic opera Turnadot and turn heads everywhere from the Centre Pompidou to the Bangkok Art Biennale with their audacious creations. A new Rizzoli monograph explores the group’s psychoanalytic approach through a close reading of their works’ conceptual evolution from 1995 to 2020.

Surface readers are invited to attend a panel with Lev Evzovich, The Whitney Museum of Art curator Christiane Paul, and Daata co-directors David Gryn and Tiffany Zabludowicz to celebrate the launch of the book and Daata’s new augmented reality app.

A florist by trade, Studio Mary Lennox founder Ruby Barber has finessed a singular botanical language of intricate floral styling that proves how each flower has its own story to tell. Named after the protagonist of Frances Hodgson Burnett’s “The Secret Garden,” her Berlin-based studio has amassed a portfolio of bold-faced collaborators that include sweeping scenography for an Hermès dinner at the Grand Palais and breathtaking backdrops for Chanel and Gucci. Her latest is a series of three rugs for the Belgian purveyor JOV, on view at Salone del Mobile, that reference the textures and colors of oyster mushrooms.

When: Until May 13

Where: Gavlak, Los Angeles

What: O’Halloran is known for oil paintings that suspend a moment in time: playing cards midair, slot machines spinning endlessly, a house of cards teetering on completion or collapse, and magic tricks. Depicted within are the drama and anticipation we find in games and life, allowing viewers to find space to reflect on tension and untold outcomes.

Our weekly roundup of the internet’s most preposterous headlines, from the outrageous to the outright bizarre.

Nymph Statue Defaced With Crayon at National Trust Property [The Guardian]

The Cybertruck Is Years Behind Schedule, So Tesla Is Launching a $30 Beer [Fast Company]

Don’t Live in “Pity City,” Office Chair Magnate Tells Employees Who Want Money [Vice]

Pastry Artwork Pits Bakery Against Town in Free Speech Suit [AP]

BMW Apologizes for Shanghai Auto Show Ice Cream Meltdown [Financial Times]

“Overemployed” Hustlers Exploit ChatGPT to Take On Even More Full-Time Jobs [Vice]

How Nazi Memorabilia Became a Favorite of the Super-Rich [Airmail]

Cube-Shaped Creature With 24 Eyes Discovered Hiding in Pond in Hong Kong [Miami Herald]

Since launching in 2014, Colony has uplifted the independent design community by offering creative direction and consulting to ensure its clients are presented in the best possible light. Now, founder Jean Lin is taking her mission to nurture the next generation of design talents one step further with the debut of the Designers’ Residency, a first-of-its-kind incubator program that aims to introduce American talents to the global design market and ensure their success within an industry often fraught with high barriers to entry.

SinCa Design is a furniture design studio founded by wife and husband Maria Camarena and Dave Sinaguglia. The couple is known for their humble aesthetics, meaningful designs, and meticulously hand-crafted furniture using traditional woodworking techniques.

Surface Says: SinCa’s “less is more” approach embodies the studio’s dedication to thoughtfully crafted sculptural furniture.

An AI-generated dupe of a Drake and Weeknd single sets the internet ablaze.

Of course Martha Stewart has an entire house dedicated to her basket hoard.

Here’s Australia’s Lord Howe Island rid itself of a century-long rat infestation.

The McDonalds Hamburglar is making a long-awaited return to the spotlight.