Duality is central to ancient mythology, from Egyptian gods who unite light and dark from within themselves to the two-faced Roman god Janus. This week, Friedman Benda’s Los Angeles gallery will showcase the work of another dynamic duo, Elliott Hundley and William Farrell, whose work as Farrell Hundley utilizes ancient narratives and techniques to make lost-wax casting objects that appear eerily out of time.

The pair recently spoke with Surface about their origin story, their relics of the future, and the prospects of their process.

How did you find each other?

EH: Will and I were friends. He was living in New York and we were talking about what he was going to do when he got out of school. I asked him, what would you do if you could do anything? He said: make furniture. And I said, well, if you want to do that, I’ll do it with you. He moved to L.A. and we did it. It was fun to think about something different from my own studio and learn from his knowledge of design.

WF: He was kind of the force who pushed me to make something, and lent me a corner of the studio and kept me company. In the pandemic, we had time to experiment and play around.

What about lost-wax casting appeals to you?

EH: It’s a way to build objects organically rather than architectonically.

WF: It hasn’t changed for the better part of, like, 5,000 years.

EH: Most of them are one-offs, and there are irregularities. The assemblage is kind of Frankenstein. The sutures show.

The subject matter you’re working with tends to be equally ancient. Did the two interests arise simultaneously, or feed off each other?

EH: They fold into each other. But when we started working, William was reading about the Bronze Age, and Greek literature is kind of my wheelhouse.

WF: I like the idea of making an object that can float between time, that could be unearthed from thousands of years ago or from a future history.

EH: There’s an aspect of world-building, but there’s also an aspect of production design, almost cinematic set dressing.

Are you building narratives in your head while you’re creating, or are you building forms that tell you their story?

EH: It happens both ways. Sometimes we go in with a specific narrative: there’s a table we made called Lukka, which is the name for one of the Sea Peoples in ancient Egypt who were infamous for conquering kingdoms as the Bronze Age collapsed. We covered the table in lobster shells, collaging them into the piece so it looked like it had emerged from the sea.

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Nantucket isn’t necessarily known for its adventurous sense of style, but Brooklyn-based Home Studios is showing the islanders that the Grey Lady can refresh while remaining recognizable. Fresh from designing Blue Flag hospitality group’s Rochambeau, Oliver Haslegrave’s interior design firm has polished Nantucket institution the Pearl, its Boarding House bar, and added Below the Rose, a subterranean lounge.

The latter is appropriately dark and mysterious; once guests take the plunge, they encounter a landscape of dark brass, onyx miele, custom Pierre Frey carpet, and a mural by Lukas Geronimas Giniotis. The Boarding House offers calmer refuge, with a restored bar and stone floor anchoring the space to the area’s colonial roots. But the Pearl is the true treasure, with private dining rooms and a patio glistening in warm white and cool blue. Its custom rift cut white oak and walnut dining tables are laden with oysters dressed in seaweed vinaigrette and harvested on the island’s Pocomo Meadow family farm—proof that some traditions are better left untouched.

Last summer, Amauri Aguiar and Bryan Young launched the design and interiors gallery Verso in TriBeCa. Now, they’re toasting one year with the first U.S. exhibition from Established & Sons founder Sebastian Wrong’s online platform The Wrong Shop.

In another first, FreelingWaters will show their reconceived 18th- and 19th-century pine cabinets, each covered in bespoke combinations of poetry and dazzling geometric patterns, never before seen in America. Erwan Bouroullec offers exclusive wall hangings that mix rural photography and abstract software art, with backings of aluminum foil allowing the textile to crumple. And Richard Woods’ eye-popping posters, boasting high-gloss spot varnish, are The Wrong Shop exclusives.

“Each artist on display represents a compelling shift in contemporary design culture,” Wrong says. These include Nathalie Du Pasquier, Rop van Mierlo, Bethan Laura Wood, Jaime Hayon, and more. “We aim to celebrate this cross-disciplinary approach to art and design, advocating creativity in many media and forms.” Design collectors can see for themselves as “Verso presents The Wrong Shop” runs from July 11–Aug. 12.

Our new weekly scoop on industry players moving onwards and upwards.

Fashion’s ongoing game of musical chairs continues with Gabriela Hearst announcing her exit from Chloé after three years to focus more on her eponymous label in New York City. A successor was not named, but reports circulated this past month suggesting former Saint Laurent women’s design director Chemena Kamali was tapped as Hearst’s replacement.

Avery Baker, the president and chief brand officer of Tommy Hilfiger Corp., also resigned after three years with no immediate successor named. Martijn Hagman will continue to oversee the brand as CEO of Tommy Hilfiger Global and PVH Europe.

Gucci, Antwaun Sargent, and Aperture recently celebrated the launch event of Mystic Parallax, the first monograph dedicated to the work of Awol Erizku. Published by Aperture, the title showcases Erizku’s multivalent practice that critically engages art history, personal experience, and Pan-African thought and symbolism. Guests mingled while enjoying light bites and cocktails, including an Ethiopian honey wine at the Gucci Wooster boutique in New York.

When was it? June 27

Where was it? Gucci Wooster

Who was there? Cameron Welch, Adam Eli, Kerby Jean-Raymond, Willa Bennett, Quil Lemons, Sanford Biggers, Hank Willis Thomas, Whitney Mallett, Antoine Gregory, and more.

M. Shively Art and Design crafts furniture, lighting, and sculptural objects for the home and hospitality settings that are distilled from childlike curiosity and expressed in exquisite forms.

Surface Says: Imaginative home furnishings and custom jobs are M. Shively’s specialties. One of its seminal designs, the Beam Table, illustrates its unconventional approach; it boasts a singular wooden plank encapsulated by lucite, giving the beam the appearance of being suspended in thin air.

Archaeologists unearth Maya ruins under the Mexican forest after 1,000 years.

The world’s “most famous” rotating house officially goes on sale in San Diego.

Paris opens an immersive funhouse of Tim Burton’s surreal cinematic universe.

Scientists create a genetically engineered soybean that tastes just like pork.