FROM THE WORLD OF ABC STONE

On the evening of  Wednesday, April 17th, at our ABC | NYC showroom, we were honored to host The Unveiling, our annual sculpture show and reception celebrating the artists selected to receive the ABC Stone-sponsored Carrara Sculpture Residency.

Gianluca Giarrizzo and Arngrímur Sigurðsson unveiled the pieces they created in Italy last Summer, Crema I and Trans-Human Bomb. Other works on view by esteemed artists Jago, Barbara Segal, Peter Glenn Oakley, Alessandro Lombardo and Brice Esso. It was an enchanted evening of art, wine, and conversation.

We’re so proud of what we’re building, and we always enjoy showcasing that work to our community of artists and art enthusiasts. Thank you to all who were involved for your dedicated efforts in making this incredible event so special.  (more…)

DESIGN + DECOR Magazine | On Newsstands Now

Diamonds may be a girl’s best friend, but Jenny Dina Kirschner of Jenny Dina Kirschner Interiors is smitten with stone. In fact, in her own kitchen featured here, she’d chosen the slabs before she’d even closed on the property—that’s commitment to a material.

The space was completely gutted, so Jenny had a fresh canvas on which to leave her indelible imprint. It would be impossible to misidentify the focal point of the space in this kitchen. The luscious sculptural island is made of polished Belvedere quartzite. The entire piece is seamless with mitered corners at the top and sides; two large slabs were used, measuring approximately 80 square feet of stone in total. Jenny found her match at ABC Stone, a renowned resource for natural and man-made stone. The company also features Functional Art and Cubic Elements to complement any exceptional interior or exterior space.

When designing kitchens for her clients, Jenny often starts with the countertop material, and her own kitchen was no exception. The entire perimeter of the room is white: the flooring, cabinetry and even the hardware deliberately sublimates itself to the majesty of the quartzite island. “The intensity of the dark stone immediately grabbed my attention,” says Jenny. “It has all these really beautiful earth tones: green, caramel, crystals and ivories. It’s swirly and very dreamy.” The cantilevered drop to table height creates an architectural play of lines and volume that add visual interest and functionality. Flanked by Prouvé Standard SP Chairs, designed by Jean Prouvé and produced by Vitra, the island beckons to be touched and interacted with—it’s not passive decoration.

With storage often a challenge in urban kitchens, Jenny chose to extend her cabinets to new heights, quite literally. “Building the double-height cabinetry was pricey and challenging, but a must for me,” she says. “There were architectural soffits and elements we had to work around, and I wanted it to look seamless.”

Since the kitchen is an open concept, Jenny preferred to delineate the spaces discreetly yet purposefully. Flooring in the kitchen is porcelain by Stone Source in UonUon, and the rest of the flooring on the first floor is pickled and white-washed white oak. By interweaving individual floor planks, Jenny creates a subtly textured boundary between spaces. Visually blurred, it’s less jarring and abrupt than a complete switch of materials and colors.

Jenny masterfully integrates textures into her spaces, but here in the kitchen she deliberately kept textural layering to a minimum. She prefers instead for the enraptured gaze and attention to wander into the vastness and beyond.

Resources:
Jenny Dina Kirschner
Jenny Dina Kirschner Interiors
646.242.6336
jdkinteriors.com

ABC Stone
129 West 22nd Street, New York, NY 10011 | 646.707.3065
234 Banker Street, Brooklyn, NY 11222 | 718.389.8360
210 Miller Place, Hicksville, NY 11801 | 516.997.9412
abcworldwidestone.com

ABC Stone is honored to have been awarded NKBA’s Innovative Retail Showroom for 2019 in the medium-sized Independent Showroom category.  The Showroom awards acknowledge outstanding design and client engagement in a dealer/retail environment, in independent and multi-brand/location showrooms. Showrooms are judged on their unique and interactive design. A prestigious jury of design and allied professionals have selected our New York City showroom, which was designed by STONEFOX Architects and planned in an exclusive partnership with RED Graniti Quarries, Vermont Quarries, and Colorado Quarries, from among dozens of entries received.

Located in the heart of NYC’s Flatiron District, ABC’s state-of-the-art Experience Center brings together both digital and analog forces to inspire innovative design on every scale. ABC looks to expand the parameters of material specification, change how we interact with our clients and how our clients interact with our materials, and ultimately revolutionize point-of-sale procedure in the natural and engineered stone industry utilizing our proprietary Virtual Warehouse system. The Virtual Warehouse, combined with the award-winning, Ketra lighting system which precisely mimics the color temperature and intensity of light no matter the surroundings, enables our clients to accurately imagine the exact properties of their stone in the space for which it is being selected. The experience is further enhanced by our ongoing educational series “Cocktails and Conversations”. These classes provide continuing education credits for interior design professionals on a variety of stone-related topics. It is our intention for attendees to leave with a thorough understanding of the subjects covered and how they can be applied in the work going forward.

The awards were given out at KBIS 2019 on February 18, 2019 at the NKBA Design Competition and Industry Awards Show at the Encore Hotel in the Encore Ballroom.

For more than a quarter century, the world’s top architects and designers have put their trust in ABC Stone. Our strategic partnerships with top quarries the world over give us unparalleled access to the finest stones ever unearthed. Exotic marble, extraordinary granite, magnificent limestone in addition to an impressive array of onyx, travertine, quartzite and semi-precious, among other fine natural stones, make ABC a one-stop stone resource for the A&D community.

Courses on Offer | 1.17.19

Session 1 Options | 4pm

Natural Stone 101
This one-hour class is designed for construction industry professionals desiring to gain a full understanding of natural stone as a building material. Learn more about the various natural stones (limestone, travertine, onyx, marble, serpentine, sandstone, slate, quartzite, and granite). Obtain information about common quarrying techniques, fabrication, and finishing methods. With this understanding, you’ll enhance your ability to select the right stone, fabrication technique, and finish for your project.

Sintered Surface | The Latest Technology in the World of Surfacing Materials
With so many building materials available on the market, it can be difficult to know which is best for your project. Recent technological advances have led to the development of this new & innovative product, sintered surface. This one-hour class is designed for construction professionals to gain a full understanding of sintered surface as an ideal material for countertop and cladding applications.

Session 2 Options | 5pm

The Art of Specifying Natural Stone
This one hour session is designed to give architects and designers an overview of how to specify natural stone. There are many factors to consider to ensure you are choosing the proper material for your project. What do you need to know about its species, color variations, and finish possibilities? Is the quarry able to produce the sizes and quantities you need? And finally, what factors affect the price of the stone you specify? Get the resources you need to help ensure the stone you choose meets the standards and design intent set for your application.

Exterior Stone Veneers and Pavers
This program gives a better understanding of the various types of stone veneer and pavers. It also identifies system components including, substrate preparation, waterproofing, and anti-fracture membranes.

*All party attendees (beginning at 6pm) will automatically receive 1 CE credit for touring our new state-of-the-art facility, The Center @ Hicksville

Please to RSVP with course selections to lyndsey@abcworldwidestone.com

Join ABC Stone at our new state-of-the-art facility in the heart of New York City for a CEU presentation, followed by a brief showroom tour, accredited by AIA, IDCEC, LACES, NKBA and GBCI.

Wine and hors d’oeuvres will be served, and attendees will earn a total of 2 credit hours, just in time for the year-end credit crunch!

This event will be held at our NYC Flagship at 129 West 22nd Street.

This is the second of two CEU event to be held in December at ABC | NYC: the first will be on December 11th, and attendees of which also earn 2 CE credits. Learn more about that event here.
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Join ABC Stone at our new state-of-the-art facility in the heart of New York City for a CEU presentation, followed by a brief showroom tour, accredited by AIA, IDCEC, LACES and NKBA.

Wine and hors d’oeuvres will be served, and attendees will earn a total of 2 credit hours, just in time for the year-end credit crunch!

This event will be held at our NYC Flagship at 129 West 22nd Street.

A second CEU event, of which attendees will also earn 2 credits, will be held on December 18th. Learn more about that event here.
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At University of Chicago, the Campus North Residential Commons, designed by our friends at Studio Gang, provides social spaces and experiences with a view towards “[enhancing] campus and academic life for today’s undergraduates,” says the Gang. The site covers a full city block and is poised as a new point of entry to the campus for the greater Hyde Park community,—Gang calls this a new “front door”—one which might encourage interactions among UofC students of diverse backgrounds, and strengthen connections between the campus and nearby communities. Campus North for short, the structure is more mixed-use than dormitory, providing a combination of student residences, dining options, amenities, outdoor green space, and even retail volumes. In terms of design the Campus North complex comprises three slender bar buildings woven into a fabric of plazas, gardens, walkways and courtyards; pre-cast concrete panels are used to clad the building, creating a contemporary facade but one informed by the neo-Gothic tradition of the campus’ architecture. The Campus North Residential Commons is LEED Gold certified featuring, among other sustainable interventions, argon-filled, low E insulated glass and continuous closed cell foam-insulated building envelope; additionally, all cooking oil from the Dining Commons is recycled into biofuel.

Our friends at the Brooklyn-based architecture firm StudiosC, who have, in recent years, undertaken a bevy of adaptive reuse project, have undertaken their latest in the form of the transformation of an neglected Williamsburg loft into a workspace for a boutique law firm. The 3,K SqFt office features abundant natural light and a restored timber-frame ceiling; with the addition of custom furniture, the firm sought to create a meaningful dialogue between design of the past, specifically of the loft, and that of the present: a relaxed, warm-hued environment for a boutique law firm. The addition of a concrete-and-steel roof deck which serves as a gathering place for employees and visitors is connected to the main office by a central corridor. Says StudiosC principal Stephen Conte, “Office design has to transcend just workstations and start to build a sense of comfort and community.” Restoring elements of the original loft was also a method of reducing waste, as well as paying homage to 20th century loft-craftsmanship: the firm sought to incorporate elements of the existing building’s structure wherever possible.

One Hundred East Fifty Third is an extremely slender residential skyscraper in Midtown, designed by our friends at Foster + Partners, rising in close proximity the 1958 Seagram Building of Mies van der Rohe. It stands 63-storeys, contains 94 residential units, and is visually distinctive for its undulant exterior of transparent and white ribbed glass. Foster has also designed the building’s extensive amenities suite, which include a 60′ swimming pool surrounded by distinctive curvilinear windows and screens of slatted oak, of which the latter are also utilized in abutting changing areas which feature rain showers. Black granite figures into the tiling around the pool as well as steps leading down to an abutting lounge, and a staircase links this program to a glassy gymnasium. Additionally, the building’s lobby features a fluted Calacatta marble wall. William T Georgis, principal among our friends at William T Georgis Architect, has designed two setups at the development as well as a pair of model apartments on the building’s 36th floor.