The main similarity between Masako Sato and her work is the fact that they both just make you want to smile. The Tokyo based designer is at Designer’s Block this year with her beautifully simple “mushroom hook” and “whipped cream accessory”.
The mushroom hooks come in several colours and work best when many are mounted on a wall together, playing with the idea of how mushrooms grow in nature. They are silicon casted made in a factory that makes Sony parts. Her packaging is equally genius, each mushroom individually contained in a plastic petri-dish comfortably resting in a bed of brown shredded paper. Her rings are something special as well, the concept beautifully balanced by the packaging. Each ring is topped with a whipped cream swirl, and embedded into one piece of a sliced circular sponge, balancing the look of jewellery packaging with the sponge cake. When asked what inspired her mushrooms she describes how she had a mould patch in her home, adding “I was worried if mushrooms were coming up, but at the same imagined how funny mushrooms are growing on the wall.”
Words & Images: David Wilson