Kelly Wearstler x Arca — nudo-2-0-image-5

Partnership info

Overview

Location
Miami
Type
Product Collaboration
Year
2024

Two years after NUDO's debut, Wearstler returned to the same premise — weaving translated into stone — and asked a harder question of a different material. Marble had already proven a hard material could read as soft. Onyx was chosen to push further: a stone translucent enough to let light move through its own veining rather than simply reflect off it, with the same knot language tested in a material that behaves very differently.

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Creative Process

Every piece starts the same way: a digital exploration of helix forms and weaving patterns, rendered as a 3D miniature so the whole design is calibrated before a single block of stone gets selected. A robotic arm handles the scale and precision, carving interior geometries into pieces of onyx large enough that the size becomes part of the sculpture. An artisan then finishes every surface by hand, which is how the collection gets its softness.

NUDO 2.0 folds new forms into that language: a Round Coffee Table on a continuous, undulating base; a Dining Table with curves that look shaped by time; a Lounge Chair built from flowing, parallel curves that balance softness and strength; a Corrugated Bench with hollowed arches that let light and shadow move across the surface on their own. The Ping Pong Table has a trick of its own: take the net off and it becomes a dining table. Several pieces from the original NUDO return here in onyx, the same forms in a material that catches light.

Kelly Wearstler x Arca — nudo-2-0-collage-layout-1
Kelly Wearstler Nudo Round Coffee Table — view 2
Kelly Wearstler x Arca — nudo-2-0-collage-layout-4

Creative Direction

NUDO 2.0's presentation at Art Basel Miami Beach 2024 felt like a gallery, with pieces set on the floor or raised on pedestals inside rooms painted in shades of ochre to warm the stone. Where NUDO's debut asked people to touch the marble, this one asked them to slow down and look.

Kelly Wearstler x Arca — nudo-2-0-collage-layout-5
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Kelly Wearstler x Arca — nudo-2-0-image-5

Onyx possesses a translucence that beautifully interacts with natural light, highlighting its intricate banding and veining. It proved to be a mesmerizing material to experiment with.

Kelly Wearstler
Kelly Wearstler x Arca — nudo-2-0-image-7
Kelly Wearstler — BoF Voices — collage-layout-4

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