Ralph Pucci by India Mahdavi: Rattan, Murals and Scenography Across New York, Los Angeles and Miami
India Mahdavi's collaboration with Ralph Pucci offers a different way to think about a design showroom: not merely as a retail interior, but as a changing setting for materials, furniture and colour. From New York in 2016 and Los Angeles in 2017 to Miami in 2018, the Paris-based designer developed scenographies that gave the collector a sequence of distinct visual experiences. The Miami presentation made this approach especially vivid, connecting an exploration of rattan with architectural-scale graphics.
A sequence of cities, a consistent design attitude
The designer's official project archive identifies three presentations across New York, Los Angeles and Miami. Their continuity is less a matter of reproducing the same room than of allowing furniture to acquire a new identity through its surroundings. A gallery can isolate a chair as an object; scenography allows that chair to speak to adjacent pieces, patterns and architectural surfaces. Mahdavi's work for Ralph Pucci uses the showroom as an authored encounter, giving the visitor a sense of how individual designs can form an interior world.
Rattan enters the conversation
At Ralph Pucci's Miami showroom, Mahdavi presented a collection that placed rattan at the centre of its material language. Ralph Pucci's own account describes the flexible material shaping dining chairs, curved seating and intricate tabletop surfaces. The point is not simply that a traditional fibre becomes fashionable: the designs combine craft technique with silhouettes that feel deliberately contemporary. Rattan's texture and structure carry much of the visual character, while the setting prevents the furniture from being read as a nostalgic reference.
From objects to the building's façade
A distinctive eclipse motif extended beyond furniture into the installation itself. It appeared on lacquered surfaces and upholstery, then grew into a mural that occupied the showroom's exterior. By moving a graphic idea between small-scale objects and a large architectural plane, Mahdavi connected the experience of arrival to the details encountered inside. The repetition does not erase differences between materials; it provides a recognisable visual thread across them.
Why the project matters
The Miami installation illustrates how collectible design, merchandising and interiors can operate together without collapsing into the same discipline. The shop is also a gallery, the object is also part of a spatial composition, and colour becomes a tool for orientation. The project demonstrates that a commercial setting can carry a clear design authorship while keeping craftsmanship and furniture at the centre of attention.
Project credits and references
Interior scenography: India Mahdavi. Client: Ralph Pucci. Locations: New York, Los Angeles and Miami. Miami installation: 2018.
Primary project references: https://india-mahdavi.com/fr/projects/interiors/80-ralph-pucci | https://ralphpucciculture.com/miami | https://ralphpucci.com/exhibitions/view/miami-showroom-december-2018/artists/
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