Harry Nuriev: Redefining Contemporary Design as Maison&Objet’s Designer of the Year 2026

In January 2026, Maison&Objet turns inward to look forward. Under the theme Past Reveals Future, the fair revisits its own foundations to propose a renewed vision of inhabited design – one that is lived, felt, and continuously evolving. Furniture takes centre stage, not as static object, but as cultural marker, emotional carrier, and active participant in daily life.

At the heart of this edition is Harry Nuriev, named Designer of the Year. 2026 Nuriev’s work operates in a fertile in-between: where craftsmanship meets conceptual thinking, where interiors behave like installations, and where objects are charged with new meaning. His creative manifesto, Transformism, is less a style than a method, an invitation to reimagine what already exists by shifting context, intention, and perception.

Nuriev is often described as a design anthropologist, and the label fits. His work reads culture closely, then edits it with precision. Through Crosby Studios, founded in New York in 2014 and later expanded to Paris, he has built a practice that moves fluidly across fashion, retail, hospitality, and cultural institutions. Each project – whether a chair, a room, or a fully immersive environment – feels like a snapshot of the present moment, positioned somewhere between collectable design and contemporary art.

For Maison&Objet, Nuriev unveils a bespoke scenography conceived as an active contemplation. Furniture becomes totemic, each piece reflecting the values of its time while gesturing towards a minimalist, empathetic future. The everyday object is elevated to artefact; consumption is questioned, not denied. It is not nostalgia, but recalibration.

Nuriev’s thinking is quietly philosophical. “If the 18th century was the century of colour, the 19th of form, and the 20th of philosophy,” he notes, “today is about looking more carefully around us.” Sensitivity, empathy, and awareness replace excess. Design becomes less about adding, more about understanding.

Running from 15 to 19 January 2026, this edition of Maison&Objet promises more than inspiration. It offers a pause, a moment to reconsider our relationship with objects, space, and time. The rest of the story, as Nuriev suggests, is still unfolding.

Maison&Objet Paris. 15-19 Jan. 2026