Hotel Spotlight
The Vera Hotel has involved many of Tel Aviv’s creatives in the hotel’s design process from the very beginning. Their creations are made using the highest-quality materials, reflecting the hotel’s thoughtful approach, which extends from design to customer service. Rea Ben David, the founder of The Print House, has selected and framed a series of photos exhibited in the hotel – some of which he has photographed himself. The blankets in each room are the creation of Israeli designer Meira Sitton, a small detail exemplifying Vera Hotel’s larger dedication to homegrown creativity.
Hotel Spotlight - Meira Sitton
By Lotte Beilin
Designed to elevate the daily rituals of bathing, dining and sleeping, Israeli designer Meira Sitton has created a collection of refined yet casual textiles for the home.
Meira’s color palettes consist of neutrals, darks and muted tones to blend into any space. The beautiful simplicity of these linens – their clean, natural look – suits every household, from the minimal, modern apartment to the traditional farmhouse. Product designs are created with durability in mind and brought to life with pure linen, a material five times stronger than cotton, hypoallergenic and fully biodegradable.
For Meira Sitton, the quality and sustainability of materials are important. Sitton believes that the elements of a home should be chosen thoughtfully in order to create an aesthetic and that we should surround ourselves with objects designed to last and contribute to our well-being. Meira sees pure linen as the fabric of the future – a durable and smart textile to mirror a conscious mindset.
meirasitton.com
The Print House by Camea Smith
By Lotte Beilin
The Print House is a state of the art print studio located on the bustling Levontin Street in south Tel Aviv. The studio specializes in fine art and photographic printing, as well as archival mounting and framing. Established by Rea Ben David ten years ago, the studio team includes professional photographers and artists, aiming to achieve the highest quality prints while using superior materials for archiving as well as the latest technology. The studio also provides a range of services: image processing, scanning and the creation of 3D models of exhibition spaces with rendering software. The studio additionally maintains a framing workshop, located in 14 Ha’manoa Street and run by Elad Tol, a skilled craftsman who builds custom-made wood and aluminum frames, picked especially to complement photographic prints. The frames are all sawn, sanded and painted at the workshop.
As a photography student, Rea Ben David instantly fell in love with the meditative ambiance of the dark room. During his studies at Hadassa Academic College in Jerusalem, he traveled to Germany with Etty Schwartz, a photographer and lecturer who taught him the art of printing. In Düsseldorf, they visited the photography laboratory Grieger, which later became famous for producing large-format prints for the renowned German photographers Thomas Struth, Thomas Ruff and Andreas Gursky. The visit served as a formative experience for Ben David, who opened The Print House a year later, in 2008, with Schwartz in tow. In its first decade of activity, Ben David’s studio has strived to push the boundaries of the medium of photography through its innovative approach to fine art printing and display solutions.
Each year, The Print House provides a print scholarship for three students graduating from the photography departments in colleges and academies throughout Israel, allowing them to exhibit their final projects in the most optimal way. Since 2016, the studio organizes an annual print fair, with limited edition prints by local artists and photographers. The Print House’s expertise plays an integral part in the Israeli art scene, and the studio is regularly involved with the production of simultaneous exhibitions in Israel and abroad. Their work is based on an ongoing dialogue between the highly experienced team at the studio and the emerging and established artists they assist with their creative process.