With her design partner, Giuseppe Lignano, Tolla has created commercial, institutional and residential properties around the globe. Their firm, LOT-EK, which has offices in both New York and Naples, Italy, is best known for accomplishments in “upcycling”: converting industrial surplus (shipping containers, airplane fuselages) into building materials. Her personal style reflects her love of the unexpected. “I am constantly tipping the balance between what’s simple and what’s interesting,” she says. “I want to be perfectly comfortable and perfectly glamorous at the same time. I think that’s what every great piece of clothing should do for you.” Prized possession? “My leather coat. Every time I wear it, I get compliments, and to this day I don’t know who designed it.”

Issey miyake polyester blouse, polyester scarf and silk and polyester pants; 212-226-0100. Pollini by Nicholas Kirkwood calf-leather sandals; 212-632-9300.
 

Photographed in the Russell-Fontanez apartment, New York City.

Hoang has designed everything from a department store to a planetarium but says the project she’s proudest of is the Switch Building in Manhattan, a seven-story structure on the Lower East Side. The intensity of the collaboration with contractors and craftsmen proved exhilarating, the kind of fiery combustion of work and stress that appeals to Hoang. Similarly, she likes a wow factor in the way she dresses: flowing silhouettes, asymmetrical cuts and major color. Although she believes that in general her work outshines her fashion, she can’t help being attracted to the bold and the beautiful. “I just bought a Diane von Furstenberg shift dress with mini bands of sequins in the image of a tree,” she says. “How could I pass that up?” Her signature color: “This decade, orange. Last decade, red. I’m slowly working my way through the rainbow.”

BCBGmaxazria polyester dress; bcbg.com. Hermes lacquer bracelets; hermes.com for stores.

Photographed At 570 First Street, Brooklyn, New York.

Wilson teaches courses in architectural design, architectural theory, and visual cultural analysis. She received a doctorate in American Studies from New York University in 2007, and an Masters in Architecture from Columbia’s graduate school in 1991. Wilson is an award-winning designer and scholar who has worked on a variety of projects over her many years in the industry. Her collaborative design practices (KW: a and Studio 6Ten) have been competition finalists for several important cultural institutions including lower Manhattan’s African Burial Ground Memorial (with Dean Wolfe Architects) and the Smithsonian’s National Museum for African American History and Culture (with Diller Scofidio + Renfro.) The Wexner Center for the Arts, the Cooper Hewitt National Design Museum’s Triennial, the Storefront for Art and Architecture, and SF Cameraworks have exhibited her installations. She is currently compiling the rich photographic archive from her book, Progress and Prospects, into an experimental exhibit and database as part of the Visible History Project.

The Row tencel and silk top; barneys.com. Lafayette 148 skirt; lafayette148ny.com. Aesa gold necklace; 212-837-2648. Susie Fox gold ring; Yael Sonia, 212-472-6488.

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