THE HOURGLASS

The photographer Nisian Hughes started making furniture because he had none. “I slept on the floor,” he says of his apartment in New York. “All my books were on the floor.” Hughes did not want to buy furniture made by someone else, so one day he made a dining table. Using stainless steel, he built a table that included an interior shelf, over which he placed a sheet of acrylic glass. Underneath the glass, on the shelf, Hughes stored his tableware and cutlery. “It was based on practicality,” he says of the design. “I could stand there and see, ‘That’s the plate that I want.’ And then I could take the plate out and put it right on the table.”

Little by little, Hughes made more pieces. “I didn’t have a bed, so I made one,” he says. Like the dining table, the bed was made of steel and included clever built-in storage spaces, visible through acrylic glass. “Then I made shelves for the books to get them off the floor,” Hughes says. “It kind of went like that.” In time, Hughes had made not only the dining table, bed and bookshelves, but also a sofa bed, baby crib, bedroom vanity and bathroom mirror, all made of steel and Lucite.

For Whisper Editions, Hughes has designed an exclusive side table using his signature combination of materials. Modern and versatile, the table can serve as a centerpiece or a useful yet stylish nightstand. Hughes has created two versions of the table for Whisper, one with a drawer and one without. In each case, Lucite surfaces allow for the table’s contents to be visible. “You can see into the drawer, or you can see through the top,” Hughes says of the table. “You can see right through everything.”

Shop Hughes's edition for Whisper here.