THE YEAR IN OBJECTS 2025

Eight chapters. Countless moods. From reflection to ritual. these are the objects that shaped design in 2025 - thoughtfully. quietly, and with unmistakable presence

- BY ANKITA RATHOD

This year, luxury burned quieter — but deeper. Across ateliers and studios, the world's most influential creators released objects that did more than decorate; they altered the atmosphere. From Jony Ive × Balmuda's Sailing Lantern, a study in light and ritual, to Vishnu & Lekha Chandran's sculptural glass lamp and Lalique's molten-gold Oceans Candle, 2025 echoed with a new kind of design poetry — one that hummed in glass, brass, and reflection.

Across continents, 2025 marked a shift toward softer, more intuitive design. Studios are slowing down, returning to materials that hold memory — glass that diffuses rather than dazzles, metals that age instead of gleam. It became a year of refinement rather than reinvention, as the world's finest makers are no longer chasing newness, but resonance. Within that quiet, these objects surfaced as the ones that mattered — the pieces that will echo long after the calendar resets.

Designers like Priyanka Shah — with her Patola Carrom for ACM Singapore reaffirmed the country’s mastery of the handmade. Transforming cultural memory into collectible design, threaded with tactility and tradition. And in a year obsessed with texture and craft, Ferris Rafauli’s Château Suprême for La Cornue and Christofle’s Carrousel Set by Charlotte Chesnais proved that even kitchens and tables could smoulder with couture energy.

These are the objects that took years to imagine, hours to perfect, and just seconds to transform a room — pieces that shimmer before they shine, that speak of devotion before decadence. Together, they form a quiet portrait of 2025: a year when design turned inward, slowed its pulse, and rediscovered the beauty of lasting things. A year where material became memory, and luxury returned to its softest, strongest form — not made to impress, but made to endure.

I. THE QUIET FLAME

Objects that alter the atmosphere before they even light up.