Editor's note: Design Phan on the Fly is a regularly occurring wrap-up of design industry news in Greater Philadelphia.

It's been a year since Michael Gruber and John Levitties teamed up to launch JAGR: Projects, a firm whose all-encompassing name is necessitated by its all-encompassing nature. Antiques dealer, interior design firm specializing in residential and hospitality, furniture designer/manufacturer, and art gallery -- JAGR is all of the above. Levitties contributes the antiques expertise and Gruber the interior design chops � he's the designer behind Marc Vetri's Amis Trattoria and Osteria. JAGR's bespoke furniture line, whose designs are informed by styles as varied as turn-of-the-century English and mid-century modern, was a natural outgrowth of the pair's skills. Gruber and Levitties are continuously designing new additions to the 65-piece line that's fabricated completely by local artisans and craftspeople.

The art gallery was a surprise no-brainer that was added when JAGR moved into their vast loft at the Rittenhouse Hotel and noted its surplus of natural light and wall space. "The gallery wasn't part of the original model-- it just evolved," says Gruber as he sketches ideas for the custom chandeliers that'll light up Marc Vetri's next venture, to be located inside the former Wilkie Buick at 600 N. Broad Street. Gruber recently won top honors from the Pennsylvania East Chapter of the American Society of Interior Designers for his work on Amis Trattoria. Expect a similar style -- inviting, warm, and slightly worn � in the former Buick dealership whose cavernous, industrial interior lends itself to the now established Gruber-Vetri vibe.

COLLAB, the modern-design boosters at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, have already begun planning 2011's Design Excellence Award event and exhibition. Iraqi architect and designer Zaha Hadid will be the honoree. Alessi: Ethical and Radical, which opened November 21, the day after Alberto Alessi accepted the 2010 design award, is up until April 10.

Internationally renowned designer Jonathan Adler is spreading his gospel of "happy chic" to Philadelphia. On Dec. 13, Adler opened the 13th store in his groovy, fast-growing empire in Old City at the former site of Foster's Urban Homeware at 33 N. 3rd Street. The two-floor, 3,800-square foot space is his second biggest retail space � the largest is in Santa Monica, California.

Be Like Water, the site-specific installation by Brooklyn artist Aurora Robson at The Skybox inside Fishtown's 2424 Studios, has been extended through January. Independent curator Eileen Tognini, who lured balloon sculptor Jason Hackenwerth to the space in 2009, clearly has an affinity for artists who work with unusual materials. Robson renders recycled plastic bottles and bottle caps ethereal in her stand-alone sculptures and her stunning, 108-foot "waterfall of light and form."

After growing tired of walking into too many corporate office buildings with lobbies decorated with imported plastic trees and ornaments and hot (inefficient) lights, Hellen Pettengill of Urban Botanical has launched a sustainable holiday decorating initiative. Fresh evergreens grown in Pennsylvania or New Jersey are her medium as are cool, LED lights and decorations designed and made by local artists. Her first sustainable display, at a pharmaceutical company in Fort Washington, uses ornaments made by the pewter workshop at the Devereux Whitlock facility in Devon.

Longwood Garden's Chrysanthemum Festival ended in late November, but the meticulous process involved in growing their Thousand Bloom Chrysanthemum will live on forever in this video picked up by widely read industrial-design blog, Core 77.

CAROLINE TIGER is a Philadelphia-based freelance author and journalist who writes often about design, including on her blog design-phan. Find her on Facebook.or send feedback here.

PHOTOS:

John Levittes and Michael Gruber at JAGR Projects

JAGR Projects' showroom and workspace in the Rittenhouse Hotel

John Levittes and Michael Gruber with one of their designs - The Anson Sette couch

The Anson Sette

The Adjacent JAGR Projects Fine Art Gallery

All photographs by MICHAEL PERSICO