Simon Ungless | When Simon Met Ralph
Retrospective
Simon Ungless, “Mrs. Higgenbottom Roadkill”, 2020, Silk and silkscreen print
When Simon Met Ralph Retrospective
The iconic Frank Lloyd Wright Civic Center building in Marin County becomes home to a showcase of the groundbreaking work of Marin-based designers Simon Ungless and Jody Niederkohr, founders of sustainable luxury brand When Simon Met Ralph (WSMR). The exhibit, which fills the Civic Center’s art galleries on the first and third floors, runs October 1, 2026 – January 7, 2027.
Known for their "rehabbed" luxury wear and one-of-a-kind home accessories, this exhibit brings WSMR's expansive creative vision together under one roof. With works selected by the artists in collaboration with Marin Cultural Association, highlights of the exhibit include men's suit jackets printed with WSMR's signature feather print, lace dresses treated to a rubberized overlay, felted wall-hangings/blankets, and never-before-seen graphic wall prints.
"It was important to us to pull together a selection that illustrates the breadth of what we do without losing focus on our signature approach to design," says Ungless.
The exhibit mixes archival items familiar to fans of the brand across the globe and debuts of entirely new pieces. "If the exhibit were exclusively archival items, it wouldn't be an accurate reflection of us, our process, or our brand," explains Niederkohr, "because we're always moving forward creatively."
In addition to their own pieces, the exhibit includes their collaboration with industrial designer turned ceramicist Susan McKinney. In their collaborative series, McKinney and WSMR sourced glass beads from vintage 1920s dresses, embedding them into clay forms. Fired at Cone 5 heat, the pieces let the glass melt into the stone, creating softly variegated tears of color infused into the neat geometry of Susan's weave-like clay creations, inspired by the building itself.
"The collaboration with Susan is so natural, it's almost like play," says Ungless. "So it was also important to us that the selection of our pieces work in harmony with the collaborative pieces."
Ungless's work has been included in many international exhibits, and pieces of his print work, created with friend and early collaborator Alexander McQueen, are part of the permanent collection of The Metropolitan Museum of Art. This exhibit follows Ungless's solo show, A Life In Print, at the University of Wisconsin's Furlong Gallery, which ran February through March 2026. WSMR also created a special commission for the Palm Springs Art Museum earlier this year.
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