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Architecture-school graduates typically begin their careers as apprentices. But when Benjamin Aranda and Chris Lasch left Columbia University in 1999, they swiftly launched their own practice, resolved to explore wondrously elaborate natural geometries and translate them into furnishings and structures—both large and small. "We commit to one shape, sometimes for years," Aranda explains of their firm, ArandaLasch. "Then we see where it leads us."

Over the past decade Aranda and Lasch—who are based in Manhattan and Tucson, Arizona, respectively—have conjured an array of aesthetically adventurous creations, all grounded in a love of science. Their fascination with quasi‑crystals, a naturally occurring phenom- enon distinguished by nonrepeating patterns, led them to devise a collection of furnishings whose faceted, handsomely finished wood components have been assembled into mathematically determined but seemingly organic structures. The line has been a bestseller for New York’s Johnson Trading Gallery, which will debut the pair’s latest furniture and lighting at Design Miami in December. "Some of the new pieces are curvilinear, but they’re rooted in the same kinds of mathematical systems," Lasch says.

Six years ago the firm made a splash when it built a temporary structure reminiscent of a snowflake for Design Miami. Now ArandaLasch is working on three projects in the city’s Design District. One of them, a commercial building slated to open in December, will house a Tom Ford boutique behind a pleated façade of fiberglass-reinforced concrete.

Meanwhile, since 2004, ArandaLasch has been collaborating with artist Matthew Ritchie on a series of lacy sheet-metal sculptures. (Their most recent piece is on view at New York’s Andrea Rosen Gallery through October 22.) And another of the firm’s commissions, arguably their boldest yet, is taking shape across the Atlantic in Libreville, Gabon, where they are constructing an open-air performance space. The venue will feature a stage jutting above the tree line and an expansive roof composed of triangular panels based on fractals, another ArandaLasch passion—but one you need not share in order to appreciate the beauty of their work. For more information go to arandalascom .

Discover more projects by design duo ArandaLasch.