Maison & Objet’s Fall 2019 show took place this past September. The theme of “Work!” had been set for the season. Given that we now live in a world driven by smart phones, this year’s programme hybridized work with digitalization and mobility. At the forefront were people’s need to personalize their workspaces, and the omnipresent and ever-trending theme of ‘well-being’.
The notion of hotel-like comfort in living spaces has completely altered house aesthetics. As design now shifts its focus on wellbeing, newly re-defined concepts are emerging that emphasize finding a balance between mind, body, and productivity, leading a higher quality lifestyle, creating open spaces, travelling while working, sharing workspaces, and even working from hotels.
A broader profile is driving this shift in focus-not just millennials. The single most important element in this symbiotic relationship, thus, is the material used. The user ought to be able to touch and cultivate an emotional bond that. Natural stone and minerals could not be a better choice!
As part of this year’s Maison&Objet Show and Paris Design Week, we have put together a collection of designs themed around using materials to increase well-being. At Paris Design Week, the Parisian firm Studio Nocc celebrated NellyRodi’s tenth anniversary at the eighteenth-century Hotel Particulier, which is nestled right in the heart of the 9th Arronissement. The two curated a methodology that merges design and science in order to design spaces and objects that rejuvenate the user. They believe in communicating through the material-in this case, natural stone.
In recent years, we have witnessed young designers put forth special initiative projects that are completely independent of space and the gallery, in terms of both their production and exhibition. Theoreme Editions creates alternative collections by picking and uniting such high-valued projects from across the world of design. The end result not only communicates a strong sense of aesthetic, but also master craftsmanship. A prime example of this communication is designer Joris Poggioli’s natural stone Totem Book Shelf, which-in carrying the aesthetic of a totem pole-can be perceived as an interior sculpture, in addition to serving as a storage unit. What’s more, its curved edges soften the often burtalist language of design, and moreover personalize it on multiple levels.
Kim and Company alongside their tectonic aesthetic stood at this year’s Masion&Objet Rising Talents Awards. With designs that weave together marble and steel, the pair has dreamt up an asymmetric series of pieces that are composed of various geometric forms and mathematically complementary colours. Also entering the limelight at the Rising Talents Awards was Bailey Fontaine, a designer who infuses his pieces with a megalopolis aesthetic inspired by natural formations. His Giacometti sculptures, in particular, both add a dimension of motion to the spaces within which they sit, as well as capture a similar aesthetic by unleashing inner-power of materials like sand, coal, salt, mineral, concrete, and gypsum.
