The Monocle Minute
On Design

For our first dispatch of the new year, we have good news for US fans of Scandinavian design and speak to Ann Demeulemeester about her latest homeware collection. We also take the temperature of the design world with a desirable ‘iced’ carafe and a cosy new graphic blanket by Italy’s Redduo (pictured). First, Nic Monisse looks forward to a busy year.

Copenhagen-based kitchen-design company Reform has launched a new flagship showroom in a converted warehouse in Brooklyn. The aim? To bring a small piece of Scandinavia to New York. The showroom has been designed in conjunction with fellow Danish company Norm Architects to highlight Reform’s extensive collection of products by embracing the shop’s high ceilings and opting for pared-back interiors and monochrome surfaces that allow the firm’s wares to stand out.

“The showroom is characterised by high ceilings and an industrial appearance,” says Katrine Goldstein, managing director at Norm Architects. “We added a certain warmth by selecting materials and colours that create a distinct residential and welcoming feel. By creating a calm yet grand background for each kitchen to tell its own story, Reform’s level of detail and materiality stands out.”

The new flagship is Reform’s largest showroom investment to date and part of the brand’s broader plans to expand in the US, with construction work on three more showrooms – in Los Angeles, Philadelphia and New Jersey – slated to begin early this year. “We’ll stay true to our brand DNA and the aim of being a design leader within the kitchen industry,” says Jeppe Christensen, CEO and co-founder of Reform, of his firm’s expansion plans. “But we’re also aware that it’s a different market; we’ll need to adapt to American consumers. We have great ambitions for Reform in the US, so this investment is only the beginning.” Good news for North American fans of contemporary Scandinavian design.
reformcph.com; normcph.com

Antwerp has produced more than its fair share of globally revered fashion designers and couturiers, with the likes of Dries Van Noten, Dirk Van Saene and Ann Demeulemeester all graduating from the city’s Royal Academy of Fine Arts. Their work, naturally, has been well represented in the collections of Antwerp’s fashion-focused Mode Museum (Momu) since its opening in 2002. Today, however, it’s more than just their clothes on show: pieces from Demeulemeester’s new collection with Belgian homeware brand Serax can now be found throughout the museum.

These new creations were chosen by the museum to furnish its exhibition galleries. They join a collection of chairs, tables and benches that Demeulemeester designed with her long-term partner and artistic collaborator Patrick Robyn. “It is nice that the public can see and experience our ‘other’ creations [beyond fashion] at Momu,” says Demeulemeester. “It is part of an evolving work that keeps taking on different forms.”

Alongside the elegant beech chairs and chunky oak tables and benches, there is also a custom-made looping sofa that Demeulemeester designed for the museum’s foyer, where it now sits. “The open-circle form serves as an invitation to visitors,” she says. For designers and creatives everywhere, it will also serve as an invitation to fearlessly work across disciplines.
momu.be; serax.com

When Nevio Mattiazzi founded his namesake furniture factory in San Giovanni al Natisone with his brother Fabiano in 1979, the northeastern Italian town was at the heart of the country’s “Triangle of the Chair” – an industrial region dedicated to the production of timber furniture. Over the ensuing decades, the Mattiazzi factory traded on a reputation for producing high-quality wooden chairs by blending traditional manual know-how with industrial, machine-led production methods. It’s an approach that has led the brand to produce its own collections of furniture with a cast of designers and creative directors that includes Konstantin Grcic and Industrial Facility’s Kim Colin and Sam Hecht. We caught up with Nevio to learn more about his company and the surrounding region.

How did the Triangle of the Chair begin?
The contemporary furniture industry and activity was really born here in the 1980s between the municipalities of San Giovanni al Natisone, Manzano and Corno di Rosazzo. This land had been producing chairs for many years before extending to the neighbouring municipalities and becoming the major business of the area. There is a real localised and limited manufacturing system here: during the most flourishing years in the late 20th century, this area used to produce more than 30 per cent of chairs in the global market.

Despite it being cheaper to produce chairs at a commercial scale in other countries, northeast Italy continues to be an important region in the furniture industry. How has it remained relevant?
Nowadays, it remains relevant globally thanks to its traditions and manufacturing skills. There are specialists here in every single process in the field, from bending, wood turning, drying and sanding to painting, pressing, upholstering and assembling. These are specialisations that you cannot learn at a trade school or replicate with a machine. They can only be learnt through experience and many years of work – and each is extremely important for making a great quality product.

How will Mattiazzi and the Triangle of the Chair stay competitive globally?
Nowadays, in order to produce chairs, it’s not enough to have knowledge of the single production processes. As such, we have invested resources in collaborations with famous designers to make high-quality and high-design products that are unique, original and environmentally friendly.

For more on Mattiazzi, listen to ‘Monocle On Design’​​ and pick up a copy of Monocle’s December/January issue.

With New Year’s celebrations continuing this week, it’s essential to have the right equipment for entertaining at home. And this Isat (or “iced”) carafe, designed in the 1930s by Vicke Lindstrand for Swedish glassware brand Orrefors, is an ideal drinks vessel for any host. It can serve as a simple decanter for those who like a neat tipple or it can be used as a cocktail shaker thanks to a stopper that turns between watertight and pour-ready positions. Both the jug and its matching cone-shaped glasses are made from frosted glass to look as though they were chiselled from a block of ice.

Lindstrand was one of Sweden’s pioneering glass artists and worked for Orrefors for 12 years but the Isat carafe has long since gone out of production. The issue might be that it’s best if the martinis made in it are stirred, not shaken: the carafe is less slippery than real ice but it is likely to shatter if it flies out of your hands during an overexcited shake. Still, as long as it’s not James Bond coming over for a nightcap, Isat is an impeccably cool design for mixing a cold beverage.

London-based designer Terence Woodgate has been creating work for British furniture and lighting brand Case since it was founded in 2006 by Paul Newman (the designer, not the Hollywood actor). Woodgate’s latest contribution is a table lamp called Soft, which is available with a black or white finish and as a floor lamp. Featuring a blown opal-glass shade mounted on a slim stainless-steel pole attached to a granite base, Soft’s rounded, conical shape was inspired by the classic standard lamps found in the homes of Woodgate’s mother and grandmother. The piece’s name comes from the warm light that diffuses through the thick acid-etched glass – an effect that adds a gentle glow to any residence.
casefurniture.com

Milan-based homeware brand Redduo’s new collection, Loads of Lines, features handmade blankets created entirely from recycled materials. The brand, which was established in 2018 by life and business partners Fabiola di Virgilio and Andrea Rosso, is driven by its founders’ ambition to make products that they would be proud to use in their own home.

With Loads of Lines, the duo has created a range of striking blankets from discarded wool-based textiles. Every piece is worked on by three different tailors who sew designs onto portions of deadstock fabric. These are then combined and hand-painted with a pattern by Di Virgilio and Rosso. The result is a graphically bold piece that will bring colour to any living space or bedroom – and a cosy blanket to keep you warm on cold winter evenings.
redmilk.space