The Monocle Minute
On Design

There’s an almost futuristic feel to this week’s dispatch as we explore a Swedish steel company’s vision to go fossil-free and our writer, Grace Charlton, takes a trip through Skopje’s brutalist landscape. Plus: We tap into the Italian design psyche with architect Massimiliano Locatelli, roll out the red carpet in Dubai (pictured) and visit Paris for a Le Corbusier retrospective.

Refugio is a new space for Copenhagen’s creative community, founded by furniture and bed maker ReFramed and design practice Asca Studio. Established in April this year in a vacant building that the founders renovated for use as their office, it functions as a gallery and event space while providing permanent desks for up to 10 design-minded individuals and small brands. Setting itself apart from regular co-working spaces, Refugio’s members are carefully chosen to ensure a mix of disciplines. “We try to nurture a culture by bringing together members from similar fields from all over the world. We have architects, interior, product and graphic designers and independent brands,” says Kasper Simonsen, ReFramed and Refugio founder. “This mix means that everyone can relate to each other’s work and use their networks to make long-lasting connections.”

Current Refugio members include US-born Cassandra Bradfield, founder of interior and object design studio Asca Studio and Italian-Uruguayan designer Matteo Fogale. Simonsen hopes that this roster will evolve as member businesses grow. “When we were establishing ReFramed, we realised that as a small brand or an independent creative, you have really big highs and really big lows. Those lows can be very lonely if you don't have other creatives around you,” says Simonsen. “Equally, if something exciting happens, you need people to get a drink or celebrate with.” Whether you’re a small brand or creative in Copenhagen in need of a support network (or a drinking buddy), it’s worth reaching out to the team behind Refugio.
reframedbrand.com

Indian carpet maker, Jaipur Rugs, tapped architecture and interior design studio, Roar, to transform a warehouse in the Alserkal creative district of Dubai into the brand’s first showroom. With a pink and terracotta colour palette, the design pays homage to Jaipur’s cultural heritage and architectural style (the capital of Rajasthan is often dubbed the “Pink City” as a result of its many rosy-hued buildings). “Every design starts with a story,” says Nikita Chellani, lead interior designer at Roar. “Here, the genesis was the city of Jaipur and its remarkable aesthetic.”

The open-plan showroom features floor-to-ceiling hanging rugs inspired by Jaipur’s step wells and libraries of rug samples presented on custom sliding panels. The use of materials like cement, marble and metallic rose gold contrast with the textiles on display and a Gabriel Chandelier brings a touch of Dubai glamour to the space. Offices and meeting rooms have also been integrated on the mezzanine level of the showroom, providing a space for Jaipur Rugs’ designers and collaborators to work while visiting the area. designbyroar.com; jaipurrugs.com

Massimiliano Locatelli is the co-founder of architecture firm Locatelli Partners and founder of furniture brand Massimiliano Editions. The Italian architect’s work spans continents with offices in Milan and New York and his projects include everything from high-end residences to bespoke furniture. To find out more about his extensive portfolio and approach to design, we caught up with Locatelli for ‘Monocle on Design’.

How does designing in Italy differ from in the US?
We don’t really have interior decorators in Italy. Though some are emerging now, there were only architects when I started three decades ago. The approach to any project in Italy, therefore, has always been driven by an architectural point of view. It has never been the case that an architect will design a space and then an interior decorator will step in and finish it. Architects work from the beginning to the end of every project. You draw a house for a person but you also choose the chest of drawers that they will put their underwear in. There’s a saying that architects “design from the spoon to the city.”

What’s the benefit of having one person responsible for all of these different facets of design?
You really get to know the people you’re working with. There has to be an understanding between you and the client – it’s important that you’re on the same page and that they know where you are. You need to respect the owner and how they’re going to use the space.

Your work seems to place importance on the person before the design. How has this influenced your practice?
The pieces that we have made are a reflection of our clients’ needs. We don’t just decide to make furniture for the sake of it. I was designing the house of the princess of Hanoi – the daughter of Vietnam’s prime minister – and she wanted a dining room that could host large dinner parties but also function as a living room. So we made a table that could be broken into many pieces, according to the number of people in the room. For example, if there are two people, you take one piece and if there are four, you take two. You can continue in this way until there are 16 people.

For more from Locatelli, tune in to ‘Monocle on Design’ on Monocle Radio.

In the early 1990s, architect Thomas Sandell was fresh out of design school when he was tasked by Swedish furniture firm Asplund to design new wares for its showroom. The inspiration for this occasional table came from 18th-century inns, where Sandell had seen shallow bowls for holding food carved directly into wooden tables. “People always put a bowl on their table,” he tells Monocle. “So, I thought, why not make the bowl a part of the table?”

While the idea was simple enough, it turned out to be complicated to execute. To make the built-in fruit bowl, a carpenter must glue thick wood lamellas under the tabletop and then carve out the smooth recess – at such effort and expense that, it never went into production. Today the statement piece is a reminder that manufacturers should allow fledgling designers to experiment with their ideas, even if they don’t immediately result in mass-market sales. The worst that can come of it is a unique piece of furniture that serves up a surprise, even if it happens to be decades later.

Swedish raw material specialist SSAB aims to be the first eco-friendly steel producer by 2026, having found a way to produce a fossil-free version of the material. It’s an innovation that Norwegian urban furniture manufacturer Vestre has tapped into, using the material to make a sleek and inviting park bench called Tellus. “Converting to fossil-free steel could reduce our overall carbon footprint by about 60 per cent," says Vestre’s chief sustainability officer, Øyvind Bjørnstad.

Designed by Emma Olbers, the light and airy silhouette of Tellus disguises what is a robust frame, capable of enduring the wear and tear of public use. Its arms, devised with enough width to comfortably jot down notes or hold a coffee cup, are a welcome detail. The bench is a chic addition to any city’s catalogue of urban architecture – and a more fossil-friendly one too.
vestre.com

Le Corbusier is a towering figure in modern architecture. Few people, however, are aware of the critical contribution that Swiss interior designer, Heidi Weber, made to his work. Running until the final week of July, the Fondation Le Corbusier is staging a unique exhibition in Paris that pays a special hommage to Weber who, at the age of 96, is his last living collaborator.

The showcase at Maison La Roche includes oil paintings, tapestries and sculptures from the private collection of Heidi Weber, the largest individual collector of Le Corbusier’s artworks. The pieces on show cover the period from 1959, when Weber successfully relaunched Le Corbusier’s long-abandoned furniture line, to 1965, when she commissioned the Swiss-French architect to design the Centre Le Corbusier-Heidi Weber Museum on the shores of Lake Zürich. Even though Weber’s name was stripped from the building’s title (it was controversially renamed the Pavillon Le Corbusier by Zürich’s city hall in 2019), it still stands as a testament to the intertwined legacy of Heidi Weber and the architect – a legacy on show at Maison La Roche.
fondationlecorbusier.fr