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In times of recession, it is said, we long for the classic, the familiar. This leads to furniture makers recycling old products and ideas that are sure to work. In order to succed and remain in the public eye today, furni-

ture makers need to be extra brave and creative. Traditional, Finnish Artek, keeping the legacy of Alvar Aalto’s products alive, celebrates the 80th anniversary of a stool called Stool. They also adopt the recycling trend by selling old, worn vintage furniture in their web shop, 2nd cycleArtek. A good example of keeping one’s legacy alive, I think. We are becoming more and more interested in and knowl-edgeable about interior design, and rather more fastidious in our choice of furniture. Artek are fond of promoting

and re-using classics from the vaults and adding that little extra which might make the piece of furniture a classic in its own right, for example a new colour. This means that one can obtain one’s old favourite with a twist and newly produced to boot.

Some manufacturers concentrate on innovations and develop new materials. Patience and smart ma-chines give rise to new possibilities. Blå Station is a sterling example, a design company which dares to question production processes. They proudly exhibit-ed design duo o4i’s lumpy shell chair at Stockholm Furniture & Light Fair. A revolutionary chair, accord-ing to manager Johan Lindau, since it is challenging both technically speaking and as a design. This elegant chair is made from a very thin material that looks like crumpled paper, but at the same time it is comforta-ble and possible to stack. Technically speaking, it was well-neigh impossible to manufacture it of veneer bending in three different directions.

Classic style with a twist, recycling and multifunction, but also high-level innovation. Z MagaZine’s interior

designer and stylist Camilla Julner has investigated, listened, and seen. Here she

tells us about her favourites and her sources of inspiration. some of what was on display at the exhibition salone del mobile in milano last spring is now available in scandinavia.

By: Camilla Julner

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The chair is the result of hard work and the ability to turn limitations to advantages.

Comeback is a modern version of an old armchair, moulded in plastic and wood, and designed by Patricia Ur-quiola for Kartell. It took seven years to manufacture and is yet another example of impressive, innovative ability.

Also fascinating is Nendo, the design studio whose founder Oki Sato was the Stockholm Furniture & Light Fair's guest of honour. His installation at the entrance was gorgeous and reminiscent of a large fountain. Minimum use of material for maximum effect.

The first time he attended, he be-longed to the new, young, and un-established designers at the section Greenhouse. Thus it was extra exciting to see him back in Sweden, where he now has several collaborating partners, such as Swedese, David Design, and Berga Form. Oki Satos has been called the most brilliant designer of the 21st century and his designs are celebrated for their sublime humour and incessant wish to tell a story. Regarded as a star in the industry, Oki Satos has also worked with Cap-pelini, De Padova, Foscarini, and others.

MonochroMe – entire rooMs in one nuance of

colour

Colour is becoming more and more prevalent, and nowa-days one might see entire rooms, including the objects, in one colour, such as navy blue with elements of black. This makes a wide variety of personal choices possible.

A great source of inspiration for me is to create a sophisticated and lively home in nuances of red for ex-travagant persons who dare to be unconventional, wildly mixing wine-red colours with burnt orange and raspberry red. However, it takes some courage and patience to at-tain the right feeling. One does not design a home in a day. The ambience will be exclusive and sophisticated and confer warmth and a sense of security. We use real rugs and worn leather, resulting in a cosy, classic style. Play with the thought of including traces of various ethnicities and

subcultures, such as gypsies, hippies, sailors, and aborig-ines - or, for that matter, Berbers and Tuaregs draped in enormous lengths of cloth. Or think of the adventurous explorer and scientist, telling a story about inner and outer rooms. Thus the home has become something of a stage, where we want to tell a story about ourselves or somebody else. Since a few years back, this approach is also seen in hotels, bars, and restaurants.

Blue, the new elegance with a touch of ro-

Mance

We Northerners love blue as an accent. Nowadays I’m inspired by interior designs done in elegant dark blue. With new approaches and a mixture of nuances in deep blue, incorporating strains of soft grey and elements of metal, cosy becomes elegant in a wholly new way and of-ten in monochrome or geometric, graphic patterns. Black was also a dominant colour in Milan last spring, as was the accent colour: black. A real aestethic experience was a whole room with beautiful, damast woven silk textiles in humorous patterns and artfully made ravens in fabric by Li Edelkoort, Rubelli at Rossana Orlandi. Black on black is romantic and sensual, creating drama in a home. Midnight blue verging on aubergine, with strains of shining black and in the form of large embroideries and jacquards, is truly beautiful and elegant. Block stripes and pinstripes, speaking directly to our subconscious, are never out of place. I have to admit that I feel affected by all sorts of stripes and in this I am hardly alone. One of the founders of a large, international textile company,

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for protection and solace. Ikea has realised this and are now going big time on textile collections of their own, and on top of that piece-goods and a sewing machine. Hurrah for one’s own creativity! We’d love to see home-made inte-rior design details, not least our curtains and pillows. I and many others like to show off still lifes of various kinds of collections. It could be timeless, unique objects of ethnic provenance, a beautiful seashell or an object of art. Ex-pensive or inexpensive is of no importance. Old-fashioned, unique or simply a loved piece of furniture showing signs of long use. There are truly well-made, newly manufac-tured, comfortable ”antiques” of high quality, as opposed to the newly manufactured, ”old” shabby chic that one

soon tires of. A new furniture collection is RHL Collection, exciting since it is reminiscent of the already classic Ralph Lauren style and with a feeling of an-tique, handpicked furniture, although the result of hours and hours of pains-taking work and with a long life span.

stripe patterns playing with

light

Tatou, the latests lamp designed by Patricia Urquiola for Flos, is an example of open-worked elegance with a beautiful stripe pattern, inspired by ancient, Japanese ar-mour and creating beautiful shadow play. The lamp is available in many different designs and will probably be-come a classic. Marcel Wander’s mirror clear ceiling lamps Valentine and Baby Valentine are sparklingly glamorous and stylishly humorous, the manufacturers Mooi being among my favourites.

the urBan noMads, consciously selling out

their lifestyle

I love to travel and the sense of freedon it entails, but I have a tendency to bring to much stuff. Does that sound fa-miliar? I would prefer to live more in accordance with my ideals, like an urban nomad. I would prefer an exciting, playful life, without too much bothering stuff. I like things to have several functions and attractive colours. Objects serving sev-eral purposes give one freedom to move around, but I haven’t quite attained that goal yet. But the new design generation,

Manuel Canovas di Lorca, says that practically all pat-terns designed by them have to have a couple of stripe patterns complementing the colourful ones.

MovaBle and adaptaBle like noMads

We live in a transition period. We are flexible in our day-to-day lives and able to work practically anywhere. There are more free lancers around and about than ever before, and places of work have become less hierarchical. We work at home, in hotel lobbies, in cafés, and maybe even in an office. Strictly speaking, we don’t need a desk anywhere permanent - the laptop is our desk, with the family pictures on the screen instead of on the shelf. We can be anonymous or choose to sit near whatever col-leagues we like to be around that day. Also, new places of work are being created, a sort of cross between the office at home and the place of work. Coffice in Stockholm is such a place, where members can share office space with colleagues or people in other professions. Here one can book a conference room or a room with private tele-phone in a café environment, in accordance with one’s needs for the day. This I regard as more stimulating and conducive to creativity than working from home.

More textiles to the people!

- The more time we spend in front of screens, the greater our need to feel and experience textiles will be-come, trend guru Le Edelkoort predicts. A textile wave will wash over us, with enormous lenght of cloth, both

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brilliant designer of the 21st century

lnterior design

Colour Carpet presents a sourishly cool colour palette. designed by Scholten & Baijings, Hay mat. ingenious and rather funny shelves. Studio Job’s new collection alt deutsche comprises, apart from a grandfather clock, a chest of drawers and a cupboard with doors featuring humorous, mystic symbols. mooi.

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rising out of a cultural, urban melting pot, combines well-known patterns with unknown, electric colour palettes, cre-ating a very energising mix. Fascinating, technical solutions such as wilderness tents have been sources of inspiration for the lamp Jehanna by Zero. Flowery ornaments, techni-cal materials, and ultra-light constructions play with light and reflections. Lively colours, bold patterns gleaming like candy wrappers, green and pink combined with white - all this makes for endless freshness. Pink is big in art and in interior design pink is now invading the living room as the basic colour. An unexpected mix of Band-Aid pink and pure light pink proves to be a sensuous and wonderful combination. Pink will become the dominating colour in home design in future and I for one look forward to it! Patricia Urquiola’s puffy armchairs and wonderful silk rugs for Moroso, which I saw in Milan last spring.

paper and pop up

Japanese origami and paper in flat dimensions are appearing everywhere and paper is a cheap material to work with. And the need for the tactile and the hand-written is growing. There is talk about the pop up gen-

eration, favouring interactivity and creative solutions

lnterior design

according to one’s needs and without any rules, and this is something we will definitely see a lot more of. The future is already here and we are currently adjusting and adapting to it, and begining to see the possibilities. We might be forced to make more conscious choices - what is really important? A person with a great deal of in-sight and a source of inspiration is, quite naturally, Li Edelkoort.

- Now that we can go online in the forest, our need for the urban lifestyle is no longer as great. On top of that, it is hard to motivate oneself to live in a one-room flat costing as much as a country-house. This has to do with our increased awareness. We choose our lifestyle and our habits with care, says Le Edelkoort. Demands on form, function, and environmentally friendly materi-als are a given for any and all.

Thus the home has become something of a stage, where we want to tell a story about our-selves or somebody else.