In Charlotte Taylor’s Copenhagen showcase, design gets messy

A messy room created by Charlotte Taylor for her 3 Days of design exhibition — (Image credit: Elizabeth Heltoft))

Amidst the tidy landscape of neatly curated Scandi-style showrooms that unfold at Copenhagen's 3 Days of Design each year, there seems to be a hunger for the mess of real life. Lines are clean, surfaces are bare and uncluttered, yet we’re meant to imagine how these immaculate sofas and unsullied blonde wood tables could to fit within the texture of our own (or, more likely, someone else’s) lives. But in her new exhibition ‘Home from Home’ – a group show staged in collaboration with Noura Residency – Charlotte Taylor has done away with the Scandinavian adherence to minimalism and tonal harmony, with a staging that reflects the chaos of the creative life.

'I feel there is a lack of design showing in a more domestic, accessible way, especially in the context of Copenhagen,' said the designer, perched on a metal chair embossed with wood grain by the Eindhoven-based designer Sheyang Le. The chair sits tucked into a long wood and metal table by Kasper Kyster, scattered with everyday detritus that conjures the notion that its owner simply wandered away mid-working lunch.

There are scraps of doodled-on paper strewn about amongst piles of books, a wooden cutting board with a slice of hard-rind cheese stabbed down the middle by a kitchen knife, as well as several beautifully wrought table top objects by emerging designers, including a sculpted candelabra by the Zurich-based Grace Prince and a delicate metal and paper mobile by London’s Mo Tong. 'It can feel very clean and safe and Scandi here,' she adds.

Each room in the small apartment – a shopfront normally used as a photo studio and event space by Noura Residency – tells a similar story. In the living room, a black and white wool blanket is roughly thrown over a sofa. The bed appears to be just rolled out of after its user has ingested the morning news. It’s a study in lived-in beauty, which comes as no surprise for Taylor, whose career straddles architecture, interiors, and fictional 3D renderings.

But according to the designer, the project became less a mise-en-scène and more an exercise in community building. 'I discovered a lot of new designers in the process, she says. A lot are friends and designers I’ve known for a long time, but many I’ve newly discovered and have built relationships with. The whole project came together by speaking with friends and friends of friends. Everyone was neurotically passionate about it coming together.'

Taylor says that this is just the beginning of the format, which will soon travel to Athens and New York to stage homes away from homes in entirely new contexts.

studiocharlottetaylor.com

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Laura May Todd, Wallpaper's Milan Editor, based in the city, is a Canadian-born journalist covering design, architecture and style. She regularly contributes to a range of international publications, including T: The New York Times Style Magazine, Architectural Digest, Elle Decor, Azure and Sight Unseen, and is about to publish a book on Italian interiors.