Hermès unveils its new home collections during Salone del Mobile 2021 in Milan; the immersive installation in the exhibition space of La Pelota invites guests to discover furniture, objects and textiles through a multisensory experience.
The set design by Hervé Sauvage takes over the exhibition space, defined by five monumental lime plaster huts resting on a bed of copper-coloured sand and painted with geometric motifs referencing the collection’s palette of colours and shapes. Inside each structure are curved partitions, display elements referencing North African vernacular architecture and solemn altar-like plinths that show the new pieces through an interplay between lights and shadows.
Among the collection’s highlights is Studio Mumbai’s ‘Sillage D’Hermès’ armchair, an organically shaped throne inspired by faraway travels, featuring a wooden structure dressed with a composite material inspired by papier mâché techniques and handcrafted in Puglia. The chair’s hand-painted stripes form a visual connection to Sauvage’s murals and the motif is recreated on the stone surface of the ‘Lignage D’Hermès’ table by Studio Mumbai, made with blue limestone of Hainaut and featuring an impossibly precise repetition of narrow lines.
The chromatic richness of the installation is echoed in the hand-embroidered cotton cord rugs created by Hermès Studio with long-term collaborator, artist Gianpaolo Pagni, whose graphic compositions also form part of a collaboration with American artist Carson Converse. Resulting in the candid ‘New Haven’, ‘Fall River’ and ‘Williamstown’ cashmere quilted bed covers, the collaboration combines Pagni’s childhood inspirations with the sublime quilting championed by Converse, and the pieces’ names nod to American cities where the technique has become an art form.
At the more discreet end of the collection are wooden pieces by Jasper Morrison, furniture that exudes a minimalist design gesture that celebrates the richness of craftsmanship and natural materials, including oak and fawn H bullcalf leather.
The experiential installation is accompanied by a specially developed aural composition by Manuel Rocha Iturbide, Antonio Fernandez Ros and Rogelio Sosa that encourages visitors to discover the collection’s dialogues: between materials, techniques, and harmoniously combined visual universes. §
