There's one category in design that many would rather ignore: the toilet. Functional and unglamorous, this basest of interior objects often remains an afterthought. A ‘high-end’ market exists, but it’s cornered by the Japanese smart toilet: sleek and spaceship-like. If you want sculpture, not software, options are conspicuously limited.

Enter Trone – the brainchild of Hugo Volpei, who launched the French bathroom brand in 2018 on the premise that the humble toilet deserves its moment in the sun. The idea was born during a visit to what may be the world’s most Instagrammed toilets: the two-metre-high egg-shaped pods at London’s Sketch, which have become something of a cultural phenomenon. And yet, inside those eggs? The same white, clinical, forgettable toilet found almost anywhere. What if the fixture itself became the star, Volpei wondered?

A graduate of HEC, France's leading business school, Volpei displayed an early flair for design, reselling customised T-shirts as a child and aspiring to become an architect in his teens. Trone was an offshoot of his final-year thesis, launched with zero industry contacts – just a Google search for ‘toilet manufacturing process’. It was scrappy from day one, with a childhood friend modelling the first prototype.

Then came the company's breakout – a deal with Big Mamma, the restaurant group behind some of Europe's biggest hospitality venues, and a brutal deadline of seven toilets in six months. Volpei brought in an engineer to turn sketches into reality, and the client list has only grown more glamorous since, with names including LVMH, Marriott International and The Berkeley.

The Trone catalogue now spans toilets, basins, flush plates, taps and accessories – sleek one moment, playful the next, in palettes that swing from bold to powder-soft. They come in forms that take a second to register for what they actually are: stepped bowls, asymmetric lids, transparent cisterns. Three hero toilet designs – ‘Callipyge’, ‘Icone’ and the newest arrival, ‘Altesse’ – showcase amorphous curves, glazed coloured ceramic and terrazzo-flecked finishes.

‘Altesse’, unveiled at Milan Design Week 2026, is Trone's answer to the Japanese smart toilet: with the lid closed, it barely registers as a toilet at all, appearing instead as a smooth, wall-mounted pod. Gone is the notorious over-engineering that’s left more than one unsuspecting user in a slapstick standoff with rogue water jets. In its place: a remote tucked behind a discreet ceramic panel.

The basins are equally sculptural, with designs ranging from the doughnut-shaped ‘Orbe’ to ‘Ritual’, where water vanishes into a funnel-shaped vortex, as if being sucked into a black hole.

‘In France and Europe, people generally don't talk about [the toilet],’ observes Volpei. ‘And when they do, they laugh about it. Making this moment “cool” is a huge ambition. Creating desire around an object that's never been desirable – that's the real challenge.’

It’s this irreverence, as much as the genuinely beautiful toilet designs, that gives Trone its appeal. Volpei has built the brand with his tongue firmly in his cheek: Trone means ‘throne’, ‘Altesse’ means ‘highness’, and ‘Callipyge’ is an adjective that means having well-shaped or beautiful buttocks. Because you can’t build a bathroom brand without embracing a little toilet humour.

Yabu Pushelberg design studio founders George Yabu and Glenn Pushelberg came to their Amagansett house by chance, but once they were in, the East Hampton location became a crucial place for them to expand on their design approach. An escape for the Toronto- and New York-based designers, the beachfront house is a clear reflection of the duo's creative values. Durability, purpose, functionality and a soulful minimalism are key elements shaping the space and are evident in the way the designers experience the home.

The pieces from Yabu Pushelberg's ongoing collaboration with Belgian outdoor company Tribù are perfectly at ease in these spaces, from sofas to loungers in natural materials, adapting to the house's many lives throughout the seasons.

Here, the designers invite us in (and out), and tell us a bit about the time they spend in Amagansett.

In Amagansett with Yabu Pushelberg

Wallpaper*: Can you tell us about your summer house?

Glenn Pushelberg: Our house was designed around the protected sand dunes. Because of the landscape, we borrowed a layout more common in yacht design than houses, completely immersing us in the natural surroundings.

The house is split across three levels. The lower level holds two guest suites and a bunk room that sleeps six. We love to host, so this floor tends to take on a life of its own.

George Yabu: The main living space sits on the second level, where the kitchen, dining, and living rooms open onto a wraparound balcony. When we designed the home with Frederick Stelle, we wanted the outdoor deck to feel like an extension of the interior. To do this, we engineered the structure without a corner column, allowing the floor-to-ceiling glass walls to slide completely out of sight. When they're open, the corner disappears entirely. This floor also holds the primary bedroom – meaning everything we need for daily life happens on this single level, where we spend most of our time.

GP: The rooftop is the final level, filled with Tribù pieces and a hot tub. It is our favourite spot to end the night – looking at the stars and listening to the waves.

W*: How did you choose it, and how long have you had it?

GP: The house was completed in June 2012. We found the property entirely by chance while flipping through a real estate column in The Sunday Times on a flight back from London. We weren’t looking for a new place, and when we went to visit, we didn’t love the existing house on the site – but the moment we saw the view and the surrounding neighbourhood, we knew it was home.

W*: When do you usually visit?

GP: We return as often as we can. We try to spend as much time there as possible over the summer because it gives us something we don’t get in Toronto or New York. That sense of quiet and distance is vital for us to have for a few months each year.

W*: How did you put the interiors together?

CP: We didn’t want anything to feel overly formal or precious. The idea is to walk in and immediately feel at ease, instinctively knowing how to use the space.

To bring that feeling to life, we filled the home with a few of our designs for Tribu. Some of the first pieces we brought into the house were the ‘Nodi’ loungers and armchairs – one of our earliest and most well-resolved collections.

Our newest additions are pieces from the Elio collection. It's enveloping and inviting, and has quickly become a favourite of ours.

W*: What role do the materials of the furniture pieces play in your experience of the house?

GY: We chose the materials to directly support how we want the house to feel, keeping everything soft and neutral. The goal wasn’t to make a loud design statement; we wanted the interiors to act as a calm, gentle backdrop that frames the view.

Because the artwork, objects, and furniture are always evolving in our homes, we focus on how pieces interact to create an easy, natural flow. For example, we actually cut our dining table and chairs down by three inches. That subtle, non-standard height brings them closer to the scale of the living room furniture, completely changing the energy. It encourages guests to linger longer over dinner, then flow naturally back into the living space. The materials and the proportions work together to keep the focus exactly where it should be: on the landscape and the company.

W*: What is the best time of the day at the house, and why? 

GP: Late at night, lying in bed and hearing the water and distant sound of the train passing by, or the quiet stillness just before sunrise, right when the birds start to chirp.

GY: Heading up to the roof late at night to stargaze and listen to the waves.

W*: Do you have a favourite view? 

GP: Looking out at the ocean from the living room, I could easily sit there and stare at it all day long, and often, I do… just don’t tell anyone!

GY: Especially with the doors slid completely open.

W*: What is your favourite activity in the area? 

GP: We love hosting, cooking together, visiting the local farmers market, and just enjoying the company of our friends and family.

yabupushelberg.com

Lighting brand Blue Green Works is something of a unique voice in American design. Launched by Wallpaper* US 400 honoree Peter B Staples in 2020 with former business partner James McAvey, it is defined by an open-ended dialogue with vernacular histories fused with Staples' personal perspectives, offering up proportions and silhouettes that are, in his words, ‘bold, and reference decades of work and rooms as inspiration'. Some would call its aesthetic vocabulary minimal, others referential. ‘I'm not in a rush to define it,' says Staples, who honed his palate at leading collectible design gallery The Future Perfect and lighting brand Apparatus, where he cut his teeth learning the ins and outs of the trade.

His open-ended, ever-curious approach has allowed the studio to be exploratory in both its creation and production. Previous collections have included a survey of lighting objects that contemplate symbols of power (from trophies to 1930s military tattoos), and fixtures referencing Horace Gifford's modernist Fire Island homes. Inspiration for the studio's latest series (its seventh) took Staples all the way to the Venetian glass-blowing mecca of Murano. One of the island's leading fabricators had seen Blue Green Works in a magazine article and reached out. The fourth generation owner has since become a close confidante. ‘I hope the friendship is lifelong,' says Staples.

Murano Glass and Blue Green Works

The start of the project was marked by a personal event in Staples' life: as he was en route to Venice to initiate the collaboration, he received news that his beloved mother had died. He boarded a plane, but it wasn't to Italy – instead he flew to the Midwest, where his father still resides in the Gustav Stickley Craftsman home that he grew up in. A few weeks later, Staples picked up the transatlantic journey again and would then spend the next seven months travelling back and forth to the workshops to consult with its furnace experts. ‘It was interesting to be alone in Venice, which is a very weird place in the most incredible way and it would come over me in waves, like “wow, this is me out in the world, and I'm an accumulation of all of the work and love that [my mother] put into me”,' he reflects.

The time spent in Venice resulted in a collection titled ‘Garden'. ‘I needed a medium that was expressive like nothing else I had worked with,' says Staples. ‘Murano glass just felt so natural because it's expressive in its objective state, and draws from hundreds of years of stewardship and artistry. It clicked with me that the kind of emotion I needed to convey at this moment in my life was not something I had in my toolbox. I wanted to make something that was about heartbreak.'

The ‘Garden' collection is defined by clear glass, which is arranged into delicate leaves and feathers, drifting in all directions. ‘There's a stillness when you're rendering something that's alive in conveying motion, but in a solid form,' says Staples. He references the ‘Fountain' and ‘Landscape' chandeliers, where each tentacle of the feathery form almost flutters. Known for its vibrant colours and slick sturdiness, Murano glass favours drama and virtuosity; but instead, Staples pushed for each component to reveal its vulnerabilities with visible edges and unconcealed construction. ‘I've looked at so much Murano glass, but I still haven't found anything that is exactly this,' he says.

While the collection features seven works, each piece is one of one. ‘There are moulds for certain metal shapes, but these works are not being produced and stocked – everything will be created by hand for each client,' says Staples. This adds a further personalised element to this already intimate collection.

‘The more I sit with Murano glass, the more I find ways that can grow the vocabulary we're forming as a studio,' reflects Staples, who says he found a salve in ‘borrowing the emotional vocabulary of another language. So often my work is about distilling ideas and references down to very simple forms. But this project was different from the start'.

bluegreenworks.com

This article appears in the August 2026 Issue of Wallpaper*, available now in print on newsstands, on the Wallpaper* app on Apple iOS, and to subscribers of Apple News +. Subscribe to Wallpaper* today

The classic 1970s ‘Mah Jong’ sofa seems to be on Charli XCX's wish list. In her newly released song, 'Card Declined', her shopping list includes 'a handbag', 'a personality', 'a whole new life' as well as the Roche Bobois, hippy-coded sofa.

‘Mah Jong’ sofa: a 1970s seating landscape

The story of the ‘Mah Jong’ sofa started from an idea of German designer, painter, and sculptor Hans Hopfer, generally recognised for inventing the concept of a 'seating landscape'. His first designs, created in the 1960s for furniture company Mobiliar-Basar, included the ‘Bausystem’ (1965), a streamlined sofa bed design, and the ‘Mobiliante’ (1967), a unique piece that incorporated sofa, love seat and ottoman. Both concepts were based on an idea of essential forms, functionality and responding to the needs of modern life.

This experience led him to create the Mah Jong sofa, for French furniture company Roche Bobois, in 1971. A fully modular, ever-changing seating system, the ‘Mah Jong’ sofa was conceived to adapt to the constant evolution of domestic lifestyles. Bohemian in its execution and based on comfort, durability and flexibility, the ‘Mah Jong’ features a system of cushions upholstered in bold textiles; over the years, the sofa has been dressed by the likes of Kenzo Takada, Missoni and Sonia Rykiel.

For Hopfer, the creation of the ‘Mah Jong’ sofa coincided with the birth of his first child and a pivot towards thinking about a piece of furniture that would serve the life of a family. Initially dubbed 'The Forever Sofa', a name that is also a mission statement for a design piece, it was later renamed after the Chinese tile game its forms closely resemble. The design of the sofa is based on pure modularity, with a corner, back and flat bottom section, which users can combine into virtually infinite compositions.

At the time of its creation, it was an innovative idea to give people the agency to design their own sofa and living space through a series of pieces that could be configured in formats that best suit their users' needs. While the earlier models featured a more streamlined cushion design, over the years the sofa evolved with visible seams and irregular edges, looking like a refined DIY composition and enhancing its mission. Added platforms and outdoor versions (as well as adjustable backs) have expanded the design's scope within the home.

Defined by bold patterns that are often found in mix-and-match compositions and definitely better suited to large spaces, where compositions can truly bring to life its creator's original idea, it is undeniable that the ‘Mah Jong’ sofa makes for an exciting shopping trip indeed.

roche-bobois.com

This is the latest instalment of The Inside Story, Wallpaper’s series spotlighting intriguing, innovative and industry-leading interior design.

On the outskirts of Marseille, where centuries-old pines meet the Mediterranean Sea, interior architect Sandrine Sarah Faivre has transformed a former caretaker’s house into an idyllic coastal retreat. Standing beside the home where her client grew up, Villa Rossignols spans 200 sq m of interiors cascading across three levels, with an equal area of terraces.

The brief for this weekend pied-à-terre centred on two defining features: views of the sea and the majestic pines that shape the landscape. Faivre was determined to preserve two particularly remarkable specimens, regardless of the challenges this posed during construction.

Recreate the mood

The interiors exude the easy elegance of a Mediterranean escape. Sunlight pours in, washing the spaces in a sense of airy, restorative calm. Pine parquet underfoot echoes the trees outside, while pale, fine-grained limestone flows through the terrace level and bathrooms, its textures creating a dialogue between the original structure and the new interventions.

The renovation’s greatest technical challenge lay beneath the house. Being excavated into the rock face, the ceiling height of a new terrace-level floor was compressed; Faivre counterbalanced this by elongating the space, using mirrors to amplify its sense of depth and draw the eye towards the horizon, where west-facing bay windows frame the sea. Full-height curtains filter the intensity of the southern sun, moving softly with the sea breeze. Within this elongated volume, Faivre choreographs a sequence of living zones: a kitchen and dining area, a living room centred around a fireplace, and a cosy reading nook, complete with bespoke oak daybed.

While the architecture speaks the long-established language of Mediterranean summers, the furnishings gave Faivre an opportunity to add some edge. Villa Rossignols becomes a showcase of Marseille’s creative community, bringing together custom padouk-veneer joinery, hand-woven raffia canework, terracotta vessels and ceramics sourced from Moroccan artisans. There are vintage icons by Charlotte Perriand – including the ‘Tabouret Méribel’ stool – and Pierre Chapo's ‘S11’ dining chairs, alongside geometric rugs, wobbly glassware and contemporary artworks.

Perhaps it is inevitable, in the end, that Faivre’s favourite space is the terrace. At its essence, this is a holiday home – a place defined by the space between sand and sea, and shaped by the presence of the pines.

The foosball table – aka table football or baby-foot – isn’t typically associated with luxury or design, conjuring images of dingy pubs and bachelor basements instead. Irish luxury furniture house Orior has set out to change that with a high-end foosball table for the discerning games enthusiast. There's no tacky plastic in sight, no garish green – just a beautiful, handcrafted piece that's as functional as it is striking. It will be available to purchase via Orior's website.

The table's solid wood frame is bold and blocky, anchoring the piece in a warm, rich walnut. The playing field is the real showstopper: 'Irish Green' and 'Orior Crema' marble contrast with the wood – a refined reinterpretation of the Crayola-green felt found on a typical table.

The clean, architectural silhouette carries through in the satin steel-lined interior walls, which lend a industrial counterpoint to the marble and walnut, and in the satin steel rods that run through the frame, capped with solid cast bronze handles. The players are carved from oak and finished with leather detailing and lacquer, while the goals are wrapped in leather. These materials elevate the table into a piece that functions equally as a game and a collectible design object.

There's a story behind the launch – timed to coincide with the recent Fifa World Cup final: Orior's company leaders met as teammates on the Savannah College of Art and Design football team, where a shared love of the sport sparked friendships that would go on to shape the next chapter of the business. The foosball table stands as a tribute to Orior's origins.

For Federico Stefanovich, mimicking nature literally in design misses the point: there’s much more to gain from this vital source of inspiration than just surface level floral patterns or leaf motifs. The Mexican talent – a 2025 Wallpaper* Ascending Star – goes deeper and finds clever ways to evoke the anatomical structures intrinsic to plant and animal life.

Presented by Mexico City’s Ago Projects gallery, Stefanovich's latest collection, Salina, stems from close observations of aquatic organisms – the vast morphology of shells and carapaces beneath the ocean’s surface. Stefanovich has interpreted the essential osseous qualities of these natural elements in the formation of collectible lamp and table designs.

‘Rather than reproduce these references literally, the collection reinterprets them through an abstract lens, seeking to capture the delicate balance between fragility and strength – the rigidity and organic fluidity that characterizes many forms of marine life,’ Stefanovich says. ‘Rather than looking primarily at existing design references or typologies, I tend to begin with structures, behaviours and relationships.’

For Stefanovich, sand-cast bronze is the best process and material to authentically capture the skeleton shapes that keep shells together. 'This process allows me to create intricate yet robust forms – limbs and branches – that can remain hollow and accommodate electrical components when necessary,' he adds.

On top of his interest in natural systems, the designer is also fascinated by the intersection of traditional craftsmanship and contemporary technologies. ‘Much of my work involves moving between handmade processes and digital tools, each informs the other,’ says Stefanovich. ‘Discovering new materials and exploring their possibilities is an important part of the process, as is finding ways to celebrate the traces of making rather than conceal them’.

Fibreglass was chosen for the lampshades because of the material's balance of precision and unpredictability; air bubble imperfections resemble the irregularities one might find on a shell’s surface. Shaped in 3D-printed moulds, the semi-translucent material is ideal for diffusing light. When illuminated, the complex-curve forms reveal all of their textural variations. ‘One material feels skeletal and dense, while the other appears lighter, translucent and almost organic,’ he says. ‘Together they create a tension that becomes central to the collection.'

That’s especially true in the table designs in which Stefanovich attempted to push the limits of asymmetry. 'I’m deeply interested in the engineering dimension of design. Balance, structural logic, assembly and weight distribution are often as important to me as the visual outcome,' he explains.

Stefanovich's solutions are both functional and expressive, allowing the way an object supports itself or comes together to become its identity – just as Mother Nature would have intended.

Fashion designer Jil Sander made her first foray into furniture design in 2025. Collaborating with the German furniture designer Thonet, she brought her minimalist yet innovative approach to reinterpretations of classic Bauhaus designs by Mart Stam, Marcel Breuer, and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe.

Now, she has added two new designs to the resulting JS Thonet collection: the ‘S 411’ lounge chair and the ‘S 1070’ table. Both pieces, rooted in technical developments, offer contemporary takes on classic designs and are available in ‘Serious’ and ‘Nordic’ editions, comprising more sober and lighter colours and finishes, respectively.

The lounge chair takes its framework from a Thonet factory design that dates back to 1932. Its distinct, S-shaped tubular frame combines an elegant cantilevered form with sprung upholstery and is paired with a matching footstool for comfort.

In her design approach, Sander sees herself as closely aligned with the Bauhaus philosophy of elevating everyday objects by marrying functionalism with minimalist aesthetics, but also with Marcel Breuer in particular. ‘It was important to Breuer to combine industrial techniques and components with attractive, high-quality traditional materials such as leather, wood, and tubular steel. He strove to reconcile avant-garde aesthetics with an appreciation for comfort. This approach showed foresight and makes all the difference in the market today.’

She adds, 'The chair appears to defy gravity, in a spirit of constructivism, as if floating freely in space,' she says. 'I wanted to achieve this weightlessness without the glitz of chrome, grounding the “S 411”.'

The JS Thonet collection’s new ‘S 1070’ tables, meanwhile, are an interpretation of a Glen Oliver Löw design from 2004, which itself nodded to Bauhaus designs – in particular, Marcel Breuer’s 1920s ‘B 9’ nesting tables.

Sander has taken the clean-lined piece and added her own finishes and colours, her glossy tabletop nodding to the finish on a Steinway grand piano. ‘To me, colours are like musical notes that can speak to each other and resonate by association,’ she says.

Sander’s purist aesthetic echoes throughout the collection, as Thonet’s creative director Norbert Ruf notes: ‘Jil Sander’s designs have always represented laid-back, elegant luxury and her clothes are worn with pleasure year after year. [She] wants to use her products to convey a sense of value.’

thonet.de

Also in the JS Thonet collection

Club de Mar Mallorca has never been just another marina. Founded in 1972, as Palma was becoming an international sailing destination, it helped draw large yachts from the French Riviera and place the city on the Mediterranean nautical map. After a five-and-a-half-year redevelopment, the club has reopened with whimsical interiors by Madrid-based designer Marta de la Rica.

Sail into Club de Mar in Mallorca

Her brief was to honour the club’s past without turning it into a museum of maritime nostalgia. ‘I wanted to create a unity of purpose through colour, material and shape,’ says de la Rica. She looked to vintage Riva runabouts – their high-varnish hulls, lacquered surfaces and easy glamour – as well as the club’s own 1970s origins, ‘an era that expressed luxury in a very sensorial and relaxed way’.

High-gloss lacquered wood runs through the bars, counters and wall panels, with slats, softened corners and rounded edges giving the rooms a nautical language without anchors on the wall. Light catches the varnish, chrome and glass, warming the interiors as it moves through the space.

The palette borrows from nautical flags, with red, blue and yellow drawn from the International Code of Signals. Stripes appear across upholstery and textiles, while sculptural furniture, rounded geometries, burgundy conical lamps and oval bars give the club a strong visual identity. Much of it was custom-designed, with nautical antiques from the club archive placed throughout: boat models, barometers, anchors and diving helmets. ‘Antiques bring soul and history to a space,’ says de la Rica.

Looking towards Palma’s Old Town and cathedral, the terrace feels afloat. ‘When you’re on the terrace looking out towards the Old Town and the cathedral, it feels as though you’re on a boat,’ says de la Rica. For her, the sea is present ‘not through thematic elements, but through materials, proportions and light’. The result is glossy, graphic and rooted in place: a 1970s-tinged yacht club interior that knows exactly where it belongs.

Club de Mar is located at Muelle Pelaires, 07015 Palma, Balearic Islands, Spain

This is the latest instalment of The Inside Story, Wallpaper’s series spotlighting intriguing, innovative and industry-leading interior design.

At the top of Regent's Park Road, where Primrose Hill's terraces begin their steep climb, a tall, narrow townhouse manages to feel both serious and unserious, sophisticated yet lighthearted.

Home to a couple and their dog, the three-storey house had a specific brief – one that isn't requested enough in a world of extreme curation in high-end design: the ability to not feel ‘overly interior designed’. Finding an interior designer to execute this wasn't necessarily easy, but in 2021 the couple came across Studio Iro's breezy, under-curated work in a magazine feature.

The architectural bones were already in place, courtesy of Chassay & Last, who opened the rear of the house into a double-height volume, slotted a mezzanine above the kitchen, and installed a stone, blackened-steel and glass staircase, drawn together with a shadow-gap detail sharp enough to cut.

Recreate the mood

Onto this, Studio Iro refined the layouts and specified finishes in a way that never feels over-engineered. Central to achieving this are the colour threads running through the house: a blue leopard-print carpet in the hallway sets the indigo undertone found throughout the property, echoed in a deep navy in the bedroom, lavender-grey stone in one bathroom and ridged dark-blue glazed tiles below ground. A burnt-orange sofa and terracotta accents on the top floor provide the contrast.

Texture plays an equally important role in lending sophistication. Clay Works limewash brings a soft, chalky quality to the primary bedroom and bathroom, while limewashed wood, stone and microcement create a tactile backdrop throughout. On the lower ground floor, microcement flows from the open-plan interior out into the garden, pairing with blackened-steel kitchen cabinetry and exposed brick for a calm, industrial feel.

Where the house does allow itself a flourish, it's a considered one: a kitchen island developed with Adam Blencowe, and a custom chest of drawers, vanity console and rug for the primary bedroom. The kitchen, built with Roundhouse, sets a Caesarstone worktop against blue-painted timber joinery; De La Espada dining chairs gather around a table the clients already owned.

That instinct – to add rather than replace – runs through the whole project. The clients' collection of modernist furniture, some of it decades old, wasn't cleared out to make way for something new. Instead, Studio Iro folded it back in, setting it alongside contemporary pieces in kindred materials.

The refusal to over-assert gives this house its authority. Studio Iro's real skill here isn't visible in any single room – it's in everything left alone, and every decision not to push further than necessary.

An often overlooked genre, outdoor showers are on the rise. Versatile and practical, they elevate outdoor spaces and offer both a pause from the heat and a practical solution to cool off in the Summer. A must-have poolside tool, we also like the idea of an outdoor shower as an indulgent, refreshing addition to a garden space.

We look at five recent outdoor shower designs that we'd like to have in our backyard right now.

Five outdoor showers we love

FormaLibera by Pierattelli Architetture for IB Rubinetterie

FormaLibera is a modular and customisable outdoor shower system by Pierattelli Architetture for IB Rubinetterie that is both a minimal design and an ultra-accessorised functional object. The idea, the architects explains, comes from showering in unconventional outdoor settings, from a field to a remote beach. From this, a first concept featured a portable version that comes with a dedicated kit and case to be easily transported and used anywhere. Evolving into a freestanding or wall-mounted shower system, FormaLibera is defined by accessory bars, soap holders and multi-purpose supports.

weareib.it

Pool by Roca

One of the leading bathrooms and faucets companies globally, Spanish brand Roca is expanding its offering outside the washroom and into outdoor spaces with Pool, a new shower that combines a minimal design with the company's expertise. The elegant, sleek outdoor shower is designed with versatility in mind, imagined for both residential environment as well as hospitality and wellness spaces. The minimalist silhouette is available in both wall-mounted and freestanding and a palette that will bring a joyful touch of colour to your garden.

roca.com

FFQT by Formafantasma for QuadroDesign

For their outdoor shower for Italian bathroom specialist QuadroDesign, Formafantasma decided not to reinvent the wheel, and instead to play on the genre's most intuitive iteration. 'Sometimes a design is effective when it is at its most subtle state, what stands out, are the services it provides,' say the designers, perfectly describing their concept. The outdoor shower is simply a stainless steel support onto which a standard hose can be installed: an ingenious way to make the most with a simple gesture.

quadrodesign.it

Bold by Natalino Malasorti for Cea Design

Cea Design's Bold by Natalino Malasorti is the result of extensive technological research to create a freestanding outdoor shower that is both minimal and powerful. The elegant stainless steel body is resistant to corrosion and the adjustable showerhead allows for options that include a rain jet or aerated rain jet, wider or closer.

ceadesign.it

Outdoor Shower by Cristina

This outdoor shower by Italian bathroom brand Cristina was conceived to be an unobtrusive, discreet presence in an outdoor setting. Its sinuous minimalist design is characterised by a freestanding design paired steel for durability and withstanding being exposed to all climates. Products like this outdoor shower affirm the brand's mission to offer 'solutions designed not to revolutionize, but to evolve what already exists sustainably and consciously.'

cristinarubinetterie.com

Today, two seemingly disparate worlds collide: the vibrant universe of British-Nigerian artist and designer Yinka Ilori MBE, and Dunelm, the UK's largest homeware retailer. As of today (8 July 2026), the pair are launching a summery new collection, available online and in selected stores.

Anyone familiar with Ilori's work will know that his visual language is joyous, often built around vibrant shades and geometric patterns (as seen in his recent London exhibition, ‘Joy Through Resistance’, and his Milan Design Week collaboration with Veuve Clicquot). That sensibility runs throughout the 40 pieces in the Dunelm collection, which spans furniture, bedding, lighting, rugs and soft furnishings, with prices ranging from an accessible £9 cotton jacquard hand towel to a £799 king-size boucle ottoman bed.

Ilori felt a personal connection to Dunelm's origins as a market stall in Leicester, having grown up around his parents' local supermarket in north London. ‘What struck me about Dunelm's beginnings was their love for community,’ he explains. ‘Growing up in a working-class environment, community was everything for my family. There were similarities with this and Dunelm's beginnings as a market stall – how they sought community.’

That focus runs through the collection. Many pieces draw on the diverse communities that shaped Leicester's textile industry across the 20th century, with floral patterns referencing national flowers from countries including India and Pakistan, in a nod to the city's Asian, African and Caribbean cultures. This commitment to authenticity extends to the campaign photography, which features real Dunelm employees.

Shop the collection

A handful of pieces have emerged as favourites among the design team and Ilori himself. The ‘Sweet Flows’ swivel chair (£299) is a colourful, pattern-rich armchair that he says ‘instantly makes you want to smile’. ‘Home interiors can be quite serious, so I chose a colourful palette and vibrant pattern that is immediately engaging. It sparks joy and stands on its own as a piece of art. It's also really comfortable!’

The ‘Bell LED’ lamp (£65), meanwhile, feels ‘very playful and nostalgic’, Ilori continues. ‘It's a classic and timeless piece that would feel at home in the 70s or 80s. There are also elements that feel quite art deco.’

The ‘Net Floral’ duvet cover set (from £16) reimagines the classic British net curtain with floral motifs, while the ‘Gerbera’ cushion (£26) combines crewel wool embroidery with a geometric floral pattern. The ‘Kaleidoscope’ floral round rug (from £135) is a handmade, 100 per cent wool piece with a textured, bobbled finish, and the ‘Half-Log’ sideboard (£599) brings a sculptural silhouette to life with a warm oak finish and chrome legs.

Both Ilori and Dunelm frame the collaboration around the shared belief that good design shouldn't be reserved for a select few. ‘I think it's important we design objects that are rich in storytelling, that speak to people in different ways and that celebrate unique ideas,' says Ilori. 'I hope this collection brings joy into people's everyday lives.’

Yinka Ilori's collection for Dunelm is available to shop from today.

Today (8 July 2026), British designer Faye Toogood unveils her latest collection. ‘Bone, Roll, Slump’ comprises furniture pieces that have an air of the archaeological about them – objects that feel found or unearthed rather than made.

The first chapter, ‘Bone’, centres on a dining collection inspired by mudlarked bones and fossils. At its heart is the ‘Bone Table’, a monolithic superellipse carved from solid oak. Asymmetrical in form, it is available in an eight-seat version or a smaller, more circular table for six.

Rather than being lacquered, the oak is oiled, preserving its natural texture and allowing the material to age gracefully. Four circular piercings punctuate the tabletop, recalling the oversized timber plugs once used in traditional joinery. They expose the oak's vertical grain while anchoring the surface to its stout, rounded legs. The swollen, sculptural profile of those legs, shared by the table and its chairs, reference knucklebones – once used in games and divination.

The ‘Bone Chairs’, meanwhile, stand on two solid legs, adopting a primal stance. Beneath their tactile exterior lies a timber frame sculpted with wool, coconut husk and natural latex – upholstered in bouclé as standard, with other fabrics available. The family comprises a dining chair, an armchair and an oversized ‘Jumbo’ armchair.

Where ‘Bone’ feels excavated, ‘Roll’ is more contained, while retaining the collection's preoccupation with weight, volume and organic geometry. Three-drawer consoles and single-drawer bedside tables take the form of rounded timber lozenges resting on stout, trunk-like bases or, alternatively, cantilevering from the wall. The grain follows the curvature of each piece, while finishes include golden oak, rich walnut and ash stained in ‘Chalk’, ‘Putty’ or ‘Malachite’.

The collection concludes with ‘Soft Slump’ – asymmetrical, bagel-like lounge chairs which appear to collapse gently into themselves. The effect is achieved through an unconventional construction: rather than stretching upholstery taut, around four metres of fabric are gathered and cinched, a bit like the drawstring of a duffel bag, creating deep folds. Set atop either hand-forged, dimpled steel legs or industrial castors, Toogood insists these are also the most comfortable chairs she has ever made.

'Bone, Roll, Slump' is unique, intriguing and pleasingly tactile – a quality that makes it feel both contemporary and somehow elemental.

Pieces from the collection can be purchased from Faye Toogood’s website.

This is the latest instalment of The Inside Story, Wallpaper’s series spotlighting intriguing, innovative and industry-leading interior design.

Talk of New York's real estate scene currently centres on 262 Fifth Avenue, a new residential tower rising on one of Manhattan's most famous streets. Standing 860 feet and 52 storeys tall, the project marks the first New York collaboration between Meganom and Norm Architects, with Five Points Development Group behind its delivery. Italian design house Molteni&C was tapped to furnish the interiors; today, Wallpaper* takes a look inside.

In a skyline increasingly defined by its density, 262 Fifth Avenue takes a more restrained approach. The building comprises just 26 full-floor and duplex residences, allowing generosity of space to become its defining luxury. That sense of deliberation continues in the architecture itself: each home is column-free, creating uninterrupted living spaces – and uninterrupted views of Manhattan.

Norm Architects, responsible for the interiors, describe each residence as a ‘sanctuary in the sky’ – places of calm that sit above the city's tumult while remaining intrinsically connected to it. The Copenhagen studio draws on its understated vocabulary of natural materials, fine craftsmanship and muted tones, producing spaces that feel subtly luxurious rather than ostentatious.

Molteni&C contributes two of the home's defining architectural elements: the 'Prime' kitchen and the 'Gliss Master Filo Door' wardrobe system. Installed throughout every residence, the kitchen combines natural stone and wood veneers which harmonise with the palette of tactile, understated finishes. Its pared-back geometry lends the living spaces a soothing architectural rhythm, balancing New York's metropolitan sensibility with the material rigour of Italian craftsmanship.

The partnership builds on Molteni&C's longstanding history of collaborating with architects and developers on landmark residential buildings. At 262 Fifth Avenue, the brand showcases a level of craftsmanship that has room to breathe, helping the tower stand apart in an increasingly homogeneous landscape of Manhattan luxury developments.

If you love vintage furniture and British heritage design, this one's for you. Pre-loved furniture marketplace Vinterior is joining forces with British design house Liberty London on a five-piece capsule collection, launching today (1 July 2026), which pairs meticulously sourced midcentury and modernist furniture with fabrics drawn from Liberty's archive.

The collaboration is led by Liberty's head of design for home and interiors, Genevieve Bennett, who selected each furniture piece with specific fabrics in mind. The result is a tightly curated edit that bridges the design philosophies of both brands: Vinterior's commitment to circular furnishing and Liberty's century-and-a-half tradition of textile innovation.

Our favourite pieces from the collection include a ‘Cassina Maralunga’ two-seater sofa, originally designed by Vico Magistretti for the Italian manufacturer Cassina, now upholstered in Liberty's ‘Shadow Stripe Weave’ in ‘Amalfi’, a pattern drawing on Futurist and Vorticist influences. Equally covetable is an early 1970s ‘Alky’ chair, designed by Giancarlo Piretti and produced by Anonima Castelli, finished in Liberty's ‘Zig Zag Velvet’ from the ‘FuturLiberty’ range, a jacquard velvet referencing early 20th-century design and the energy of jazz-age dance.

The collection also features two 1960s Vico Magistretti ‘Carimate’ chairs, sourced from Vinterior's archive and dressed in Liberty's densely embroidered ‘Mount Stitch’ fabric in ‘Acacia’, a woodland and mountain-inspired print that pops against the chairs' red frames. A 1960s Swedish ‘Lamino’ footstool is covered in Liberty's ‘Cravat’ fabric in ‘Scarab Lacquer’, chosen to complement its curved silhouette, while a vintage 1960s beech standard lamp is finished with a bespoke Liberty lampshade in ‘Ottoman Spot’ velvet, a design inspired by a 19th-century artwork unearthed in the Liberty archive.

‘[Liberty’s] designs have outlasted trends for over 150 years, and the pieces in this collection have done the same. That's the spirit this partnership is built on: timeless design, beautifully made, built to last,’ says Vinterior founder and CEO Sandrine Zhang Ferron.

‘We were naturally drawn to fabrics from our FuturLiberty and The House of Liberty collections, inspired by the same 1960s-70s periods as the selected furniture pieces – each fabric felt perfectly aligned in history and aesthetic,’ adds Bennett. ‘Sculptural, curved silhouettes juxtapose dynamic geometrics, charming scenic landscapes and bold textures.’

With just five pieces available, this collection is unlikely to stay on the market for long. Shop the furniture below for a rare opportunity to own a timeless piece of design history, reimagined for the present.

Shop the pieces

Dae Lim started his apparel and lifestyle brand Sundae School based on a cheeky proposition: ‘What if God was Korean and smoked weed every day?’

Eight years later, that concept – a label that would showcase Lim’s rich Korean heritage with an ethos that was equal parts streetwear and stoner – has evolved into a cult New York-based e-commerce brand, known for its distinctly-styled relaxed-fit hoodies, chinos, batik bandanas and, yes, mochi edibles.

The opportunity to open a bricks-and-mortar store offered something more: to cater to Lim’s community. ‘I knew [the location] had to be Chinatown,’ Lim says. ‘The Asian American diaspora started here. We wanted to plant a stake in the ground where our roots are.’

He found the perfect spot in a compact, 450 sq ft storefront on Hester Street, once home to the studio of minimalist artist Sol LeWitt. Conveniently, Dae’s husband Nohar Agadi is an architect, who cut his teeth at Foster + Partners before starting his own studio, Nohar’s Ark.

Much like the garments and accessories Lim and his team design (‘We’ve aimed to distill the hanbok costume tradition in wearable, modern uniforms,’ he says), the flagship is sleek and pared back, with selective embellishments. In particular, Agadi chose to reference the Haeinsa temple in South Gyeongsang Province, South Korea, a Unesco World Heritage List site famous for its collection of Buddhist writings, in his design. At the temple, 80,000 texts are kept in a wooden shelf system, an element Abadu referenced when developing the store’s modular aluminum display system.

The open structure, kit-of-parts seamlessly incorporates screw-in hanging bars and racks. Depending on the use of the flexible space – playing host to a community gathering, launch, or the screening of a World Cup football match – this solution can be easily reconfigured. Above, a grid of light-strip fixtures, developed with lighting designer Frank Favia, mimics the paper lantern canopies that cover traditional temple courtyards.

‘The interesting thing about [Korean temples’ spaces] is that they’re laid out to take visitors on a journey,’ Agadi explains. ‘A series of gates lead them from a secular into a spiritual and sacred world. Here, we're expressing this condition with a layering of different, carefully selected materials, helping people transition off of the street.’

While the room-within-a-room’s modular display system is made up of hyper-engineered aluminum components, the interior is wrapped in light pink (reminiscent of the Korean hibiscus flower) floor-to-ceiling curtains that also help to section off two changing rooms and conceal offices.

Lim, Agadi and co-architect Andy Kim tapped Seoul-based talent Hyunhee Kim to create a series of custom artworks, based on Sundae School’s logo, a clever amalgam of the Korean national emblem emblazoned with the word Ddul (weed in Korean). The insignia carries through the shop on from a large backdrop panel to a custom display table. The same five-petal shape adorns frosted acrylic panes inserted within the shelving system.

Reinterpreted traditional Korean doors imbue the store with an additional layer of architectural resonance. They also help to conceptually welcome in customers and visitors – creating a new type of sacred space for Sundae School’s thriving community.

Sundae School is located at 117 Hester St, New York, NY 10002.

This is the latest instalment of The Inside Story, Wallpaper’s series spotlighting intriguing, innovative and industry-leading interior design.

Nestled at the base of the San Gabriel Mountains in Sierra Madre, a 1947 adobe home – a traditional building method using sun-dried bricks of organic materials – has been reimagined. Removed from the noise and polish of Los Angeles, this neighbourhood is shaded by California oaks, eucalyptus and pine, and shares its hillside with bears. It's an unusual setting for a design story.

The home’s transformation began with a fire that destroyed much of the structure, leaving only the original adobe brick wall standing. Rather than rebuild from scratch, designer Kirsten Blazek of A1000XBetter chose to work with what remained.

‘The overall vision was to maintain as much of the original character and style of the home as possible, while making it more functional for modern living,’ she explains. New rooms were added – a kitchen, a primary suite, a family room – though the expansion was restrained. ‘We worked mainly within the original footprint,’ the designer notes, ‘only adding a small amount of square footage for the primary closet.’

On the original adobe side, the layout was left untouched. The hallway windows, original to the 1947 build and ‘one of [Blazek’s] favourite features’, were preserved. ‘I wanted the house to feel like a modern California hacienda,’ she says of her guiding aesthetic, ‘and embraced that through every colour choice and finish.'

That palette draws directly from the landscape. Dunn-Edwards paints in warm, grounded tones – including an exterior shade named ‘Wild Horses’ – echo the surrounding terrain and scrubland. ‘I very much gravitate to an earth-based palette,’ says Blazek, ‘and the location at the base of the San Gabriel Mountains made that feel completely natural.’

Recreate the mood

The interiors, meanwhile, speak to a lifelong passion. ‘I have a deep connection with the American Southwest and have long collected Native American and western-influenced art and objects,’ she says. Yet the rooms never tip into pastiche. Midcentury furniture – sourced from MidcenturyLA, Amsterdam Modern and Lawson-Fenning – grounds the collected pieces with clean, modern lines. Rugs from Pampa and Salam Hello add warmth underfoot; drapery by Zak and Fox frames the windows. ‘I never want my work to feel too referential,’ Blazek reflects. ‘I love midcentury lines, so there's a pleasing blend of both genres throughout.’

Among her favourite moments is the dining room fireplace – original to the house, but updated with dimensional tile from Lofa Tile. Nearby, a framed print by artist Mark Maggiori anchors the wall. ‘It's one of my favourite pieces,’ she says. ‘I was grateful to finally find the perfect place for it.’

Between the ancient craft of adobe and the clean geometry of midcentury design, this renovation represents both preservation and reinvention – a modern hacienda rooted in its land, its past and the strength of Blazek’s vision.

It has been 11 years since Ilse Crawford launched her first collaboration with Ikea, marking a new chapter in the Swedish retailer's relationship with independent designers. Called 'Sinnerlig', the collection of cork and natural-fibre homeware translated Crawford's human-centred design approach into products available at Ikea's scale, and scooped her a 2016 Wallpaper* Design Award in the process. While some pieces from that first collection remain in production – including the popular bamboo pendant lamp – many sold out quickly, becoming collectors' items that now command several times their original price on resale sites.

Now, Crawford revisits the partnership with ‘Halgatt’, a pair of table lamps made from ceramic, linen and brass. Rendered in the earth-toned materials Crawford describes as 'classic', the designs embody the visual warmth and tactility that have long been hallmarks of her work.

One comprises a white stoneware block with a matching linen shade – square and architectural, tone-on-tone. The other pairs a dark cylindrical ceramic base with a beige linen shade. Both feature neat brass dimmer switches on their side. It’s the sort of understated design that you can imagine fitting into any interior, which, as Crawford explains, was her intention.

‘When I design lamps, I want them to bring warmth and life to a room,’ the designer reflects. ‘The challenge is to capture a classic's qualities – the right proportions, choice of materials and shade, and a timelessness that makes the lamp always feel relevant. My inspiration for “Halgatt” comes from how we live our lives. The lamps have a versatility that supports the decor rather than dominating it – and are just as suitable in the living room as in a dining room, a bedroom or a work area.’

Crawford, who began her career as the founding editor of Elle Decoration before establishing Studioilse in London, has built an international reputation for designs that prioritise human experience. From furniture collections and homeware to hospitality projects including Cathay Pacific's acclaimed airport lounges, her work is guided by a belief that good design should support everyday life through care, comfort, trust, soul, dignity, generosity and resourcefulness.

Writing in Wallpaper's February 2025 issue, Crawford reflected on these values: 'We believe that design is a tool for building new and better models for life and living. In the studio, we think about how we can “elevate the elemental”, by which we mean prioritising the tactility of the things we touch daily, optimising natural light and celebrating natural materials to support humane experiences.'

The Ikea x Ilse Crawford ‘Halgatt’ collection is available online and in UK stores, with the beige/brown ceramic lamp retailing at £35 and the white ceramic lamp retailing at £25.

The work of Laurids Gallée is defined by a distinctive sense of colour expressed through transparencies. Working primarily in polymer resin (with occasional experiments in wood or aluminium), the Austrian designer gives the material an almost liquid quality, playing with shape and colour to create objects that defy traditional forms. ‘The creative process is characterised by a mandatory playfulness,’ he says of his work, which is still guided by a serious approach to both traditional and contemporary craftsmanship, and functionality as the final goal (lighting design being a preferred medium).

Despite the glass-like appearance of many of his works, Gallée had never worked with the material until recently, when he collaborated with Moser on a new series of glass vessels. Dubbed ‘Axis’, the collection explores the Czech glassmaker’s creative director Jan Plecháč‘s vision of pushing the expressive boundaries of crystal glass and its manufacturing possibilities. The pieces are defined by an architectural approach (nodding to early 20th-century modernism), with grid-like cuts defining their design in ‘Rosalin’, Moser’s traditional pink hue, which is rendered from a rich brick-like tone on the thick base of the vessels to a delicate shade towards the top.

Within the collection, which also includes tumblers, saucers and a carafe, the vase was particularly challenging to create and pushed the boundaries of the material and the Moser glassmaking workshop. Blown into a mould characterised by a sharp angle, the vase features an angular exterior and round core, both a pure expression of the craft and a feat of technical ability (it can be mouth-blown by only the most experienced glassblowers).

‘Pushing the absolute limits of what’s technically possible is truly exciting,’ comments Gallée. ‘I have immense respect for the craftsmanship of the team at Moser, who have not only surpassed those limits, but even extended them further. It’s an enormous honour for me to work with someone who’s taken their art to such perfection.’

When Roy Halston Frowick – the Iowa-born fashion designer better known as ‘Halston’ – designed a garment, he wanted to make it ‘more simple’, ‘more American,’ and ‘more contemporary’, he said.

Halston took a similar approach to his office design, located in an International Style skyscraper designed by Skidmore Owings & Merrill (SOM) in Manhattan. With its vertiginous Fifth Avenue views, red carpet, glass expanses and mirrored walls, the HQ embodied what made the designer the clothier of the 1970s: minimalism, freshness and a healthy dose of sex appeal.

The office also featured minimal chairs specially created for the fashion designer in 1979 by Charles Pfister, who led interiors at SOM for 15 years. The furnishings echoed the modernist qualities of the skyscraper they were in: a gleaming tubular-steel frame and a cantilevered profile that supported the sitter just so.

Though the chair design had the potential to become a design classic, it remained a one-off for Halston’s office. Nearly half a century later, though, SOM has dusted off the design and revived the chair in partnership with Ikonstudio, a contract furniture company owned by Teknion (an earlier collection resurrected designs from Louis Kahn’s archive).

Just like Halston’s own seats, the ‘SOM79’ chair features a hand-polished chrome frame and dark leather upholstery. Ikonstudio, however, has reworked it slightly, to align with contemporary manufacturing techniques, ergonomic principles and sustainability standards.

The company has also released a complementary ‘SOM79’ table, which features a matching tubular frame that, when viewed through the transparent glass tabletop, creates the form of an ‘H’ to honour its original patron.

The chairs were teased in May 2026 at New York Design Week as part of the Afternoon Light fair, and launched in June during Chicago’s Design Days. They are now available to purchase through Ikonstudio, to be specified in homes, offices and hospitality spaces.

And there is more in store for SOM: later in the year, in tandem with Form Portfolios, it will launch a new archival collection with the American furniture company Haworth.

‘These works emerged from a moment when architecture firms were deeply engaged in every aspect of the built environment,’ said SOM partner Julia Murphy in a press release, ‘down to the scale of the chair’ – a philosophy, clearly, that has never gone out of style.

This is the latest instalment of The Inside Story, Wallpaper’s series spotlighting intriguing, innovative and industry-leading interior design.

In a waterfront enclave of Red Hook, Brooklyn, a loft in the historic New York Dock Building served as an industrial landmark, a cabinet of curiosities sourced from across the globe, and – above all – the home of interior designer Laurie Blumenfeld and her husband, Robert Russo. Conceived and executed by Blumenfeld's studio, the space takes raw industrial architecture and coaxes it toward warmth and worldliness.

Built in 1910 as a warehouse for the New York Dock Company, the building arrives with all the industrial splendour one might hope for: soaring beamed ceilings, 13ft metal-framed windows, and original concrete columns still bearing traces of graffiti from the building's years as an unofficial street art museum. The structure was reimagined into residences in 2018.

When Blumenfeld arrived, she set out to build on its spirit, treating the home as a kind of autobiography rendered in objects. The result is part gallery, part travel journal, part family heirloom – filled with pieces old and new from South Africa, India, Greece, Peru, Vietnam, Brazil, Turkey and Italy, each woven naturally into the interior rather than displayed as trophies.

Among the most compelling of the apartment's stories: a visit to the Basquiat and Warhol exhibition at Fondation Louis Vuitton in Paris led Blumenfeld to commission a large-scale artwork from artist Alex Mitrecey for the living room. Around it, other vignettes unfold – a ceramic bowl from Umbria, a soapstone sculpture from Cape Town, chairs by Brazilian designer Juliana Vasconcellos alongside ‘Wassily’ chairs, Marcel Breuer's 1925 Bauhaus classic.

Recreate the mood

The neutral palette – black, taupe, ivory, gunmetal gray and white – serves a dual purpose: canvas for the eclectic objects on show, and complement to the building's industrial character. Powder-coated black metal echoes the factory-style window frames and threads through the kitchen, office and bedroom. Cerused wood, sheepskin, travertine and glass bring warmth, while colour arrives deliberately – through large-scale art and a striking antique concave mirror in the primary bedroom.

Then there are moments that depart from the script entirely. The powder room, draped in Farrow & Ball's ‘Paean Black’ in limewash and anchored by an asymmetrical vanity in Cipollina Ondulato Rosso marble, is moody and immersive – a world apart from the airy openness of the living areas.

Yet for all its gallery-like qualities, there is no mistaking this loft for anything other than a home. Russo loves to cook, and the bespoke kitchen storage system – a sculptural centrepiece that immediately draws the eye – was designed with dinner parties in mind. Each room also carries an original piece designed by Blumenfeld's studio: a personal signature that runs through the whole.

Red Hook, Blumenfeld says, is ‘a place where past and present coexist effortlessly’ – and the loft holds true to that: industrial and intimate, globally sourced and place-specific.

'I have a strong desire to escape from the forces of gravitation, to free myself from gravity and float free': these words shine a light on the essence of Shiro Kuramata. Playful and poetic, radical and innovative, Kuramata was a pivotal figure in 20th-century Japanese design – and continues to leave an imprint, with lingering traces of his furniture, objects and interior spaces exploring notions of materiality, lightness and perception.

Shiro Kuramata's unique vision

From iconic chairs, lighting, vases and perfume bottles to legendary bar spaces, restaurants and retail interiors, Kuramata’s singular vision shaped decades of creative output in Japan’s seminal post-war period, blending traditional Japanese aesthetic concepts with modernist expression.

Typically defined by a sense of impermanence, a playful experimentation and a dematerialisation of form – expressed in curves, geometry, colour – his work captured a precise moment in time that was never meant to last (today, 35 years after his death, very few of his interiors still exist – as he anticipated).

Acrylic resin, glass, steel mesh, aluminium: industrial material experimentation was a key thread, with Kuramata’s surreal and sculptural objects often defying spatial physicality, instead embodying a visual sense of lightness and emptiness, in his pursuit of freedom.

Or, in his own words: 'I continue to hold onto the naïve hope that only when we are freed from conventions, established concepts and ideals, and all kinds of constructs that have long been attached to this earth, will we be able to gain freedom in the true sense of the word.'

Shiro Kuramata: life in design

Born in Tokyo in 1934 as the youngest of six siblings, Kuramata’s earliest visual landscape was shaped by an upbringing in company housing at RIKEN (the Institute of Physical and Chemical Research), where his father worked.

As the Second World War unfolded, Kuramata moved between stints in bomb-blitzed Tokyo, Yokohama and rural Shizuoka Prefecture, while also discovering an early love of carpentry (his father reportedly gifted him children’s carpentry tools on his eighth birthday).

After high school, Kuramata joined the design department of a furniture factory before studying for a year at the Living Design Department of the newly created Kuwasawa Design School. A new building under construction at an intersection in Ginza then caught his eye – leading to his involvement creating interior elements for San-ai Dream Center, a progressive urban retail and leisure complex by architect Shoji Hayashi, completed in 1963.

Two years later, Kuramata, then aged 31, established his own design practice Kuramata Design Office in Tokyo – a move that catalysed the freedom for him to explore decades of radical experimentation, through furniture, objects and spaces.

Within a few years, Kuramata unveiled his Furniture with Drawers series – a layered structural composition balancing functional precision with a surrealist touch. The project, self-initiated without a client commission, was featured in a Danish magazine, marking his overseas debut. 'I am interested in furniture that is not intended to be used, but simply happens to manifest as furniture,' he said.

Key projects

Imbued with the energy of Japan's fast-paced post-war recovery, Kuramata went on to design his first architectural project in 1967: the HQ of fashion company Edward’s in Tokyo, where floor-to-ceiling light pillars consolidated the increasingly elemental role of light in his spatial vision. His iconic 1972 K-series Oba-Q Lamps followed, created using heated acrylic, draped like fabric, resulting in luminous, hovering white ghost-like forms.

It’s perhaps little surprise that Kuramata shared a deep creative synergy with fellow visionary Issey Miyake. A decades-long partnership unfolded when Kuramata designed his first retail space for Miyake inside the innovative From 1st complex in Minami-Aoyama in 1976.

A clean minimalist backdrop with playful pops of luminous fluorescent lighting, the new store not only radically disrupted conventional notions of formulaic shop interiors, it was a spatial expression of the spirit of the clothing itself, fusing purity and lightness with a timeless touch of futurism.

As Kuramata continued to design countless restaurants, bars and retail spaces, his experimentations in materials such as acrylic metal mesh deepened – reflecting his growing interest in material expressions of transparency and light, perceptions and illusions.

Shiro Kuramata chairs

It was in 1976 that Kuramata conceived The Glass Chair – with six structural plates of glass created without screws, using a newly developed UV-curing photopolymer adhesive – resulting in a chair imbued with an ethereal sense of immateriality.

One celebrated creation is How High the Moon, a chair designed in 1986 which appears to be comprised mainly of air – its clean-lined form outlined in near-invisible industrial mesh, evoking a poetic sense of weightlessness, transparency and illusion.

The Miss Blanche chair – unveiled in 1988, just three years before his death – is another masterful expression of lightness, perception and impermanence, with its clear acrylic resin form peppered with a frozen scattering of artificial red roses.

Shiro Kuramata and Memphis

Another key force for Kuramata was his creative synergy with Italian designer Ettore Sottsass. Aligned in their postmodern expressions of bold colour and geometric form, Kuramata became a founding member of Sottsass’ seminal Memphis project in 1981 – consolidating his visibility and reputation in the international design world.

Kuramata’s death in February 1991 at the age of 56 due to heart failure was as sudden as it was premature. Since then, just as he anticipated, his immaterial creative output has almost completely vanished.

Legacy

Among the few interiors by Kuramata still intact today is Comblé, a 1988 cocktail bar in Shizuoka city. Here, hidden in the first floor of an otherwise nondescript building is a time capsule of Kuramata’s designs: geometric lines, a vivid red aluminium wall panel, a curved counter in yellow fibre reinforced polymer and terrazzo flooring with light-emitting diodes.

Kuramata lovers can also make a pilgrimage to Hong Kong, where Kiyotomo Sushi Bar, completed in Tokyo in 1988, lives on at M+ Museum – after the entire structure was dismantled, shipped and reconstructed in its new home.

Meanwhile, select furniture and lighting designs continue with a limited number of manufacturers, including Cappellini, whose output includes his 1970 rotating storage unit Revolving Cabinet and the iconic Miss Blanche chair; and Vitra, which produces How High the Moon chair.

For Kuramata, his diminished material presence in the world today would most likely come as little surprise, with his creative output rooted in the fleeting, immaterial and impermanent – yet his radical imprint on the design world is here to stay.

So much time is spent thinking about adult-sized furniture that it is easy to forget the needs of children. A new exhibition at the design museum MK&G in Hamburg, 'Mini Furniture: Chairs for Children' (14 June to 1 November 2026), aims to change that.

The show looks at 130 child-centric chair designs across two centuries, with a European focus. It demonstrates how designers have taken small humans into account – in both practical and playful ways – and how those kids have engaged with chairs over time.

The designs span traditional high chairs to modernist creations bringing ‘high design’ to the younger generations. There are also chairs that are designed to support children’s social and creative development – showing that furniture can help us grow.

‘Children are not only an important part of our society, they are also the current and future users of the designed world,’ says Simon Klingler, the exhibition curator. ‘Yet design history is still predominantly told from an adult perspective – a perspective we are keen to broaden.’

‘We have observed that children would rather spend their time playing, exploring and moving around than sitting down,’ adds Klingler. ‘This is why we’re interested in chairs as companions, figures of identification and, at times, even playmates.’

The exhibition is arranged in four chapters: ‘Variety’, ‘Form: From High to Low’, ‘Function’ and ‘Colour’.

‘Variety’ displays the overall breadth of children’s chair designs, put in their historical context – from a miniature version of Marcel Breuer’s iconic B34 (3/4) cantilevered armchair (1929) to the Lou Lou Ghost (2008) by Philippe Starck, the ‘baby’ version of the Louis Ghost.

‘Form: From High to Low’ contrasts two distinctive children’s chair types rooted in practicality: the stool and the high chair. While low stools adapt to a child’s height, the high chair brings babies and toddlers up to the scale of an adult table, with a focus on safety and security.

Many high chairs show the potential for adaptability, like the well-known Tripp Trapp chair – originally designed by Peter Opsvik for Norwegian furniture-maker Stokke in 1972. ‘Its construction is so adaptable that it can be used from early childhood as a high chair through to adolescence as a regular seat, demonstrating how thoughtful design can grow alongside its users,’ says Klingler.

The exhibition’s ‘Function’ section is dedicated to chairs that go beyond seating and embrace play, while the chapter on ‘Colour’ looks to the role that colourful furniture plays in children’s wellbeing and psychological development.

‘The exhibition demonstrates that children’s chairs are far more than simply scaled-down versions of adult furniture – they constitute a distinct field of experimentation for materials, colours and design ideas,’ says Klingler.

During the process of research and curation, Klingler was surprised by how long modular and adaptable concepts have been around. ‘A hundred years ago, designers were developing high chairs that could be adjusted to different ages and needs by folding, repositioning or turning individual elements,’ he says. ‘Many of the issues we discuss today under the headings of sustainability and flexibility were already being explored in the design of children’s furniture at a very early stage.’

One of the exhibition’s key insights, says Klingler, is that good design is not an abstract concept, but an integral part of our everyday lives from the earliest stages of childhood. ‘It influences the way we perceive and engage with our surroundings, often without us even realising it.’

Here is a look at nine chairs from ‘Mini Furniture’.

Children’s high chair by Gebrüder Thonet, c. 1900

This beech, plywood and rattan high chair displays the elegant and innovative bentwood approach that Thonet became celebrated for. It features an inbuilt tray for food, that can be folded back, as well as a foot support.

Armchair by William Birch for Liberty & Co, c. 1900

This Arts and Crafts design in oak and rush shows how even long ago, children’s seating needs were being carefully considered and designed for, with a high-quality approach similar to adult furniture. Antique dealers have noted that these chairs would sometimes have inlays in the back panel depicting scenes from nursery rhymes.

Children’s ladder chair by Erich Dieckmann, c. 1925

Dieckmann, an important furniture designer of the Bauhaus alongside Marcel Breuer, designed this children’s wooden and linoleum chair in the 1920s. Rectilinear and minimalist, the chair doubles as steps that can be used to reach high shelves or surfaces.

Correction Chair, unknown maker, 1931

This English chair in mahogany is an example of how chairs were used to correct children’s posture, or otherwise harnessed as a disciplinary tool at school or home – a version of the ‘naughty step’.

Eames Elephant by Charles and Ray Eames / Eames Office, 1945

While the American husband-and-wife design duo was experimenting with moulding plywood into everyday furniture, they envisaged a group of animals for children to sit on and play with. The elephant has since become iconic, and is now manufactured by Vitra in recycled polypropylene or plywood, in a range of colours.

Rocking car by Hans Brockhage, 1950

‘I am intrigued by furniture that blurs the boundary between sitting and playing,’ says Klingler, referring to the rocking car designed by German artist Hans Brockhage. ‘These designs challenge conventional ideas of furniture by encouraging movement, interaction and imagination.’

The Rocking car is purposefully playful and inventively adaptive. Shaped to resemble a car, and move like one with its wheels, the wooden piece has climbing ladders at the front and back; once turned over, it becomes a rocking chair.

Zocker by Luigi Colani, 1972

Conceived by German industrial designer Luigi Colani, the bright orange Zocker chair reflects the bold style of the 1970s as well as the increasingly popular use of plastic for furniture. ‘I am particularly fascinated by the Pop Design creations of the 1970s,’ says Klingler. ‘Zocker conveys a sense of playful functionality while also evoking slightly nostalgic visions of childhood.’

Ergonomic studies informed the boulder-like design, resulting in a multifunctional chair that can also be used as a seated desk, a lectern-style shelf or a toy. Colani released a slightly modified version for adults a year later, but the design was first and foremost for children.

Ring of seats by Ginbande Design, 1991

This sculptural piece – which almost looks like a surrealist artwork – seats three children on an upholstered donut-like circle, complete with wooden backrests. It encourages social interaction and play – and has hopefully, over time, let to the cementing of a few friendships.

Hippo by Wolfgang Rebentisch, 1993

A colourful, geometric interpretation of a rocking horse, Hippo – designed by Rebentisch for children’s furniture maker Stokke – confidently invites play and movement.

British designer Lee Broom has received a lot of milestone calls over his career. Beginning his creative tenure in the fashion world by interning for Vivienne Westwood, he’s spent the last 20 years crafting award-winning light pieces and luxury furniture with his eponymous design brand, exhibiting from Milan Design Week to Mexico City. In 2020, he collaborated with Beyoncé, providing a minimalist yet striking gold Hanging Hoop Chair that sat central to her 2020 visual album Black Is King. Yet for Broom, who first endeared himself to Westwood by creating a fantasy costume for Madonna in a junior design competition and has now contributed his own bespoke piece to the pop superstar’s newly-released Confessions II film, there are few calls like one from the Queen of Pop.

'The 15-year-old me is doing cartwheels in their bedroom, for sure. I was thrilled. Growing up, I really appreciated her artistry not just as a musician but as a visionary, a spokesperson for LGBTQ+ rights, and an all-round blueprint for the pop industry,' he tells Wallpaper*. 'I grew up in theatre and then went into fashion, so performance, art, fashion, design all infiltrated my work. An artist like Madonna who has a sort of performative storytelling, pushing-the-envelope quality to their work – I was completely sucked in.'

Broom was contacted by Madonna’s production design team back in February, inquiring about potential products that could be utilised for 'a top secret project with a very famous artist'. Later, he was sent a storyboard showing the expansive concept for the film, which takes viewers through the pop icon’s forthcoming Confessions II album via a series of interlinked rooms and vignettes. In the section dedicated to new song One Step Away, Madonna is featured in a slick, hard-edged kitchen. For the scene, it’s a bespoke adaptation of Broom’s 2015 Crystal Tube Light that illuminates the image.

The original Crystal Tube Light is a cut-glass, handcrafted piece that was previously featured as part of the designer’s 2015 Milan show, The Department Store. 'I designed a number of crystal light fixtures with this idea of creating industrial lighting products and combining them with the sort of decorative cut glass that you would get in decanters or whiskey glasses,' he explains. 'Laurie Walters, the art director for the Confessions II film, really loved the piece because the setting that it's in is a very contemporary apartment with art deco references, and this light fixture is very much that. They wanted something elongated that could hang above the kitchen island unit and create this sort of linear vision in shots in the background.'

In order to fit the brief for the video, which demanded a longer, two metre version of the piece, Broom set about designing prototypes from his East London studio. 'My product development team looked to find ways that we could increase the overall scale of the piece. We kept the tube formation diameter exactly the same, but we connected elements together and changed some of the crystal cuts so that it worked as a pattern on a much larger scale,' he explains. Bringing in hand-cut glass from the Czech Republic and assembling the object in Barking, the featured scene was then shot on location elsewhere in London. 'I quite fancied delivering the items myself, disguised as a delivery guy. But no, that wasn't the case,' Broom jokes. 'Everything was very secretive and locked down.'

For Broom, who has always looked to mediums beyond design, working with a global superstar such as Madonna offers a chance to bring his work into the frame of popular culture. 'When you talk specifically about the design industry, it's a very loose, open word, but it's actually very specific: it’s furniture, product, industrial design, perhaps interior design. It's restricted in a way, and I feel like the general public who aren't in that industry sometimes find it difficult to connect with what we're producing,' he suggests. 'So when you have an opportunity to insert your work and your vision into something as globally iconic and as popular as a Madonna music video or film, it opens it up into a different ether that people aren't used to.

He continues: 'My own work as a lighting designer and a product designer is in a commercial space, but I love the avant-garde and I feel like if you can allow those two points to meet – the commercial and the art – then that’s a really interesting tipping point that’s sometimes difficult to get right. But when you look at an artist like Madonna, that idea epitomises some of their work.'

Later in the year, Broom will begin work on his 20th-anniversary show in Milan, with more collaborative projects also in the pipeline following his recent projects with Lladró and Fendi Casa. For the designer’s childhood self, however, there’s likely to be few things as memorable as his Confessions II contribution.

'For my 16th birthday, I remember getting my mother to buy me Madonna’s SEX book,” he chuckles. 'She got her friend Audrey, who worked next door to Waterstones, to queue up in the morning and buy it, neither of them knowing exactly what the content of the book was. It was literally the best birthday present I've ever had, even though she wasn't so happy when she actually got to see what was inside…' From superfan to collaborator, it’s yet another milestone to tick off in Broom’s illustrious trajectory.

This is the latest instalment of The Inside Story, Wallpaper’s series spotlighting intriguing, innovative and industry-leading interior design.

This Kolkata office has taken the belief that a stimulating environment unlocks creativity to heart. As the brand headquarters of Doreme, an Indian children's clothing label, the space takes its identity literally – transforming 3,600 sq ft into a giant sewing kit. Designer Pooja Bihani of Spaces and Design brought the vision to life through oversized buttons, cross-stitch patterning and neon-coloured lacing woven throughout the interior.

The office occupies a former warehouse – precisely the kind of open, generous shell that such a concept requires. Within it, Bihani introduced curved, flowing forms: amoebic workstations, oval meeting areas and a central showroom table stretching nearly twenty feet. Circulation has been carefully choreographed through subtle pathways, minimal doors and few visual barriers – an approach, again, well documented for its positive effects on workplace wellbeing. In place of solid partitions, curtain panels made from Doreme's own textiles, which mimic the drape and fold of garments, guide visitors.

Recreate the mood

The scene-stealer is the dramatic canopy ceiling: lime-green fabric fans out in a sunburst from a central stretch ceiling, acting as an art installation in its own right. Customised oval illumination tracks bring it to life – and serve a practical purpose too, providing the light required for accurate colour rendering in a fabric workshop.

The broader palette stays grounded in neutrals – white walls and muted grey surfaces – allowing neon accents to land with full force. Greens, pinks, oranges and yellows pulse through the space with a colour logic borrowed directly from the children's world Doreme inhabits, but applied here with a sophistication that feels entirely grown-up.

In this office, no detail is incidental. The tools and materials of garment-making have been elevated into design elements in their own right. Glass table bases are filled with thousands of buttons, zips, yarns and drawstrings. Storage units wear perforated faces patterned in cross-stitch; oversized buttons replace handles; desk partitions are laced with neon string; and functional dividers are reimagined as woven textile art.

By embedding the vocabulary of making into every element, the Doreme workspace achieves something whimsical and rigorous in equal measure – a kids’ wonderland that takes craft seriously.

There has been a loosening up of upholstery in recent years. Where tightly tailored forms once dominated, furniture with ruffles, skirts and softer silhouettes has become increasingly common. At this year's 3 Days of Design, Vitra offers its own interpretation with 'Bascule', an easy chair by Berlin-based Studio Πthat combines fashion-inspired upholstery with an adjustable suspension system hidden beneath its surface.

Named after the French word for 'seesaw', ‘Bascule’ features a generous seat wrapped in a loosely cut textile cover that drapes around the frame like a jacket. Beneath the upholstery, however, lies a mechanism developed by Vitra's engineers that automatically adapts to the sitter's weight, allowing the chair to move smoothly from an upright position to a near-horizontal recline.

'Like a cross between a swing and a seesaw,' explain designers Lisa Ertel and Anne-Sophie Oberkrome, who took the new mechanism as the starting point for the design. Concealed within the armrests, it responds to subtle shifts in body weight with a gentle rocking movement supporting a range of sitting positions, regardless of the user's size.

When it came to upholstery, Ertel and Oberkrome looked to tailoring techniques from the world of fashion – originally developed for ease of dressing and freedom of movement – and translated them into the chair's design. During development, fabric was draped directly onto working prototypes to observe how it responded as the chair reclined and returned upright. Different textiles produced distinct fold patterns and surface textures, emphasising the chair's changing form.

'It always got exciting when movement came into play,' say the designers. 'As soon as “Bascule” moved, you could see how the fabrics responded – where they stretched taut, where they fell loosely and where folds formed.'

The result is a chair whose appearance shifts with use, lending it an air of effortless nonchalance.

‘Bascule’ can be customised with fabrics chosen in a single colour or in combinations of two different hues for the inner and outer faces. It comes in a high-back version with an integrated height-adjustable neck cushion that adds to its anthropomorphic appearance, or as a low-back model. Bases are available in aluminium swivel and wooden versions.

The comparison to clothing extends beyond appearance. Conventional polyurethane foams and permanently bonded components have been replaced with materials and construction methods designed for repair, replacement and eventual recycling. Cushions are made from recycled fibres or V-Foam, a material developed by Vitra and BASF that the company describes as the world's first economically recyclable polyurethane foam.

The approach reflects Studio Œ's broader interest in honest, long-lasting design, with components that can be separated and returned to the circular economy rather than discarded.

Vitra sees Bascule as a design equally suited to domestic interiors and workplace lounges. For Studio Œ, meanwhile, it continues an approach focused on repairability, material honesty and longevity.

'For us, the comparison with a jacket couldn't be more fitting,' says Oberkrome. 'A favourite jacket you love to slip on, one that is soft, familiar and simply comfortable.'

‘Bascule’ will officially launch in September 2026, but a preview is on show at Vitra's Copenhagen showroom during 3 Days of Design (10-12 June). There, the chair is presented beneath a tent-like canopy of soft fabric within what the brand describes as an immersive sensory setting.

Vitra, Klubiensvej 22, Pakhus 48 2150 Nordhavn Copenhagen

vitra.com

This is the latest instalment of The Inside Story, Wallpaper’s series spotlighting intriguing, innovative and industry-leading interior design.

Oblouková 171 in Žatec is a building that almost wasn't. The Czech townhouse sheltered the same family for four decades before falling into serious neglect – and now emerges as one of the most compelling restoration projects in recent memory.

The story begins in the 1920s, when the current owners' great-great-grandparents settled in the town. Successive generations lived there until the Velvet Revolution, after which the house fell into disuse. By the time it passed to its current owners as an inheritance, it was barely standing. The roof leaked, ceilings were caving in, entire sections of the roof truss were missing and dry rot had spread through the structure.

The inheritors, as it happened, were architects – Jan and Barbora Hora of Ora – and they saw potential where others might have seen a write-off. When they discovered a spot in the attic where the family had hidden moonshine behind a beam, their minds were made up: the house had to be saved.

The renovation took eight years, and was predictably gruelling. Steel tie rods were used to brace the entire building; a collapsed vault was rebuilt; and a concrete slab replaced a ceiling so waterlogged it had sprouted a destructive fungus large enough, as the owners put it, to fill a skillet. Most demanding of all was the three-tiered hop-drying attic – a structure typical of Žatec and its hop-growing heritage – which required specialist craftsmen to restore.

From the outset, salvage and reuse were guiding principles. The owners had spent years collecting reclaimed materials – old floor tiles, handmade bricks, antique beams – and Oblouková 171 finally gave them a home. Rotten ceiling joists were replaced with hand-hewn beams sourced from a demolished house 400 kilometres away; red marble tiles were rescued from a skip; courtyard paving came from Šatov tiles that had sat in a barn for a century. The result is something of a Frankenstein house – a patchwork of parts gathered far and wide, stitched together with care and conviction.

Recreate the mood

Where new elements were unavoidable, they were handled with utmost taste. Custom ash-wood doors reinterpret traditional panelled designs; new windows faithfully match the profiles of the originals. The street façade was the thorniest problem: stripped of its detailing in the 1990s, it required historical photographs just to establish what had been lost. The architects then chose reinterpretation over reproduction, restoring the underlying geometry while simplifying the ornament. The result, with its pretty pastel symmetry, looks like something out of a Wes Anderson film.

The completed building now functions as guest apartments, a family holiday retreat and a taproom serving craft beer from a local brewery, which is fitting: Žatec – recently inscribed on the Unesco World Heritage List – built its identity on hops. Oblouková 171 now raises a glass to that legacy while adding a new chapter of its own.

The word itself gives something away. To the American ear, a ‘line' is simply a line. The British ‘queue', on the other hand, contains multitudes: the soft consonant, the sighing vowels trailing listlessly behind like people who've already given up. It's a word that expects patience of you before you've even reached the end of the aspiration.

The Hungarian-British satirist George Mikes once observed that an Englishman, even if alone, forms an orderly queue of one. A wry quip, perhaps, but it also suggests that queuing isn't really about waiting at all; it's about enacting a social identity, a public declaration of belonging.

And wasn't it the sociologist Émile Durkheim who insisted that society runs on invisible forces – norms, obligations, collective agreements – as binding as any physical law? What, I ask, is a queue but Durkheim made flesh? Society's invisible hand; a spontaneous, self-policing act of mutual deference that requires no referee, no rulebook, no app. You simply take your place and trust the system.

Of course, not everyone does. In India and China, the queue is a polite fiction, a non sequitur to be circumvented by the quick-footed and the shameless. In Singapore, the opposite pathology prevails: see a queue, join it, find out why later. It is civic trust with a dash of FOMO in its purest form.

Milan Design Week, which draws half a million visitors through the city each spring, has become the world's most theatrical queue, with design houses measuring their success by the length of the snaking line outside.

The queue has a darker face, too. At disaster relief points and refugee camps the world over, it is something altogether grimmer – a rationing mechanism for food, water and medicine; scarcity made visible where lines measure not patience, but desperation.

At the other end of human experience entirely, consider the Titanic, where men in evening dress heroically stood back and let women and children – strangers – board the lifeboats first. The most extreme queue in history was also the most distilled act of civilisation that proved the line holds, even when everything else is literally going under.

For what the queue demands of us (patience, deference, faith that order will eventually deliver us somewhere worth going) is a rehearsal for how to live alongside other people. But the point is, the front of the line will come. It always does.

This article appears in Wallpaper’s July 2026 Design Directory, available from 4 June, in print on newsstands, on the Wallpaper* app on Apple iOS, and to subscribers of Apple News +. Subscribe to Wallpaper* today

When you think of the quintessential office chair, chances are you picture Herman Miller's 'Aeron'. When it launched in 1994, it rejected the foam-and-fabric conventions of office seating in favour of advanced suspension technology. It was more than a chair, it was a serious piece of kit – the product of an experimental ethos that Herman Miller shared with figures like Charles and Ray Eames.

More than three decades after it changed office seating, the ‘Aeron’ is evolving again, this time to reflect a further shift in how we occupy our working environments. Today, the company has announced two new colourways, material innovations and expanded size inclusivity for its flagship ergonomic seat.

Since its debut, the 'Aeron' has been synonymous with neutral tones – 'Onyx', 'Graphite', 'Carbon', 'Mineral' – cool, professional looks calibrated to the offices of the 1990s. Colour on the original ‘Aeron’ was always limited; early versions applied pigment only to the Pellicle suspension mesh, leaving a jarring contrast with the neutral frame. Material advances now allow a single consistent tone across both frame and Pellicle – a seemingly small detail that makes a big difference.

Two new, bolder hues now join the line-up: 'Jasper', a warm, earthy olive that leans into the biophilic design trend sweeping modern workplaces, and 'Nightfall', a deep midnight blue. These tones reflect a looser, more informal relationship with work – a merging of lifestyle and office.

‘Our research suggests that strategic use of colour can have a powerful effect on workplace engagement and individual productivity,’ elaborates Joseph White, director of design strategy at MillerKnoll. ‘Saturated colours in cohesive environments have the capacity to change our respiration, our blood pressure and even our body temperature.’

The 'Aeron' has always been a material innovator. In 2021, it became the first chair in Herman Miller's portfolio to incorporate ocean-bound plastics. Now, the aluminium base has been redesigned using generative engineering tools, shedding nearly two pounds without sacrificing durability. Combined with increased use of post-industrial recycled content and bio-based nylons, these changes are estimated to reduce the chair's global average embodied carbon footprint by 12 percent. ‘By using the right materials, in the right amounts, in a product built to last, Aeron shows what circular design can achieve at scale,’ says Gabe Wing, MillerKnoll's vice president of sustainability.

The 'Aeron's' ergonomic credentials, meanwhile, remain firmly intact. A sci-fi-sounding roster of technologies – PostureFit SL, Harmonic 2 Tilt, 8Z Pellicle – work in concert to support the body. The chair has also been updated for greater size inclusivity.

With over nine million chairs sold and a replacement rate of just 0.055 per cent, the 'Aeron's' longevity may be its most telling quality indicator of all.

The updated chair makes its public debut at Fulton Market Design Days in Chicago, 8-10 June 2026. UK customers can purchase the 'Aeron' here.

Fanciness is something that’s resonated with Jeremy Anderson since he was a young boy growing up in suburban Minneapolis in the 1980s. He remembers his mom gingerly removing cube-shaped crystals that hung off the family chandelier and, with characteristic Midwest practicality, placing them in the dishwasher for a cleaning. He remembers noticing the silky damask patterns on mattresses and yearning to play dress-up with dolls.

‘Boys don’t play with dolls,’ Anderson recalls of the prevailing attitudes of the time. Now, with a solo show of lighting, furniture, mirrors and vessels on view in New York with the prestigious London design dealers Gallery Fumi, ‘I am giving myself permission to tap into that energy in a way I really couldn’t,' he says.

The show, titled ‘Held In Light,’ is Anderson’s largest solo presentation to-date. He works primarily in ceramics, a medium he discovered while still in high school. After co-founding the renowned lighting studio Apparatus, Anderson returned to ceramics about six years ago, a career transition that’s allowed the W*400 designer to plumb even deeper creative impulses.

Anderson’s work takes familiar objects and furnishings and transforms them into something more otherworldly and whimsical. Rotund stoneware vessels are ornamented with blooming petals and fins that give them a friendly, creature-like sensibility. Ceramic chandeliers and lamps are ornamented with ceramic beads, a move that evokes traditional lighting while giving them a delightful anthropomorphic quality, like a swinging fringe haircut.

‘I am very inspired by classic forms and shapes. It’s about putting my creative voice on those shapes and making them feel more modern and weird,’ Anderson says.

Gallery Fumi’s founders took notice. For co-owner Sam Pratt, who grew up in Sierra Leone, it was the hand-made quality of Anderson’s work and their universal ability to stir up memories that gave it a particular resonance. ‘There’s an unusual sculptural thing [inherent to the work]. I also see something African about them,’ he says, adding ‘Just as important is Jeremy the person.’

For the ‘Held in Light’ show, Anderson has amped up the scale of his work with a selection of 21 pieces that include a dining table, cabinet and a daybed. Each features a bronze frame, cast to appear at once delicate and brawny, and embedded ceramic slabs painted in Anderson’s signature, meditative stripes.

One of the most eye-catching pieces is a new daybed that blends fantasy with a certain pomp. It features a French horsehair mattress covered in a silky Zak + Fox fabric (a gussied up version of a traditional mattress) and bolster cushions fashioned from a 19th-century homespun fabric.

The works are displayed as part of Gallery Fumi’s New York residency at Gallerie 56, an exhibition space in the podium of Herzog & de Meuron’s ‘Jenga’ tower at 56 Leonard Street. In a full circle moment, Anderson would often drive past the building when commuting to his studio in Brooklyn.

‘So much of what I make is tapping into memory and being able to play in a way I didn’t feel like I was able to when I was young,’ Anderson explains.

‘That’s why the making process and being hands-on is so important to me,’ he adds.’ That’s what it’s all about.’

'Held in Light' is on view at Gallery Fumi's New York residency at 56 Gallerie through 3 July, 2026.

This is the latest instalment of The Inside Story, Wallpaper’s series spotlighting intriguing, innovative and industry-leading interior design.

On Montréal's South Shore, a 1929 residence has had its modernist roots refreshed. A recent renovation by local studio Vives St-Laurent set out to be wholly faithful to the home's early-20th-century provenance, introducing contemporary interventions with a light, considered hand.

Tucked to the rear of its plot and wrapped in greenery – as was the modernist way – the three-storey house found just the right owners: a family who had previously restored a Victorian property in Toronto. This project offered them a different historic context to engage with.

Vives St-Laurent's design process was shaped by a number of inherited conditions: modest ceiling heights, pronounced roof slopes and a building modified repeatedly over the decades. The accumulated changes made it necessary to distinguish original features from later additions, and the designers chose to draw out qualities that had been buried rather than impose a new vision.

Recreate the mood

That restraint is felt in the material palette. White oak flooring and stained millwork form the foundation, supplemented by soft lacquered surfaces and painted moldings. Threads of continuity run throughout: an oak island in the kitchen is echoed in the bathroom vanities; cabinetry in a beige lacquer offers gentle contrast against the walls; and honed Calacatta marble spans both kitchen and bathroom surfaces, while ceramic tile adds texture and tonal variation in the wet rooms. A terracotta-toned floor brings warmth to the ground level, and pale wall tiles work to reflect and distribute the home's natural light.

The most substantial changes were concentrated on the ground floor, which now accommodates an entrance, shared bathroom, two offices, kitchen, dining area and living room. A glass partition carves out a semi-enclosed workspace while preserving the flow of daylight, and openings were reworked to frame views to the garden. Existing elements – the fireplace, exposed beams, chimney and original layout – were restored.

The furniture remains impeccably true to character throughout: from the Swedish midcentury armchair and Danish teak wall unit in the living space to the scattering of Artek 60 stools. In the dining room, a striking geometric rug anchors a set of vintage Cesca chairs by Knoll (and a bright red Stokke children's chair), while overhead, Herman Miller's Nelson Saucer suspension lamp provides the perfect midcentury finishing touch.

The resulting home wears its history lightly but unmistakably. This is how you honour a property's origins without announcing them too loudly.

To mark two decades since Kristian Byrge and Peter Bonnén founded Muuto in 2006, the Danish furniture brand has crafted a new piece in collaboration with Copenhagen studio Spacon: the 'Close to Heart' chair, launching at 3 Days of Design on 10 June 2026. Produced in a limited edition of 150 pieces, each made in Denmark from extruded aluminium, the chair is equal parts rational and romantic, with each of its profiles shaped like a heart.

The brief was framed around Muuto's anniversary theme, 'Next Chapters in Scandinavian Design', and thus came with a clear warning: avoid nostalgia. Rather than looking back, the question posed was what tradition becomes when designers push at its edges – a question that led the Spacon partners, Nikoline Dyrup Carlsen, Malene Hvidt and Svend Jacob Pedersen, to the chair's motif.

The heart emerged not just as a symbol, but as geometry. 'It has that perfect triangle on one side and then the double curve on the other,' says Hvidt. 'So the shape itself has this beautiful contrast between sharpness and roundness.' Immediately legible, it grows increasingly complex the longer you study it. 'The shape goes from something very simple and quite childish into something diverse and sophisticated when you really dig into what it offers.'

The choice to realise the chair in extruded aluminium echoes this conceptual tension – a material typically associated with industrial coldness, pressed into the service of one of culture’s warmest symbols. The designers, however, do not see this as a contradiction to be resolved. 'The warmth of the heart and the coldness of the aluminium should join together as you get further into the project,' says Pedersen. 'Aluminium has a lightness to it. It's mouldable, so it fits very well with the heart typology and its curved lines. So in the end, it makes more sense than the immediate contrast suggests.'

The aluminium has also been anodised – a finish that shifts the material's character even further: 'It's a bit more exclusive, and it has that quality where it absorbs all the surrounding light and colours in a beautiful way, which gives it a softness that we were very fond of,' explains Carlsen.

The 'Close to Heart’ chair sits within a broader strategic project that Spacon has been developing with Muuto around the anniversary and its 'next chapters' – one centred on the relationship between technical rigour and emotional resonance. 'Muuto has a highly professional team that constantly works with innovation in manufacturing. Meanwhile, they also have a love for aesthetics and sensory experiences – the feelings we can create through design,' says Hvidt. 'So this furniture is really about the meeting between system and feeling – or as we put it, "How can we make a system learn to feel?"'

Spacon's own philosophy runs along similar lines: a deliberately interdisciplinary practice spanning architecture, interior design, art and craft. 'We’re not being bound by one tradition or one historical way of doing things; [we try to be] more expressive and culturally open,' says Carlsen. For her, this is the 'next chapter in Scandinavian design': 'It's about taking inspiration from the core values of Scandinavian design – pioneering, thinking in new ways, building and creating – but being less restricted by traditional design language.'

The heart – that most universal of motifs – turns out to be an unexpectedly rigorous design proposition. Yet for Hvidt, the ambition behind the chair is ultimately a simple one: 'We're looking forward to people sitting in the furniture and hopefully having it bring smiles to their faces and spread some love.' As far as next chapters go, it’s hard to argue with that.

3 Days of Design runs in Copenhagen from 10-12 June

At Rho Fiera, during Salone del Mobile 2026, French designer Thélonious Goupil and Italian furniture brand Campeggi – a specialist in convertible furniture – took the foldout bed to new extremes. ‘Bienvenue’ is a compact wooden box that unfolds into a ‘guest room’ complete with bed, duvet, pillow and privacy screen.

Closed, the unassuming shell of stained and varnished birch plywood can serve as a stool, a step or a surface. A bean-shaped handle on its side makes it easy to lift; slide one panel away, and what's within is revealed. Out emerges a self-supporting foldable headboard and a Lycra-covered mattress, inflated via an electric pump, that expands into a complete sleeping space – including a partition to offer a sense of enclosure that places this well beyond the territory of the traditional portable bed.

The name, meaning ‘welcome’, signals the intent: ‘Bienvenue’ is imagined as a next-level solution for the overnight guest. Tongue firmly in cheek, it combines hospitality and design ingenuity – an optimistic proposition for an era of shrinking square footage.

The project grew from a conversation between Goupil and Guglielmo Campeggi at the Small Small Space gallery in Milan, where Goupil had exhibited ‘Paysage Industriel’, a series of lamps that also appeared on Campeggi's stand at the fair. Their conversation turned to a shared question: how do we inhabit spaces that keep getting smaller, and can well-designed objects help rekindle the art of welcoming others within them?

Goupil, a graduate of Ensci-Les Ateliers who trained at Ransmeier and Jasper Morrison, has long worked at the intersection of utility and cultural observation – an approach that extends to his co-direction of Collections Typologie, a publishing house devoted to the study of ordinary objects (from boules to the camping tent). Campeggi, meanwhile, has spent decades building a portfolio of transformable furniture. In ‘Bienvenue’, both sensibilities converge: an object that is as functionally impressive as it is culturally resonant.

With past mentors including Marc Jacobs, Paul Fortune, John and Christine Gachot, and Gabriel Hendifar, interior designer Casey Kenyon was exceptionally well placed when he launched his own studio in 2019. Drawing on the experience gained from these creative titans, the New York-based designer’s most recent project is a confident expression of his own style and sensibility – made possible by clients who were 'game, open and trusting,' Kenyon says.

This one-bed apartment in an Upper West Side co-op was designed for a couple – Ted, a screenwriter, and Josh, an agent – who split their time between Manhattan and the Hudson Valley. The seventh-floor apartment’s predominantly north-facing rooms are bathed in soft light throughout the day, though the relatively low ceilings required careful consideration of scale and proportion. Some of the larger pieces the couple had hoped to bring from their Upstate home – a substantial sofa, for example – simply proved too imposing. 'We taped it out on the wall, and I was like, this is never going to work,' recalls Kenyon, who instead focused on lower furniture to create the impression of greater ceiling height.

Several key pieces were custom designed out of necessity, owing to the city’s notoriously narrow hallways and limited elevator capacities – 'a proper New York challenge,' as the W*400 designer puts it.

The sofa had to be delivered in pieces, while the television cabinet was also assembled on site. Crafted in walnut, the cabinet features teal gloss doors that neatly fold into side pockets and is finished with vintage handles sourced from Kenyon’s ever-evolving collection. This, he explains, is one of his tricks for softening the feel of a new object. 'Vintage hardware takes away the newness in a way that’s special,' he says. 'A little bit of patina goes a long way.'

Additional bespoke furniture creates a dining nook opposite the kitchen, where a plaid Zak & Fox wallpaper and a mounted Picasso plate are designed to catch the eye of anyone seated on the banquette. 'You can sit there as one person with your laptop or to have takeaway, or as six people when entertaining,' Kenyon says.

Upholstered pieces throughout the apartment introduce a carefully calibrated range of hues selected so they feel 'complementary, but don't match,' the designer explains. 'I typically like complex colours, which can change and shift during the day. While the apartment is mostly off-white, the bedroom is a different shade to the living room because the light is different in each.'

The couple’s impressive art collection played a key role in bringing personality and richness to the interiors. Among their existing works, a grid of nine Andy Warhol Polaroids hangs in the dining room alongside a trio of black-and-white photographs by Diane Arbus. Although the collection is not intentionally queer-focused, Kenyon notes that several prominent queer-identifying artists appear throughout the home, including Hugh Steers, Peter Hujar and Nick Hoover.

Perhaps the most fortuitous acquisition, according to Kenyon, was the Genieve Figgis painting in the living room, which serendipitously echoed the colours of the custom burgundy rug. 'We were constantly looking for something to go above the sofa, even after the room was done, and then the Figgis just came to be, and it was perfect,' he says.

Another fun discovery rests atop a tall Art Deco plinth in the bedroom. Kenyon came across this small bronze figurative sculpture at a Paris flea market and, after an enthusiastic early-morning text exchange with his clients, promptly purchased it – before discreetly sneaking it home in his suitcase. 'If you were looking for it on the internet, you would never find it,' the designer says.

Overall, Kenyon sought to create a dialogue between harder lines and materials and softer, more 'frouffy' embellishments, allowing these relationships to slowly reveal themselves as the eye moves through the apartment. A floral vase placed beside a black steel side table, or the glass-topped Guy Lefevre coffee table positioned opposite a crewel, brush-fringed cloth, are among examples.

'I think we did a good job here of playing with softness and rigidity,' Kenyon says. 'Those sorts of things are lovely and important, and feel real.'

Danish design company Gubi partnered with Italian rattan specialist Bonacina 1889 to reissue two designs by Italian modernist Tito Agnoli. The ‘P3’ lounge chair and ‘P3S’ chaise longue were first conceived in 1964 for Bonacina 1889 and feature the designer’s distinctive formal clarity.

Trained as a painter under Mario Sironi, Agnoli enrolled at the Milan Politecnico as an architecture student, before becoming assistant to Gio Ponti and later Carlo de Carli. From the 1950s, he worked with some of the most cutting-edge companies of the time to create furniture and lighting that encapsulate the modernist spirit of the mid-20th century through precise lines and modular thinking.

His long collaboration with Bonacina 1889 resulted in several chairs that explore the structural possibilities of rattan, cord and woven surfaces. The ‘P3’ duo of chairs encapsulates his linear thinking, with a structure based on a minimal metal frame supporting the rattan weave. ‘The brilliance of the “P3” lies in how it conceals its complexity,’ explains Elia Bonacina, CEO of Bonacina 1889. ‘Every curve demands precise control of tension and weave, yet the final form feels sculptural and effortless. It flexes with quiet strength and reveals the full expressive potential of rattan.’

‘What makes this collaboration powerful is the clarity of intention,’ says Marie Kristine Schmidt, CEO of Gubi. ‘Bonacina brings profound material knowledge; Gubi brings a contemporary, international lens. With absolute certainty in our respective expertise, the outcome feels inevitable.’

Over the years, the Danish company has become known for its sensibly curated reissuing of design icons of the past, from legends like Pierre Paulin, Mathias Rasmussen and Gianfranco Frattini among others. It is also no stranger to rattan furniture, having brought back to life Gabriella Crespi’s ‘Bohemian 72’ furniture from the 1970s.

‘This partnership grew from a shared love of rattan and a deep commitment to design,’ confirms Bonacina. ‘We worked closely, exchanging knowledge at every stage, shaping a result that reflects both our identities while speaking clearly to the present.’

The Gubi x Bonacina collection starts at £999
gubi.com

In the canon of design, one region stands apart – defined by a visual identity as distinctive as it is sought after: Scandinavia. Following the early 20th century, the Nordic countries became known for marrying modern industrial design with social-democratic ideals, producing objects that were simple, functional and affordable – and which continue to command an outsized place in the design conversation today.

Denmark remains a particular bastion of this tradition. The country industrialised later than many European counterparts, and traditional craftsmanship retained its influence even as modernism took hold, yielding a design sensibility that achieves something rare: minimalism with warmth. That influence has since permeated broader visual culture, felt in everything from Apple's product philosophy to the aesthetic of contemporary apartments, cafés and interiors worldwide.

The Danish design boom of the 1930s to 1960s gave rise to a remarkable generation of studios and manufacturers – many still deeply relevant today – responsible for some of the most classic objects of the last century. Ahead of 3 Days of Design 2026, running in Copenhagen from 10-12 June, we turn to the stalwarts of Danish design.

Carl Hansen & Søn 

Founded in 1908 in Odense, Denmark, Carl Hansen & Søn is perhaps best known for producing Hans Wegner's evergreen ‘Wishbone’ chair, which has remained in continuous production since 1950; other celebrated Wegner pieces include the ‘Shell’ chair and ‘CH25’ lounge chair. A champion of sustainably sourced wood and traditional craftsmanship, the brand's catalogue reads like a greatest hits of Danish modernism.

Fritz Hansen 

Established in Copenhagen in 1872, Fritz Hansen has achieved the feat of turning furniture into cultural artefacts – foremost among them, perhaps, are Arne Jacobsen's ‘Egg’ and ‘Series 7’ chairs. The brand collaborates with architects and designers to create icons found across the world – in airports, offices and living rooms – among the most recognisable objects of the 20th century. Piet Hein, Bruno Mathsson and Arne Jacobsen's ‘Superellipse’ table remains a masterclass in collaborative design, while Jaime Hayon's ‘Ro’ chair is a welcome addition to the roster.

Gubi

Gubi occupies a glamorous, slightly more maximalist corner of Danish design, making it a top choice for interiors that call for personality alongside elegance. Founded in 1967 by Gubi Olsen and Lisbeth Olsen, the Copenhagen-based brand helped revive the furniture of Mathieu Matégot, as well as produced the ‘Masculo’ chair by GamFratesi and the ‘Multi-Lite’ pendant by Louis Weisdorf. The catalogue has since grown to include the ‘Bestlite’ lighting collection by Robert Dudley Best and Matégot's ‘Tropique’ chair.

&Tradition 

Founded in Copenhagen in 2010, &Tradition stewards classics by the likes of Verner Panton, Viggo Boesen and Flemming Lassen while simultaneously championing emerging talent, harbouring a curatorial approach that respects heritage without being beholden to it. Panton’s ‘Flowerpot’ lamp is possibly among the most recognisable pieces in the collection, accompanied by classics like Arne Jacobsen’s ‘Bellevue’ lamp, Boesen’s ‘Little Petra’ chair and Anderssen & Voll’s ‘Inland’ sofa.

Louis Poulsen 

When it comes to Danish lighting, one name stands above the rest. Louis Poulsen has been shaping the meaning of light since 1874, but it was the brand's partnership with architect Poul Henningsen that sent it stratospheric – the resulting ‘PH’ series, engineered to minimise glare, remains one of the most sophisticated lighting systems ever devised. Verner Panton's ‘Panthella’ lamp and Arne Jacobsen's ‘AJ’ floor lamp round out an extraordinary archive. Based in Copenhagen, the brand continues to work with leading designers to produce luminaires that treat light as an architectural material.

Fredericia

Founded in 1911 in the Danish town of the same name, Fredericia is a furniture house with a roster that’s grounded, tactile and human – favouring longevity over trend-chasing. It includes Børge Mogensen's ‘Spanish’ chair, a rugged piece that has lost none of its authority since 1958, as well as key pieces from Hans Wegner and Nanna Ditzel. More recently, Space Copenhagen's ‘Palette’ and ‘Spine’ collections have added a compelling contemporary layer.

House of Finn Juhl 

The designer Finn Juhl arguably introduced Danish modernism to America, and this Copenhagen house exists to honour and preserve his body of work. Every piece – from the ‘Pelican’ chair to the ‘Chieftain’ – is produced with total adherence to Juhl's original vision, using the materials and techniques he specified. These are poetic objects, each as much sculpture as furniture, with upholstery floating free of the frame, as was Juhl's style.

Georg Jensen 

Since silversmith Georg Jensen opened his Copenhagen workshop in 1904, the brand has been synonymous with jewellery and homeware inspired by natural forms, which feel alive rather than geometric. The ‘Blossom’ pitcher, ‘Acorn’ cutlery, ‘Bernadotte’ serving collection and Henning Koppel pitcher are among its most beloved works, each underpinned by handcraft and material excellence.

Alexandre de Betak launched his modular sofa, ‘Le Takbe’, during NYC x Design, in collaboration with Paris gallery Pierre Augustin Rose's New York space in SoHo.

Over the past three decades, under the banner of his Paris-based creative agency Bureau Betak, de Betak built a global reputation for masterminding some of fashion’s most spectacular shows – from Dior’s delphinium-covered hill in the Louvre’s courtyard and the ethereal Berluti show, where shoes floated through the Musée des Arts Décoratifs, lifted by oversized white balloons, to Saint Laurent’s glittering spectacles beneath the Eiffel Tower. After founding the company in 1990, he produced more than 1,500 runway shows, installations and events that blurred the boundaries between fashion, architecture and art.

In 2023, de Betak opted to take a step back from the company to concentrate on his personal dreams as a designer and artist, creating ‘spaces of radical stillness where the viewer is not spectator but subject’. Working out of a mews studio in London’s Marylebone, his obsession with the tension between ancient and contemporary, low-tech and high-tech, remains constant. Recent works include a large-scale light installation coinciding with Frieze London 2025, and Chashitsu Hikari Schürli, a site-specific light sculpture unveiled during Gstaad Art Week in February 2026.

Alexandre De Betak’s sofa for Pierre Augustin Rose

The origins of the 'Le Takbe' modular sofa are deeply personal for de Betak, who first designed it for his own homes around the world, conceiving it for an informal way of living – for lounging, gathering, playing, and meditating, without hierarchy or prescription.

It is formed of a low platform, on which cushions can be freely arranged and rearranged, adapting to the rhythms of daily life. This first edition with Pierre Augustin Rose introduces removable backrests, offering a more structured seating configuration while preserving the openness of the original. The design is available in two sizes – a conventional rectangular sofa or a more expansive square shape – and two fabrications, either wool or linen, and it can be configured as a daybed, sofa, or something in between; a small landscape within a room, shaped by whoever inhabits it.

Founded by Pierre Bénard and Augustin Deleuze, who were later joined by Nina Rose, Pierre Augustin Rose draws from the legacy of 20th-century masters while remaining resolutely anchored in the present. Their work reflects a refined balance between memory and invention, with form, proportion and materiality approached with precision and restraint. Rooted in a passion for singular environments, Pierre Augustin Rose creates collections that are both bold and nuanced, where furniture becomes a vehicle for atmosphere as much as function. At its core lies a clear ambition: to project a distinctly French sensibility into a contemporary, international context.

pierreaugustinrose.com

This is the latest instalment of The Inside Story, Wallpaper’s series spotlighting intriguing, innovative and industry-leading interior design.

In the quiet countryside of Damme, Belgium, a centuries-old farmhouse sits among rolling greenery – hardly an unusual sight in this pastoral part of the world. What is surprising is what awaits you inside, and more specifically, below. In their top-to-bottom reimagining of this property, Van Damme-Vandeputte Architects has installed a Parisian-style nightclub in the basement.

The renovation itself is breathtaking. The architects set out to reinterpret something inherently rural – a historic home overlooking a tree-lined canal – and transform it into something contemporary and refined, without erasing its past.

One way the architects achieve this is through occasional, vivid bursts of colour: hallways and a bathroom are clad in a deep, clay-like red; a living space is drenched in teal, employing artisanal paint techniques that breathe new life into the home's classical bones. Slender bronze and patinated brass details weave throughout, serving as elegant connective tissue between eras.

Authentic original features like beamed wooden ceilings and an open kitchen fireplace have been left largely untouched, anchoring the home in its history. Remarkably, achieving this transition required no major structural intervention. Instead, the architects worked through a succession of carefully weighted decisions: for example, existing materials were, wherever possible, reclaimed or treated rather than replaced.

The kitchen ranks among the home's finest spaces. While grounded in a neutral palette and timeless veined marble splashbacks, it feels anything but conventional through a series of ingenious details like alabaster light fittings, generously rounded worktops and distinctive half-height curtains. Most luxurious of all is the contrast between the custom dark walnut cabinetry and solid natural stone worktops – sourced from Italy and Turkey and cut to a substantial eight centimetres – which flow uninterrupted from the washbasin into the wall, lending a monolithic feel.

The interior gains further cohesion through its curation: design icons from Molteni & C and Edra sit alongside lighting by Parisian duo Garnier & Linker and London's CTO, while artworks are drawn from the client's private collection.

It all makes perfect sense – and then you descend to the cellar. Transformed into a private nightclub inspired by a cabaret, the space has been saturated in an all-encompassing, enveloping red. At its centre stands the bar, where a marble countertop meets high-gloss tropical amara wood. The defining piece is the red sofa – handcrafted by Collett & Victor to a design by Jean-Philippe Demeyer – which channels the glamour and romanticism of 1920s Paris. Step below ground here, and you step into another time and geography entirely.

Recreate the mood

During Milan Design Week in April 2026, AMO/OMA and Solidnature staged a surreal stone supermarket that replicated the mundane shopping experience with a humorous minimalist take. For one month only, you can order the pieces that stocked the playful installation.

A stone supermarket by OMA/AMO and Solidnature

Titled ‘Il Sonno’, the supermarket was conceived by architect Samir Bantal, AMO's director, and was based on the idea of celebrating the expressive potential of stone, which was the sole material for shelving units as well as groceries, offering an immersive experience within the space.

'Nobody thinks while shopping; it’s a reflex,' says Bantal. 'At Il Sonno Supermarket, this reflex is frozen in stone. Commodities have been transformed into desirable objects, stripped of function. The dream lies in the interval between recognising an object and realising that it has solidified. A supermarket with a fleeting stock, forever frozen in time. The experience of rushing through the supermarket is slowed down to wonder.'

For one month only, until 21 June 2026, you can pre-order 12 of the items from the supermarket shelves, which include onyx bananas, red marble steaks, sandwiches made of travertine with red marble and green onyx, and beautifully veined Flamingo Nebula marble milk bottles. Each piece from the limited edition is unique, as it will feature the chromatic and textural variations of the natural stone.

'Natural stone introduces a different sense of value, rooted in sustainability, durability and authenticity,' says Solidnature owner, David Mahyari. 'Unlike systems built on speed and disposability, it shifts consumption towards awareness, where everyday choices become part of a larger dream – shaping a more conscious and future-oriented world.'

Order now from solidnature.com, prices start at €90

First conceived in 2020, Max Lamb’s 'Economy' chair started as an experiment in waste reduction – a theme that has recurred throughout the London-based designer’s practice. Its original form was hand-cut from polystyrene foam using hot wire and is the result of a series of prototypes that led to a structure that left as little waste as possible on the workshop floor. ‘It's taking what some people perceive to be artisanal into something more industrialised, much more practical, pragmatic and efficient.’

Case in point, the chair now makes its large-scale production debut, as part of Swedish design brand Hem’s furniture collection. The new edition, dubbed ‘Min’ is made of pine, a material that perfectly matches Lamb’s intuitive process. To produce it, individual timber elements are cut at diagonal angles and split to become the legs, back and seat, an exercise in material efficiency that speaks to Lamb’s ability to combine a distinctive design language with a particular attention to the possibilities of an object’s construction.

Max Lamb's Min chair for Hem: an exercise in reduction

Creating the chair involves a rigorous process of reduction: 'the design itself has been conceived to use almost half the quantity of material that would be required to make the same chair with square legs,' explains Lamb. 'By cutting the legs in half diagonally to create triangular legs, you end up with two legs for the price of one – or two legs from the amount of material it would normally take to make one.

'What gives the chair its personality and character is not necessarily about using as little material as possible. Rather, it’s about making one piece of material go twice as far as it otherwise would if the legs were square.'

Lamb's practice has historically been focused on hands-on making: his work has ranged from metal furniture bent by hand, to cutting up a tree to make a seating series, to taping up cardboard into chairs. 'The Min Chair has been developed and refined over a lot of iterations: all of the development and prototyping happens within my workshop,' he explains. 'Because I’m first and foremost a maker and run a workshop-based practice, I am able to refine the design in real time. I want to make sure that the design is responsive to material, the properties of the material, and the production process.

'The design is a consequence of the making process and my endeavour to achieve these efficiencies in production and material usage. The outcome is a chair that has personality, has an aesthetic, but that aesthetic and that personality are consequences of those endeavours to efficiency.'

A fresh crop of hardware companies has emerged in recent years with a simple question: can humble cabinet pulls and knobs be a new medium for bold aesthetic expression? The challenge: not to let form overpower function; wild, oversized shapes must not impede actual daily use. Ellis Works, recently founded by Alex Bellos, the former president of retail brand West Elm and CEO of lighting and lifestyle goods firm Schoolhouse, is attempting to bridge the gap between style and substance by turning art into product.

‘A lot of talents are creating beautiful sculptural forms, but when it comes down to it, these designs are being introduced into our kitchens and bathrooms,' Bellos says. ‘I want to push forward artistic exploration but also make sure that the results work.’

Ellis Works is based in a workshop in the Sunset Park neighbourhood of Brooklyn. From here, the company’s carefully curated selection of pulls, handles and knobs – mostly imagined by a tight roster of local artists – is produced. They’re made in different sizes and mounting styles and in ten materials, from contemporary finishes like brass and nickel, to patinas like verdigris and antique.

‘We’re trying to solve problems, help architects and interior designers have flexibility, all while maintaining our point of view,’ Bellos says. ‘Everyone loves edge pulls, but they’re hard to install, so what we did is develop a design that looks like this typology but doesn't have to be mortised-in.’ Designed in-house, the easy-to-mount ‘Throop’ collection, for example, is defined by a streamlined wave shape that allows it to function properly without having to be anchored on top of the mass of a cabinet door.

Though it might seem like Ellis Works is a career pivot for Bellos, he actually first forayed into the product category when taking over Rejuvenation Hardware 12 years ago. ‘What I was particularly drawn to was the brand’s history; going through its archive and pulling out a Sears catalogue from 1904 and seeing what could be brought back to life,’ he adds.

He spent 14 years at West Elm, where, on becoming president in 2017, he brought revenue up $2 billion. He moved to Food52 in 2022 but departed as company CEO in 2023 (Food52, the parent company of sister brands Dansk and Schoolhouse, filed for bankruptcy in December 2025).

Bellos remembers thinking, ‘I have almost 20 years of experience in the home furnishings industry; how can I take established traditions but also my own acquired knowledge and apply it in new ways that make sense?’

The potential of hardware had that special pull. ‘Since my time at Rejuvenation, I’ve loved the category,’ he says. ‘For one, it’s the real jewellery of the home. It’s also one of the only things you interact with constantly. The feeling of a brass knob in your kitchen or bathroom changes your perception of these environments.’

Bellos established Ellis Works at the end of 2025. Its name and ethos are an homage to his great-grandfather, an Austro-Hungarian immigrant who, like millions of people, came through Ellis Island to start a new life, eventually starting a butcher shop in Ridgewood, Queens.

Like his ancestors, Bellos sees value in old-world techniques; for him, there’s a special kind of magic intrinsic to hardware, that high-design can be distilled into small packages. Take a recent collaboration with the Brooklyn-based silversmith Heath Wagoner. For the ‘Tessuto Cabinet Knob’, the designer created jewellery-like pulls that resemble flowing fabrics straight from a Caravvagio painting. ‘[Heath] can do an experimental wax casting in his studio and we can bring that to market pretty much exactly as he’s done it,’ Bellos said.

Ellis Works is a lean operation for now – it’s just Bellos, a product technician and a skilled artisan. ‘We have the flexibility to test out new ideas, play and collaborate with great people,’ Bellos says. ‘There’s a spirit of partnership both on the back and front end of the process; with the talents we commission and the architects and interior designers that spec our products. I love the personal aspect; being able to talk to everyone involved.’

Wagoner isn’t the only collaborator. Artist and designer Jonathan Mergele has created ‘Ferrea’, a collection of hardware that resembles knots, the result of a trip to Portugal and observing how artisans created a cathedral grate. Kalen Kaminski, founder of multidisciplinary practice GONE, has contributed Portal, a series of mesmerising hand-blown glass knobs.

During New York Design Week, Ellis Works has teamed up with Canal Street lifestyle brand William White to stage an immersive installation that demonstrates how the hardware can be used to support different daily tasks. Also launching as part of the showcase is Scottish studio potter Joshua Williams’ all-ceramic ‘Cairnsmore’ cabinet knob.

This creative potential – that high design can be delivered in small packages – thrills Bellos. And he hints that there may even be more product categories in store for Ellis Works: ‘When starting the company, I was very specific about the idea of door and cabinet hardware being functional goods,’ he says. Now, he continues, the question has become, ‘what are other functional goods in the home?

‘What are other opportunities to experiment and play with almost any type of object that’s screwed into the wall?’

On 8 May 2026, Michael Anastassiades announced that he is closing his eponymous lighting brand. 'After 20 inspiring years, the time has come to close the chapter of my lighting company, Michael Anastassiades, a platform for communicating my personal vision in lighting and introducing innovative ideas to the market,' he wrote in a note shared to his network.

The brand made its debut in 2006, as Anastassiades had started creating objects and lighting for his London home, and quickly became known as the master of lighting design. He has since expanded his lighting output, through a long-term collaboration with Italian lighting company Flos.

'What began as an open-ended experiment grew organically into a body of work that reflects a deeply personal journey,' continues the designer. 'Through this broad exploration of ideas, I created an eclectic brand, a model inspired by creative visionaries in history who committed themselves to the exceptional fabrication of objects. Over the years, it became a space where ideas could evolve freely, shaped by curiosity, experimentation, and rigorous practice, and led to invitations for meaningful collaborations across the design industry.'

Among the company's best known pieces is the Tube Chandelier, which also marked the brand's debut, the Mobile Chandeliers, and the Tip of the Tongue collection, where an illuminated sphere effortlessly sits on the cusp of a brass base.

'I am proud to see how these designs have found their place in both private and public spaces around the world,' he says. 'What comes next for me as a designer is a deeper focus on the creative process, and the freedom to explore new directions in design, in all its forms.'

The studio's operations, including the production of limited edition furniture and lighting, as well as design collaborations, will continue as normal.

A sample sale is planned in London between 14-16 May 2026, 115 Old Street, London EC1V 9RT.

michaelanastassiades.com

Watch: at home with Michael Anastassiades

Last year we visited Michael Anastassiades' home as part of our 'Stuff That Surrounds You' series. Watch the film below

Following a preview at Maison & Objet Paris in January, Lady Deirdre Dyson's 'Mélange' rug collection has now arrived at her flagship Paris gallery, and will land very soon at the London gallery too.

True to its name – ‘mélange’ denoting a mixture of different and often incongruous things – the collection is wonderfully varied and unpredictable. Rather than pursuing a single overarching theme, as Dyson typically does, she has embraced pure creative spontaneity.

The collection comprises seven distinct carpet designs, each entirely self-contained yet united by a shared spirit of play and wit. That spirit is expressed through a language of geometric and kaleidoscopic forms, and a palette rooted in warm taupe neutrals punctuated by burgundy, purple and burnt orange.

'I decided to move away from any preset objective and relied entirely on a random design process from ideas that just popped into my head,' says Dyson. 'There are references to past works using overlays and floating shapes, while some carpets appear figurative and others more angular and geometric. What did become evident is that the designs are characteristically mine.'

'Crystal' features a jagged graphic border evoking refracting light, punctuated by black silk highlights. 'Safari' plays with dramatic vertical frequency-like lines broken by earthy two-tone stripes. 'Triptych' and 'Moulin' share a centrifugal energy – the former setting animal-print triangles in burnt orange and camel against grey; the latter layering transparent triangles over a rich burgundy and purple ground.

'Glassy Greens' conjures the illusion of floating shelves rendered in delicate sea-green silks, each balancing a contrasting rectangular form. 'Pouch', true to its name, is a tactile, curved design with a fluid silk outline in layered taupe neutrals that lends it an almost three-dimensional quality. Rounding out the collection, 'O' is a purely geometric study in 100 per cent wool, in which overlapping rectangles, squares and circles are enlivened by an accent of deep framboise.

Most designs incorporate fine silk woven alongside Goodweave-certified Tibetan wool, handcrafted by Nepalese artisans. All pieces are made to measure, tailored to individual specification and available across a broad spectrum of colours – a fitting final note for a collection that, in Dyson's words, she hopes offers 'something for everyone'.

Deidre Dyson galleries are at 554 King’s Road, London SW6 2DZ; and 12 Rue des Saints-Pères, 75007 Paris

It was a visit to the Museum of Modern Art in New York that planted the seeds for architect and designer Hannes Peer’s latest collection for the Italian brand SEM. ‘On the museum’s top floor, there’s an entire room filled with the work of Louise Nevelson,’ recalls Peer, who was taken with the American artist’s stacked wooden assemblage sculptures from the 1970s. ‘That was the moment I decided to go all-in on this idea.’

That idea, specifically, was to translate that sculptural language developed by those midcentury artists into a contemporary collection of monolithic wooden furniture. The resulting collection, titled ‘Core’, is composed of eight pieces wrought in solid mahogany, rosewood and cherry – each defined by an abstract, carved façade. ‘The form of the pieces is rather simple,’ Peer explains of the concept, which also sought inspiration in the wooden volumes of the French designer Pierre Chapo, American sculptor Leroy Setziol’s rhythmic wall-hung carvings and artist and artisan Jean Touret’s tactile wooden surfaces. ‘But at the same time, the bas-reliefs are very intricate.’

In developing ‘Core’, Peer’s intention was to centre the process of handiwork – a discipline he sees as increasingly rare in 2026. Peer was born in the mountainous northern Italian region of South Tyrol – known for its long tradition of wood carving and carpentry – and his work is deeply informed by that culture of making he was surrounded by growing up.

However, when confronted with the realities of production, he quickly realised that the scale of the pieces – coupled with the fact that they are editions, rather than one-offs – meant that it required a more digital approach. ‘We designed everything in 3D, including the imperfections in the wood,’ the designer explains. ‘It was almost as if we were hand-carving it digitally.’ The forms are then milled using a CNC carver, which translates those digital reliefs into precise cuts in solid wood.

Yet, to complete the pieces, a master craftsperson finishes each one by hand. ‘We needed our own Geppetto,’ Peer jokes, referring to Pinocchio’s creator in the Italian fairy tale. Each element is refined by a carpenter, who then treats the surface with a beeswax finish to achieve the collection’s warm, honey-coloured tone. ‘It’s very digital, but at the same time extremely handmade,’ notes Peer, ‘which I think is quite an interesting metaphor for 2026.’

Among the collection is a monumental pedestal cabinet featuring shifting patterns that include a gouged wood grid, concave circles and repeating chevron motifs. There is a dining table, whose diamond-shaped base is zig-zagged with gouged wood sections that look like a series of carved strata, as if the surface had been cut back to reveal its layers. Peer also designed two wall-hanging panels, which strip away the functional aspect of the collection and crystallise it into purely sculptural art.

Peer presents the collection at the Spotti Milano showroom on viale Piave. The presentation, titled ‘Hardcore’, was conceived alongside SEM’s founder, Claudio Spotti and stages the collection in a stripped-back setting, highlighting the essential materiality of the carved wooden forms.

From 18 April 2026, 10am to 7pm, Spotti Milano, Viale Piave 27, 20129 Milano

sem-milano.com

In today's wellbeing-focused culture, awareness of the importance of sleep has never been greater. Sleep is connected to longevity, recovery and productivity, and people are more conscious than ever of how much they are getting.

Swedish bedmaker Hästens has long been ahead of the curve, viewing a bed not merely as a piece of furniture but as an ‘instrument’ that restores you. It is a philosophy the brand has pursued since its founding 170 years ago, long before sleep became a cultural talking point.

Now, in collaboration with designer Ferris Rafauli, Hästens is doubling down on that conviction: that what you rest on makes a profound difference to the day that follows.

This thinking underpins the announcement of two new 'sleep instruments' – the Grand Vividus and the Drēmər. The Grand Vividus was first introduced in 2020, with the Drēmər following as a second expression of the same philosophy. Both underwent significant development through 2024 and 2025, and have been arriving in selected partner stores since late 2025. 'A bed holds you, but a sleep instrument restores you,' says Jan Ryde, fifth-generation CEO of Hästens. 'The new Grand Vividus and new Drēmər bring that pursuit to an even higher standard.'

So what elevates these instruments above an ordinary bed? The Grand Vividus is handmade in Sweden from natural materials – horsehair, wool, cotton and flax – with up to 600 hours of craftsmanship in every piece. In true Scandinavian spirit, every material, layer and refinement either contributes to restoration or is removed. Nothing is superfluous.

The Drēmər applies the same principles, addressing key pillars of better sleep: support, sleep climate, quietness and recovery.

Hästens' broader argument is that the cultural conversation around sleep still doesn't go far enough. Rest, the brand contends, is the hidden variable behind how we live – and the object at its centre should be a tool properly optimised for its purpose.

This is the latest instalment of The Inside Story, Wallpaper’s series spotlighting intriguing, innovative and industry-leading interior design.

If your image of Sicily is one of sunbaked buildings crumbling under the weight of centuries, you wouldn't be wrong – but you would be seriously underestimating the island's architectural range. This Palermo diner, conceived by Didea, offers a corrective: sleek, metallic and futuristic. It is also conceptually distinct from its Sicilian predecessors. Rather than designing a room, Didea wanted to design a system – contemporary, essential and replicable.

The client was a family business with generational roots in the food sector. In their move into hospitality, they chose explicitly to look forward rather than trade on nostalgia.

Look past the spaceship-cool minimalism, and the bones of a classic 1950s American diner are there – refracted, then refracted again through a contemporary lens. That midcentury lineage collides with the graphic confidence of 1970s office interiors. Yet for all its references, the space is never literally nostalgic – that would be too easy.

Stainless steel anchors everything. Shaped into continuous surfaces, linear counters and curved details, it grounds the space in the industrial tradition of the classic diner while remaining clean and controlled. The material works hard beyond aesthetics: it reflects light, organises movement and supports the operational rhythm of service.

Red provides the essential counterpoint, contrasting irresistibly against the silver. It announces itself most boldly in the grid ceiling system – slatted modules forming a regular, articulated pattern that also integrates lighting and technical services – before appearing again at carefully chosen moments throughout the space.

Pale wood panelling offers relief: warm without sentimentality and just enough to temper the industrial palette. The balance between materials is always considered, with nothing competing and everything contributing.

The relationship between the dining room and kitchen was also carefully thought out. Through thresholds, transparencies and visual passages, the work behind the counter is made visible – woven into the spatial narrative rather than concealed from it.

‘The project stems from the idea of creating a system of spaces conceived not only for consumption, but for meeting, staying and recognition,’ says Nicola Andò, architect and creative director of Didea. ‘Spaces able to offer an alternative to traditional fast food, maintaining a balance between speed of service, food quality and architectural identity.’

In a city defined by its past, Didea has made a case for designing the future.

After a decade of absence, Baccarat makes its grand return to Milan Design Week, debuting a starry collaboration with Bethan Laura Wood, who took the crystal brand's classic ‘Zénith' chandelier as her starting point. Conceived in the mid-19th century, this ingenious composition of crystal elements and diamond bevel-cut tassels continues to be one of Baccarat's signature pieces.

Wood's take on the ‘Zénith' sees her deconstruct and reassemble it into a vertical modular system, based on a series of star-shaped metal supports suspended on steel wires that ‘hover like spaceships'. The metal elements become the frame for a playground of crystal forms and colours, based on both traditional codes and new shapes. ‘The goal was to create a system that allowed different-sized chandeliers to be made,' says Wood. ‘I wanted to play with the rules of how a traditional chandelier is built, keeping the language of baroque but interpreting it in a way that's more minimal and abstract.'

Incorporating elements sourced from the Baccarat archives alongside Wood's own research, the result feels like a visual explosion. The arms of the chandelier, which traditionally face outwards to support the light sources, form part of a horizontal structure and connect to two turquoise crystal elements (a pinched diamond-shaped lozenge and a more elongated one), which hold the light bulbs. The frame is covered in an array of prisms, octagonal shapes and flowers, in both clear crystal and a dreamy palette of olivine, parma violet, turquoise and amber, while, at the top, a round mirrored panel replaces a traditional rose, to emphasise the chandelier's explosive effect. ‘I wanted a big mirrored plate because it helps you get this feeling of a vortex,' says Wood. ‘When you're looking up at the chandelier, it reflects in itself to make this kind of endless cascade.'

The chandelier will be available to order as a single ring (‘quite minimal for Baccarat', concedes the designer) or as a multiple-ring composition for a dynamic, cascading effect (there's no actual limit to the number of rings you can order). Other designs include two wall sconces, both of which include the mirrored backing and the pinched diamond lozenge, as well as some of the floral elements. ‘The mirrored backplate gives a feeling of lightness,' she says. ‘The sconces are pushing this baroque aesthetic, but they're also modern and space-age, and look a bit like bugs: a few different references to let your fantasy go wild. I like that they work well as single pieces, but can also be combined to create a more dramatic composition.'

Completing the collection is a series of candleholders, featuring crystal flowers and petals in elegant colour combinations, with pink powder-coated steel bases. ‘I wanted to keep in certain details that were signifiers of Baccarat, but not be completely bound to the fact that everything had to be within traditional coding,' she says. ‘I think Baccarat has a long history of really letting designers and creatives push their language.'

The designs will form part of ‘Crystal Crypt', a sci-fi-inspired experience devised by artist and curator Emmanuelle Luciani, who viewed Baccarat as ‘a temporal bubble, a vessel-cathedral of unique craftsmanship'. On show during Milan Design Week, the experience – which Luciani describes as ‘a total artwork, blending movement, film, scenography and sound' – is inspired by the church of Saint-Rémy, in the town of Baccarat, and the work of American science fiction writer Philip K Dick (the installation is named after one of his short stories). Creating a space that exists somewhere between past and future bears testimony to how Baccarat continues to skilfully use creative collaborations to reinvent historical craft through a contemporary lens.

‘Crystal Crypt' is on show from 21-25 April 2026 at Via Marco Formentini 10, Milan, baccarat.com

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Easily recognisable thanks to its detailed simplicity and strong Japanese influences, Federica Biasi’s work ranges from beautifully crafted wooden coffee tables to kimono-inspired ceramics. So when the young Milan-based designer was commissioned by De Padova to create a new armchair for its 70th anniversary, she seized the opportunity to weave her contemporary sensibility into the long and storied legacy of the Italian company.

‘The collaboration with De Padova comes from an encounter between different worlds, from people meeting and sharing visions,’ she writes. ‘The project reflects a dialogue between cultures, in line with the vision of its founder Maddalena De Padova, and marks the beginning of a meaningful collaboration.’

While Maddalena De Padova mostly looked to Scandinavia for inspiration, Biasi continues to draw on subtle Asian influences for this project. A reinterpretation of Japan’s archetypal floor chairs, ‘Edda’ is a perfectly balanced piece that both extends and redefines the language of the historic brand.

Unlike its traditional predecessors, it does have a pair of very short legs at the front; they are part of a simple black frame with two round bars that slope down backwards. Supporting a white upholstered section slanting in the other direction, it creates a design full of movement and dynamism.

The ‘Edda’ armchair ‘is a design that appears essential, yet holds a depth made of stories, details, and rituals’, says Biasi. ‘The stitching that defines its volumes, the soft padding, and the solid wood supporting structure come together in carefully balanced proportions conceived for contemporary interiors, where comfort and minimalism meet.’

Available with removable fabric, leather or velvet, the ‘Edda’ armchair is on display during Milan Design Week 2026 at the De Padova showroom on Via Cecelia, 7; and the Boffi De Padova showroom on Via Solferino, 11.

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The collaboration between Hannes Peer and Minotti has brought the Italian architect’s work to new horizons, elevating and distilling his sculptural and architectural approach into a refined, ultra-engineered series of designs that bear signs of both the creative gesture and the accuracy of the production.

Seen through the lens of Minotti’s sense of clarity, Peer’s designs have been among the most striking examples of translating an artistic sensibility into a functional, elegant furniture object.

Their latest collaboration, unveiled at Salone del Mobile 2026, features the ‘Blaine’ table, an object that speaks to both parties’ sensibilities while adding a new direction to their respective practice. Featuring a sculptural, cast aluminium base, the table nods to the work of Henry Moore and the modernist approach to casting that was recurrent in Florence Knoll and Ray and Charles Eames’ work.

‘It has always been a dream of mine to design a piece that works in that direction, that on one side is very organic, but also rather restrained in form,’ Peer tells Wallpaper* ahead of the launch. The architect's collaboration with Minotti has resulted in pieces such as the ‘Emmi’ chair or the ‘Nico’ table, both bearing signs of a sculptural, free-handed thinking while working perfectly within the company’s portfolio.

With ‘Blaine’, Minotti’s painstaking approach to refining its projects took a new direction for Peer, who started with what he describes as ‘wild forms’, which were then ‘reduced, edited, talked about’ with the company’s team over several months, ‘without ever losing sight of the original idea. It’s amazing to work with the Minotti team, sometimes there are up to 30 people in the room, five engineers, the whole family shows up, I see it as a sign of love and respect for us designers,’ he says.

The pieces’ final perfection, he explains is the result of ‘many hours, many conversations, many people working together. It’s more similar to a bottega than a big company, there is something so beautiful about that environment.’

The two trestle-like legs forming the base feature a gentle curve and an opening that looks carved, rather than moulded, exuding a sense of artistic elegance that looks much closer to a piece of art. ‘To create a cast object is a huge responsibility,’ says Peer. ‘I was always intimidated by it because the matrix that you use to cast, it's forever. You cannot [mess] it up. You have to be very sure that that is the one.’

As the son of an artist, this language comes naturally to Peer: ‘I think I've known Henry Moore before I've learned to count,’ he recalls. ‘I am very proud of my roots, and I think that is something that I always bring to a project.’

The table’s base will be available in polished or painted cast aluminium, with a top in either marquetterie wood or marble. It is not an object that is visually quiet: its presence holds a room’s attention, like an artwork. ‘I think that we're all storytellers. It's very, very important that each and every design comes not just as a single furniture piece, but rather with an idea of a home or an environment, that approach is super important, and that's where we connected so much with Minotti, who share this vision completely.’

Lightness, minimalist rigour and precise silhouettes have been founding principles of Vincent Van Duysen’s work. Now the Belgian architect makes his debut into the B&B Italia collection with a new chaise longue that encapsulates his design ethos while offering a modern interpretation of comfort.

‘This collection explores how structure can shape comfort, and how comfort in turn gives meaning to structure,’ explains Van Duysen. The design is based on an elongated structure holding a rattan woven surface, which stretches into a loop to create a gentle reclining form. The material’s tactile warmth is at the core of the design, and it was chosen for its breathability and organic lightness.

The structure is conceived to remain discreet, as the seat’s sensuous curve is the star of the show. ‘Every piece begins with a gesture of structure, but it ultimately exists for the body and the way we choose to live with it,’ continues Van Duysen. ‘Sometimes a small detail can completely transform an object. A simple chamfer or a continuous line can redefine the way we perceive a familiar form. The project is about balance, between structure and softness, precision and comfort, architecture and the body.’

Find out more at bebitalia.com and vincentvanduysen.com

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