Hasta La Ideas

Movie: in our second video interview with Konstantin Grcic in Milan, the industrial designer discusses the upsides and downsides of designing collections for multiple brands, rather than building relationships with a select few. 

“I think the business model of design studios working for several companies, and companies working with many different designers, is quite unique [compared to other industries],” says Grcic, who unveiled new products for brands including Emeco, Flos, Magis and Mattiazzi in Milan this year.

“It has its advantages; it creates dynamism,which I think is positive. I’ve seen the negative side of it as well; because of the dynamics things change and a company that was great to work with for five years suddenly becomes less interesting.”

Grcic concedes that he would prefer to work with fewer companies and build long-term relationships with them.

“To be honest, I prefer working for only a very few companies and having a very steady relationship,” he says. “That’s how it was in the old days, especially in Italy. The great masters each had a few companies that they worked for, almost for a lifetime, and that’s what produced the really great work.”

However, Grcic says that is still possible to work with a company on a short-term basis and produce good work.

“I think some companies, for sure, hire designers for marketing reasons, for having their names in the catalogue,” he says. “But there are other companies – and those are the interesting companies – that are looking for designers as partners for realising certain projects.”

He continues: “It’s interesting that a company like Magis, for example, somehow succeeds in bringing together very different designers on very different projects. If it works, it’s actually quite fascinating. It creates an interesting tension and energy.”

Similarly, Grcic says that a long-standing relationship with a company doesn’t guarantee good design.

“There are companies that only work with very few designers and it can show that the continuity creates better work,” he says. “But it can also end in repetition and a kind of dead-end street.”

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marketing reasons” – Konstantin Grcic appeared first on Dezeen.

Milan 2013: British designers Industrial Facility will unveil these three-legged stools for Italian design brand Mattiazzi in Milan this week (+ movie).

Named Radice, the stools combine the front-half of a traditional four-legged stool with an unusual single leg in the middle of the back.

“Radice has some tension in its form and it is a slight surprise that the third leg works as well as it does to resolve the overall structure,” says Industrial Facility’s Sam Hecht. “It is in some ways structurally diagrammatic, yet is made comfortable visually and physically because of how this third leg supports the seat.”

A low backrest branches upwards from the back leg. Its t-bar shape provides a practical place to hang coats and handbags and is reflected in the bracing at the top and bottom of the legs.

The Radice stools have no visible fixings or screws and the seat appears to merely rest on the leg frame.

Manufactured by Mattiazzi, the stools will be available in red, yellow, black or natural wood, with additional cushion options. There is also a choice of two heights.

This is Industrial Facility’s second product for Mattiazzi: in 2010 they presented a chair called Branca, inspired by the growth of tree branches. See all our stories about design by Industrial Facility.

Mattiazzi will show the project at the Salone Internazionale del Mobile from 9 to 14 April, alongside chairs based on camping equipment by Jasper Morrison. See all our stories about Mattiazzi.

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for Mattiazzi appeared first on Dezeen.

French designers Ronan & Erwan Bouroullec will present this wooden chair for for Italian brand Mattiazzi in Milan next month.

Called Osso, the design has four sculpted wooden pads making up the seat and backrest.

The chairs are made from oak, maple or ash sourced close to Mattiazzi’s factory.

Each one is manufactured with a mixture of CNC tooling and handcraft.

The collection will include a chair, armchair and child’s chair plus high and low stools.

More about Ronan & Erwan Bouroullec on Dezeen »

The information below is from the designers:

Osso, Mattiazzi

Working with Mattiazzi is comparable to work with an organic farm. While being a small, family-owned company that has been manufacturing chairs for others since about forty years, Mattiazzi decided to do less yet better. By using sophisticated CNC set of tools and at the same time a greatly refined manual know-how, Mattiazzi has a hybrid way to consider furniture production.

We were particularly interested by the fact that all the equipment is powered by solar energy and that the wood is coming from the surrounding areas to be carefully selected without the use of any chemical treatments. They came back to the basics and this is precisely what piqued our interest and our fascination for the Mattiazzi family’s endeavour. As designers, we feel involved in supporting such valiant microstructures that are always on the edge as they try to adjust to a constantly changing market.

That said, the Osso chair had to be the illustration of what Mattiazzi is in its roots. We designed an object in plain wood but not in regular plain wood, the quality of the wood literally makes the object, like the best piece of meat would make the refinement of a dish. Our intention was to let the sensuality of the wood material – from oak to maple to ash – express itself.

The Osso chair invites to be touched, even caressed as it is extremely sculpted and polished thanks to the use of highly sophisticated digital control equipment. The high-tech assembling system of geometrical wood panels allows a quite singular strength while preserving a design balance of the object. The Osso collection will include a chair, an armchair, a children chair as well as high and low stools.

MATTIAZZI Salone del Mobile Hall 6 Booth F32B + Fuorisalone Kaleidoscope, Gallery Corso Buenos Aires 10, entrance Via Giovanni Masera

See also:

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Industrial Facility for Mattiazzi	Flex by Georgi Manassiev	Platypus chair by Studio Juju