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Sunday, March 18, 2012

Fifty years from now: Louise Campbell

Lately I've been giving thought to the young designers whose pieces I believe will be considered "classics" fifty years from now, so I plan to do a regular feature about their work.

Louise Campbell
The first of these young designers who caught my eye was Louise Campbell. Born in Copenhagen in 1970 to a Swedish father and English mother, she lived and studied in both countries.

She graduated from the London College of Furniture in 1992 and the Denmark Design School in 1995. She opened her own studio in 1996. Her focus is primarily on furniture and lighting, although she also works on product and interior design.

Her client list includes companies such as Louis Poulsen, Zanotta, HAY, Royal Copenhagen, Holmegaard, Stelton, Muuto, Interstop and the Danish Ministry of Culture. Her work is playful, feminine and experimental, taking everyday objects, materials and manufacturing processes in new directions, such as combining laser cut steel with water cut neoprene rubber and laminated felt in the Prince chair or wrapping steel with angora wool in the Retreat chair.

I encourage you to go to her site and read her descriptions of each piece. They're clever and funny and well worth your time. For example, here is her description of the Entertainment chairs:

For waiting rooms. An attempt towards distraction. Upon sitting down, a sound system is activated in the headrest of the chair. Each chair has its own recording. One falls in love with you, begging you to never leave it. One teaches you an effective Spanish lesson. One sings gently into your ears. One hates you for sitting down without first asking for permission, and lets its anger pour over you for as long as you stay seated. 

Text and images from louisecampbell.com, unless otherwise noted

Entertainment chairs
Bless You chair
Folda sofa
Relief chaise
Retreat chair
Prince chair
Random chairs
materialicious.com
Spider Woman stacking chair
archiexpo.com
Fatso lamp
Shutters lamp for Louis Poulsen
Campbell pendant
bolig-huset.dk
Fiducia candleholder
yankodesigns.com
The More the Merrier candleholder
scandinaviandesigns.com

7 comments:

  1. I pinned that Prince Chair. Thanks for the education on current design!

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    1. I've pinned several of her pieces too. I really like how innovative she is with materials.

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  2. wonderful!! thanks for starting this series...it would be great to know about promising designers from this era...look forward to future posts :)

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    1. I think this series should be fun. You younger folks will be alive 50 years from now to find out if my predictions were correct. :)

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  3. I agree, that prince chair is lovely!

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    1. I think it's interesting that the Prince chair is steel and neoprene rubber. I think my favorite is the Folda sofa.

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  4. the link is broken that connects with her site but I encourage you to fix it because found the site despite the broken link and it is really great!

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