Blog 07/10/09
How to Create an Outdoor Room
Nowadays, people want their gardens and terraces to look as good as their houses. Most people in the UK don’t have the luxury of a huge amount of space in their homes, so making the most out of any outdoor space is a must. A lonely set of garden furniture perched on a lawn is hardly maximising the potential of your outdoor area; why not follow these tips to create an outdoor ‘room’ where you can entertain or just relax with family, without having to build a costly conservatory!
Take time to consider the style of your house, the interior layout and the decoration style you have chosen. If you really want to make the most out of your outdoor space, you should put as much thought and planning into how it will look, flow and function as you do for the inside of your home. If you love minimalism and modern design, then traditional teak garden furniture may look out of place as you step from inside to outside. Similarly, a love of flowery chintz inside will make overtly sleek and modern furniture outside look like it belongs to a show home rather than your home. If in doubt, choose chic and simple designs for outdoor furniture that are understated enough to complement just about any decoration style. Choose neutral colours such as the creams and browns of this Golf armchair and darker browns and whites of the Box armchair. Choosing simplicity in the style and shape will also help the garden furniture blend into the existing style of your home. This Joker armchair is contemporary but plain enough to not seem out of place in a home that has more traditional furniture.
Choose materials that are weatherproofed and therefore able to stay outside all year round, whatever the weather. This will give a sense of permanence to your garden ‘room’; a place where you can enjoy al fresco dining or read the papers over breakfast even in the chillier months. Our garden and pool furniture is made from Shintotex®, a synthetic Rattan which has the same look as natural fibre but is far more resistant to the elements. This is mounted on an aluminium frame, making the furniture practically indestructible and easy to clean.
Consider the layout of your garden furniture, just as you would with your lounge or dining room furniture. Position the armchairs, tables, sofas and sun loungers not just with function in mind, but also for the way it looks. Consider factors such as symmetry and the way pieces flow. For instance, make sure that there is a clear walk-way from the back door of your house through into the outdoor space and the eyeline is not blocked by the back of a bulky sofa. Don’t overfill the area; it’s better to have a feeling of space so that you can enjoy the garden, terrace or pool-side without being surrounded by cluttered furniture.
Finally, don’t forget to accessorise. Use pot plants, throws, cushions and candles as accents to ‘dress’ the space and make it feel more homely. Parasols not only create shade but can also provide privacy and finish off a space by placing a type of partial ‘ceiling’ over the area. And don’t forget good lighting so that you can enjoy your ‘outdoor room’ well into the evening.
Blog 30/09/09
Interiors Go ‘Pop’ with Space Age Style
Mid-century design is once more having it’s time in the sun, with 1950s and 1960s furniture enjoying something of a renaissance. There is growing demand for the space-age style bold colours and shapes made with modern materials personified by many of the Bauhaus furniture classics. Pieces such as Eero Arnio’s Ball Chair of 1963, a piece that has become synonymous with 60s Pop Art culture, and Eero Saarinen’s Tulip Chair, an earlier piece from 1956 but which bears all the hallmarks of the space age shapes and fluidity of line that would be so prevalent in the following era.
The 50s and 60s were – for the most part – a time of expression and individuality pervaded by a feeling of hope, possibility, freedom and prosperity. Europe and the United States had bloomed in the post-war era and horizons were broadened like never before, with the pinnacle being the space race to get the first man on the moon. Suddenly there seemed to be far fewer rules and existence seemed simpler, more carefree; at least in the world of art and culture and before the Vietnam War signalled the start of a different zeitgeist.
Perhaps it’s a desire to hark back to a simpler time that is behind our current love for all things Bauhaus. The simple, clean lines, modern and groundbreaking materials and bold and sometimes wacky shapes seem to lighten a room, making it an enjoyable place to be. It’s beautiful design, it’s functional but it’s also fun!
Blog 23/10/09
Bauhaus Furniture: Still Relevant for Today?
If you think Bauhaus furniture is too high-concept for your home then think again. Some people equate Bauhaus with the sort of modern furniture that you only see in museums or show homes, but thanks to top-quality reproductions of Bauhaus classic designs (like ours!), these beautiful pieces are accessible to the mass market. And they are as suitable for today’s homes as any contemporary designer furniture.
That’s because of the very theory that underpins the original Bauhaus movement back in the 1920s: that objects around you should be supremely beautiful, but this beauty should be partnered with technology in order to make them not only functional but also to provide every-day living solutions for your home. What could be more current and in-keeping with today’s busy lives than marrying beauty with function while solving problems around your home?
‘Practical’ is not a word often associated with modern furniture or art, but Bauhaus furniture is absolutely practical. The Eero Saarinen Tulip Chair and Tulip Table, for instance, are designed to maximise space – they provide seating and dining solutions while taking up very little space thanks to the pedestal legs and lack of arms on the chairs. Eileen Gray furniture is also designed to slip into the smallest of spaces while still providing solutions, like the shape of the chromed cocktail table. The minimalism of Bauhaus furniture, in simple colour schemes and with sleek flowing lines, also makes it easy to co-ordinate with existing home decoration styles.
Another way that Bauhaus furniture proves relevance for today is in its durability. You may pay more for a Le Corbusier sofa than a high street sofa, it’s true, but you won’t need to replace it anywhere near as soon. Bauhaus furniture was designed to last, by using tough materials such as aluminium and quality leather and the best manufacturing processes such as stitching, etc. Our reproductions are built in exactly the same way, which means your piece of Bauhaus furniture becomes an investment for decades to come. In today’s difficult economic climate, who isn’t looking at the bottom line, but then who doesn’t want to surround themselves with things of great beauty? In these, and many other ways, Bauhaus furniture proves it’s as relevant for today’s homes as it was when it was first designed.
Blog 05/11/09
Bauhaus Keeps On Influencing
Here on this blog, we recently asked if Bauhaus furniture was still relevant for today. Could pieces of furniture designed up to 90 years ago really fit into our fast-paced demanding lives or please us as much aesthetically as contemporary design? Well, of course we were likely to say yes - Bauhaus furniture is absolutely relevant for today! We admit we’re a little biased! But it seems we are not alone in this view, with the respected New York Magazine in agreement.
In a piece published on 1st November, the magazine claims that “the German art school that closed 76 years ago is still determining what your coffee cup looks like”, even going as far as to assert that “we all live in a Bauhaus”! In the article, various pieces of contemporary design from well-known companies such as Muji and Ikea are described as the “offspring” of the Bauhaus movement. So influential are the core principles upon which the Bauhaus design movement is based – of modern design, utility and practicality – that they can even be seen in the ubiquitous iPhone, according to New York Magazine.
New York’s Museum of Modern Art is just about to house the exhibition “Bauhaus 1919–1933: Workshops for Modernity”, a show brimming with objects and furniture “as clean, functional and striking as anything on the market today”. It’s official, Bauhaus furniture continues to influence our everyday lives.
Read more: How the Bauhaus School Is Still Influencing Modern Design -- New York Magazine http://nymag.com/homedesign/features/61726/#ixzz0W0cJa2RF
What Makes Ludwig Mies van der Rohe Design Furniture Stand Out from the Rest?
Even if you don’t know much about modern design furniture, the chances are you’ll recognise a piece of Ludwig Mies van der Rohe design furniture. His Barcelona Chair, first designed for the German Pavilion, also of van der Rohe’s design, in Barcelona’s World Exhibition back in 1929, can still be seen gracing top offices and modern homes across the world to this day. So what is it about Ludwig Mies van der Rohe design furniture that makes it stand out from the rest as some of the finest design classics of the twentieth century?
First, he was passionately committed to the modernist movement and designed and developed furniture according to stringent rules of beauty, function and performance in design in order for them to be seen as inherently modern.
Second, he was one of the first architects to harness some of the principals of modern architecture for the design of every-day furniture. He used industrial technologies in furniture design that had never been used before; he used cantilevers to set off the elegant structural frames that were at the very foundation of his furniture; and he brought an architect’s precision to the choice of luxury materials such as the finest chrome and leather.
Finally, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe design furniture is very much based on the architect/designer’s two tenets: “Less is more” and “God is in the details”. Both sayings are very much part of today’s aesthetic lexicon. In these two simple aphorisms, Van der Rohe defined a very modern way of seeing beauty in the design of objects around us, whether furniture or buildings; so modern in fact that they remain buzz words to this day.
Blog 15/12/09
Set of Hit TV Series Ugly Betty Fuels Demand For Bauhaus Design Furniture
There’s always a strong demand for Bauhaus design furniture and similarly inspired pieces of contemporary furniture. However, sales of such pieces have been given a boost from an unexpected quarter: from hit US TV series ‘Ugly Betty’.
The hugely popular comedy show Ugly Betty uses set furniture that includes just about every example of Bauhaus design furniture, either exact copies or pieces that are heavily inspired by the modernist style. Viewers of the show have loved the cool chairs, tables and occasional furniture, particularly the office design furniture used in the achingly hip offices of Mode magazine.
Around the Mode offices you’ll see examples of Le Corbusier design furniture, Ray and Charles Eames office furniture, Eileen Gray design furniture and Ludwig Mies van der Rohe design furniture, among others. Here at Home Concept, we’ve long known of the huge popularity of this style of furniture, and indeed our furniture store is heaving with great examples from all these designers. However, it’s always great to hear the word getting out to a whole new audience: decorating your home or office with Bauhaus design furniture couldn’t be more fashionable right now!