Design Reimagined
Designer Nina Tolstrup has the ability to see the potential in the overlooked and forgotten. fluoro spoke with Tolstrup about her passion for reinvention and her recent furniture collaboration with Marc Jacobs.
What started as a need for a specific chair for an interior project has grown into something greater. Nina’s understanding of the importance of resourcefulness has seen her look to the potential of salvaged chairs, working with the metal frame to create something new.
Tolstrup looks for specific features when salvaging chairs, “it’s not any chair that I would pickup. The frames must have proportions that I find interesting. I now have started to see many other possibilities with this kind of approach, there are so many things that we discard too easily.”
Tolstrup has applied this concept to a new series of chairs, covering them with fabrics from the Marc by Marc Jacobs collection.
(f) Looking to your collaboration with Marc Jacobs, when using fabric from a past collection how do you ensure the chair is viewed in a contemporary sense?
(NT) Marc Jacobs fabric is very contemporary and I always work with a simplicity and functionality that will express a contemporary feel. The form of language that has evolved from this collection is very simple and elemental in nature. This serves well as a canvas to apply bright and bold colours and patterns.
(f) You have stated that it is “more interesting to reinvent to justify what you are doing.” Do you think this view applies to the broader furniture design industry? Why? Why not?
(NT) Designers are obsessed with creating chairs, as a good chair is always a challenge to make. The re-imagined chair is in some way reinvented – as I use abandoned old chairs and bring them to life again.
However, in general, I think that chair design is an area of little reinvention. New materials and processes do every now and then invite for reinvention of chairs but this do not apply to the broader furniture design industry. Why? It most likely cost too much in R&D and there are plentiful of lovely chairs around.
(f) What is the most interesting object you have seen someone ʻre-imagineʼ?
(NT) Stuart Haygarth is a designer/artist that I know from my local area in London and I think his Optical Chandeliers are a great re-imagined object made out of 4500 prescription spectacle lenses. The light effect is fantastic and the chandelier beautiful.
(f) Recently you have begun to sell the instructions to some of your creations, specifically your pallet project. You also donate the information to a charity. What does this social aspect add to the message of your work?
(NT) It has been a great experience to sell DIY instruction and be able to reach out with my designs to a totally new audience. The social aspect gives me the confidence that my work is helping to serve the needs of a community. This a new and empowering aspect of design and I am glad that this had been communicated through this project which continues to evolve and develop.
(f) Are there any projects in the pipeline that you can share with fluoro readers?
(NT) I am currently working on the curation and exhibition design of the Danish Craft collection which is another aspect of work which I really enjoy. This will be shown this September at Objet Maison in Paris. I am also exploring further projects through my gallery in London 19 Greek Street.
