CMF Trends
Material as Decoration
There is a new widespread trend in the aesthetic appearance of surfaces and the materials from which they are produced: accentuate the essence of the source materials, whether natural or artificial, the structure and decoration.
Natural colors and defects of the materials come to life, seemingly liberated: the rules of decoration have changed.
The designer does not design patterns and select colors but rather designs how to combine flaws and colors determined by nature with new vision and logic.
The form is a pretext for infinite combination of color variants, textures and designs to create harmony.
Evocative essences
Among the strongest examples of Materials as Decoration is the great world of wood. For years, following the laws of minimalism, the saturation of wood’s essence has been dimmed, neutralized and the patterns of wood grains reduced to the minimum.
Today there is instead studied and precise research of natural color combinations, surprising for their varieties of tints and intensity. There is an evident desire to communicate the precious innate diversity of woods.
FROM LEFT TO RIGHT: WOOD COLLECTION, “STUDIO EFFE” FOR SOUVENIR MILANO, PHOTOCREDITS: SIMONA.SAGRIPANTI – I SENSI DEL LEGNO (DETAIL), SLOW WOOD, PHOTOCREDITS: SIMONA SAGRIPANTI – UNA STANZA, DESK DETAIL, ANTONIO ARICÒ, PHOTOCREDITS: ANTONIO ARICÒ – TOP TABLES DETAIL, SIX GALLERY, PHOTOCREDITS: SIMONA SAGRIPANTI – KNOLL PAVILION DETAIL, PHOTOCREDITS: KNOLL – UNA STANZA, ANTONIO ARICÒ, PHOTOCREDITS: SIMONA SAGRIPANTI.
The consideration on the preciousness of natural woods is not only aesthetic. For example, in the showroom of SlowWood, visitors were invited to “taste” small samples of wood, a sensorial experience that was both immersive and subjective.
Rich mixtures
Already at the 2014 edition of MDW, marble returned to the center of interesting design proposals.
Already at the 2014 edition of MDW, marble returned to the center of interesting design proposals. Beginning with the most classic, the white Carrara and the black Marquigna, marble was reinterpreted, liberated from references to its past. Reworking marble with innovative technologies can reinvent marble as forms that seem surprisingly lightweight.
This year, the research of varied opulence of colors, markings and veins spotlights the structure and appearance of the materials, bringing out their properties, showing their natural richness. This style is present not only in marble but also in other materials: stones, composites, and even new conglomerates made from recovered and recycled materials.
FROM LEFT TO RIGHT: MAREA COFFEE TABLE, BUDRI AGUA COLLECTION BY PATRICIA URQUIOLA / PETRA REDS BLOCK BY KUTLEH, PHOTOCREDITS: KUTLEH / ORFEO COFFEE TABLE, DESIGN BY MATTEO CIBIC FOR MM, PHOTOCREDITS: MM / UNSIGHTED EXHIBITION, “THE PIE” COFFE TABLE DETAIL, BY JONATHAN ZAWADA, PHOTOCREDITS: STEFANIA.PERENICH / ALGAS VASE, DESIGN PATRICIA URQUIOLA FOR BUDRI, PHOTOCREDITS: BUDRI / INLAY COFFEE TABLE AND AVALON VASE BY BLOC STUDIOS, PHOTOCREDITS: CAMILLE.VIVIER.
Kutleh (arabic: block, mass) is a project that repurposes the surplus produced from cladding tiles used in everyday construction projects and attempts to create blocks out of the discarded. These new kutleh blocks emerge as a new medium.
The variation of colors and forms that spring from different locations is where the beauty lies.
Designed chaos
In the multicolored world of materials obtained from recycled waste and scraps, the trend is to emphasize and utilize the unpredictability of the decorative effects in a creative way, selecting the harmony of colours, checking the flow of the mixtures.
The study of the random placement of these variations becomes an aesthetic richness.
from left to right: precious plastic, emil corre at rossana orlandi, photocredits: simona sagripanti – delta line stools, ecopixel, photocredits: ecopixel – plasmarock at mutant matter, dutchinvertuals, photocredits: ronald smits / lithoplast rock at mutant matter, dutchinvertuals by Shahar Livne, photocredits: ronald.smits – chair charlie, ecobirdy by Vanessa Yuan & joris Vanbriel, photocredits: ecobirdy.
“Getting trash into cash…
the plastic-diamond I worked on during #preciousplastic V3.
Completely made from old cd cases
19kg of PS and 90cm high”.
– Emile Corre, Instagram profile
valuable Marble from plastic [Dave Hakkens]
Alluring imperfections
The fascination with imperfection guided the search for new surfaces: corrosion, oxidation, stratification. These designer-artists tried to avoid the monotony of uniformity.
from left to right: rust harvest furniture, studio yumakano, photocredits: studio yumakano – mooi, seat and wallcovering detail, photocredits: stefania perenich – Jan Kath, carpet detail, photocredits: jan kath – new merge series, tables and stools collection by okkim studio, photocredits: okkim studio.
“Rust Harvest” is an experimental materials project focused on rust.
The attractive expressions of rust could be produced in quantity and used in new textures and products, with a technique that allows to transfer only the rust from metal plates using acrylic resin. Because the resulting material can be used like ordinary acrylic resin, it holds limitless possibilities for various products, interior design, and construction.
Rust Harvest Furniture Vol.2 [Yuma Kano]