IKEA PS Collection 2014 | A sneak peek in Paris

Wall shelf with 11 knobs by Keiji Ashizawa Tokyo, Japan

From April 1st the new IKEA PS Collection ' On the Move ' can be found in IKEA shops worldwide. The official launch was last week in Paris and I had the pleasure to be invited by IKEA to jump on the TGV and have a look at it for the first time. 

With more people who currently live in cities than in the countryside IKEA is responding to this trend with the new PS collection by and for young urbanites. A total of 15 young designers from cities around the world, including the Amsterdam design duo Scholten & Baijings designed 51 flexible , affordable and multi-functional design products .

It’s a collection for people and homes on the move: young-in-mind urban people living “in the moment” in a small space. The use of color in this collection is a little different than you're used to see from IKEA. In addition to the colors orange and red we see some softer yellow, green pastels and neon pink in this collection. 

Dutch design duo Scholten & Baijings are well known worldwide for their minimalistic forms and balanced use of color. For the IKEA PS collection they designed a series of clocks and posters. Stefan explained how IKEA and their team worked together on every little detail of the clocks, and how he hopes to reach a larger audience with this collaboration. 

The posters are typically Scholten & Baijings, who In their design make use of light effects, grids, transparency and layered patterns. The look of the posters change when you look them from different viewpoints.

"I wanted to design something simple for children to encourage play and move ment. They can balance on it, jump over it, crawl under it... then sit down on it to relax... so they can do it all over again!” Balancing bench by Henrik Preutz Älmult, Sweden

“I have designed two pieces both of which I would describe as open.The wardrobe is a piece that is free from codes. It can be placed anywhere and due to its camouflage it adapts to any kind of home furnishing. It plays with what ́s hidden and what ́s revealed and it allows you to create your own design. Wardrobe in white or grey/silver by matali crasset Paris, France 

“The inspiration for the pendant lamp came from science fiction and video games. The main idea is that the customer can change the shape of the lamp shade and the light output by pulling the string. Pendant lamp by David Wahl Shanghai, China

“The idea was to create a work environment within the living space. The furniture we design allows you to continue working at home, but more importantly, to keep your work separate from the living area when you’re spending time with your family.” Bureau by Krystian Kowalski Warsaw, Poland

                                 PICTURES 1|2|4|8 IKEA   3|5|6|7 VOSGESPARIS

Merci Conceptstore | Friends & Partytime

The ever changing themes at Merci make it always surprising and different when visiting. As I wrote in my last post I visited the annual party at night and it was a great occasion to meet up and have a drink with some friends ;) But of course I had to have a look at the store and make some pictures, before lunch at the cinema cafe. 

At night it was time to party with the girls and I met up with Valerie who kindly offered me a place to sleep, merci encore Val! Karine, Lau, Cez and Anna who joined us later. Nothing can beat a good night with friends and it was a real pleasure to see everyone again.

I loved this table where at night they demonstrated how to make the lamps you see in front of the wall.

Opening of Paris Designweek | Meeting VIPP in Paris & Some news for my Dutch readers |

On my last night in Paris I went to the annual Party at the Merci store for the opening of the new design season and Paris design week. See some pictures of last years party here: Merci Y Design party & Meeting Paola Navone i will sort out some more pictures from the party gang tonight

I also met one of the lovely ladies from VIPP there who I previously met in Copenhagen, when we had the great styling challenge at their flagship store. You might remember the styling we did with the new bin VIPP launched in cooperation with Concept store Merci. So of course while being at Merci I had to have a closer look as there were even more sizes to admire. 

Next to being a super cool concept store, Merci is know for the its graphic design by studio be-pôles on many of their items. Being a huge Merci fan, I have quite a collection of Merci goodies myself. This bin comes in a limited edition of 40 only! 

VIPP Online store in the Netherlands is now open! 

Good news for us who are in the Netherlands, the online shopping site www.vipp.com is now live to customers and fans throughout the Netherlands. The full Vipp product family of kitchen and bathroom accessories including the iconic Vipp pedal bin will be available to ship to anywhere in the Netherlands.

"Since 1939, Vipp has opened many new chapters in the company history. Making our high quality products available to the entire Dutch market is another important chapter in our journey that began with a single pedal bin in a small town in Denmark more than 70 years ago” says Jette Egelund, daughter of Holger Nielsen, who created the Vipp pedal.
Vipp specializes in functional tools for the kitchen and bathroom. Check them out!  

A first look at the new MENU design | Maison & Objet

At Maison & Objet many Scandinavian Brands I got to know better during our Designtrade blogger tour this last June. Or worked with for DesignTrade in our blogger zone were also present in Paris. It was a pleasure to meet some of them again. But as this fair is huge, the brands are very busy and I only had a few hours it was impossible to see all. 

I did promised myself though to have a look at the stand of Danish brand MENU as I am totally in love with everything the do and wanted to see the Flip around table. As you might remember we were invited for a dinner at restaurant Host with them. I just got an email from Menu saying that the restaurant is the winner of the 2012/2013 Best Design Restaurant of the world Award!

By then... we never got to meet them in person by then as they were working towards a deadline for their brand book. If you have the time you should have a look at the amazing pictures here: MENU brandbook.

At the fair I also noticed the little teaser they gave of the new table designed by MENU which will soon be launched and was firstly presented here. The table has nice accessories, such as this lamp. I had the pleasure to have a nice chat with Bjarne Hansen himself who told me the wonderful story behind the design. More info will be coming soon. So how do you like this new table!

Paris shopping | Beauty & Interiors

Before heading of to Maison & Objet, I had a quick ... well actually a really laid back stroll through Paris. On Saturday morning after a little coffee and the officious croissant on Boulevard St. Germain I visited the new Caravane boutique.

Walking around in the area I also found this beautiful boutique Le labo which I recognized from their tinned candles, I loved the industrial character of it. What do you think, pretty amazing hey!

Interior of the Aesop shop in the Marais where I passed by in the afternoon, I love this brand and the basic design of the shop with its 427 steel dishes into the walls | originally ‘lids’ which close the pipes used as plumbing throughout the city of Paris|  

Pictures (C) Desiree | Vosgesparis

Maison et Objet 2013 | Mixed Materials | Nelson Sepulveda & Ay Lin

Design Ay Lin

Natural materials, crafting, forms, pure, serenity.... it is difficult to explain what is the magic of the products coming out of the hands of the creative trio of Ay Illuminate. I wrote about them many times before | like here | And one of my favorite all time lamps, made by Nelson Sepulveda is giving a beautiful natural touch to my own home I am still dreaming about the round version of it as that was my first love.

Of course I had to visit them at the Maison & Objet in Paris this last weekend and we had a chat and a coffee. I also finally got to meet Nelson I love it how he seems to see beauty and find inspiration, in everything that surrounds him, he for sure is a very intriguing personality

Pottery by Nelson Sepulveda

At the fair I also got to finally see the pottery by Nelson Selpulveda and the new work of Ay Lin who designed the sombrero, the poofs and a new range of lamps, see them here here!
I added a small video below with an interview by Cecile Poignant that I like a lot to show you some more of his world. And at the end of this post some pictures of the Dadasi collection I got from my friend Karine of Bodie and Fou which is one of the online address where you can buy the collection for your own home. 

             

                                                                  Design Ay Lin

Pottery by Nelson Sepulveda

Pictures (C) Desiree | Vosgesparis

Maison et Objet 2013 | Mixed Materials

Beautiful details and materials in the stand of all time favorite Rick Owens. Copper plates elegantly used with black iron cast tables. I love this dark and Gothic feeling of the furniture, the heavy iron bowls... I just want the whole set in the picture below..

New copper three-legged stool (there's a matching pillow) I thought Giovanni's bracelets fit beautifully with it... New lights, here on the wall I loved the concrete version.

Beautiful and sober I found the work of Belgian designer Michael Verheijden. Here as well, a combination of materials such as, marble, brass, and various types of wood combined well with each other. On his website more design!

Combinations of black & copper stay beautiful | byTom Dixon

Wood treated in all kind of different ways, giving the impression of the material being metal seems a trend. These handmade tables by Mos Design all have a wood based tabletop treated with high resistance stucco and painted with acrylic colors.

Really beautiful also this round carpet 'Loop' made out of hundreds of small circles and designed by studio Mia Moto via Pulpo. And the small round table below by Stefano Gaggero | Arcade Paris, with the iron base and beautiful black slate stone tabletop. 

More and different materials in an up following post about my visit to Maison et Objet this weekend. And stay tuned also for some beautiful shops I discovered in Parijs! 

 Pictures (C) Desiree | Vosgesparis