ADAM 'S VIEW: ACNE Furniture - Paris presentation

“furniture has always been my world and it is my history as a designer, where i began creatively. Sometimes i am asked what is Swedish design, and I always think of the Creative Collective – The NK Group – an incredibly influential collective of furniture designers, based in Stockholm during the 1920’s to the 1940’s. The NK Group is what Swedish design encapsulates for me – functionality, creativity, object and craftsmanship.
Carl Malmsten was one the most archetypal Swedish furniture designers from this group, and his work is extremely personal as i grew up surrounded by his pieces at my grandmother’s home. i began to research his work more in-depth and i came across the Nya Berlin (New Berlin) Sofa. The Nya Berlin was an archetypical piece of Malmsten’s design and was created for use in the Swedish consulate in Berlin. it has not been in production since 1949, so it was really inspiring to work with. with this sofa as a reference, i started to look at how we worked architecturally, instead of just treating say the upholstery. i decided as an alternative to objectify its form from a perspective play. as we do with fashion we played with proportion, lineage and structure – stretching, squashing and pulling the simplistic shape to create new sculptural forms. and why we chose to dress it in indigo? Denim is our heritage and i thought it was super interesting to treat the upholstery in the same way we approach our jeans – by washing bleaching and hand-dying the pieces to create very bespoke finishes. I just love how the fabric changes and grows with time. For me denim is always fashion.” Johnny Johansson / ACNE