Doing it the Dutch style

Diane Daniel profiles three designers from the Netherlands, who recently showcased their portfolio at an Italian furniture fair

Contemporary Dutch design often tilts toward nonconfor-mity, accentuating colour, shape and surface material to create something innovative and eye-catching.

Although the design furniture market has slowed in recent years, an appreciative Dutch customer base has helped keep it afloat, said Gerrit Vos, co-owner of Workshop of Wonders in Utrecht, which showcases designer furnishings, mostly from Europe. “In Holland, it’s quite normal to buy design products, more so than other places,” Gerrit said. “We spend relatively a lot of money on design talents, investing in interiors and gardens and such.”

A notable increase in sales during the past 18 months has come from the professional sector. “The pickup has been tremendous, but less so with residential customers and more with projects with architects,” he said. “Also, hospitality — restaurants and hotels — is really big at the moment, and offices are spending money again, too.”

Here is a look at 3 Dutch designers who introduced furniture designs during the Salone del Mobile Milano, the Italian furniture fair that was scheduled for April 12 through 17.

Christien Meindertsma

When Label/Breed, an initiative to match designers with manufacturers, invited Christien Meindertsma, 35, to create something using a natural composite material, she immediately rejected one option. “I thought I shouldn’t impose my Flax Project on them,” recalled Christien, whose sunny studio in an 1800s farm-house in the village of Asperen houses the project’s output.

The effort began in 2008 with a commission for rope lamps from Thomas Eyck, who sells designs online and in shops.

Afterward, Christien devoted the next 5 years to documenting the cultivation and harvesting of flax, which finds a fertile home in parts of the Netherlands, as well as studying and interpreting the plant as the origin of linseed oil, linen and rope.

The creative output on display in her work space includes a hanging rope lamp, a bird-shaped figurine filled with flax seed, linen tea towels and a flax-rope ottoman, two of which were among a selection of gifts given to Michelle Obama by Dutch royalty in 2009.

After Label/Breed connected her with Enkev, a company specialising in natural fibres, they concluded that a composite of flax and PLA — or polylactic acid, a bioplastic — would be an ideal construction material and, as she said, she could “geek out” on flax again. The composite is composed of 4 layers of woven flax and five layers of dry-needled felted flax, both containing PLA fibre.

“It goes into a mould, and is heat-pressed, somewhat like a toastie,” Christien said, clapping together pieces of felt and fabric to demonstrate. “The PLA then melts into everything and makes the composite hard and strong.”

Christien said she chose to make a chair from flax because of the technical challenge: “It’s like the queen of products. It has to look nice, be strong and be comfortable.”

She designed the chair to be made from one sheet of composite measuring roughly 2’X3’, with very little waste. The initial run will use straw-coloured natural flax, but it can be dyed, so future offerings could include a rainbow of colours.

Lex Pott

A glance at Lex Pott’s portfolio is dizzying, especially considering that the Amsterdam-based designer turns 31 this year. Mirrors, candleholders and even scissors share space with tables made of Belgium blue stone and cabinets of Douglas fir, all commissions or collaboration executed over the past few years.

“I started out freelancing for some other designers and also did a lot of experimental work to get my name on the map,” said Lex, who now runs a 3-person studio in a former shipyard in North Amsterdam.

“Things might look a little chaotic from the outside, but behind the scenes it’s quite organic and logical. I simply like interesting projects, and I don’t care if they’re for mass production, limited or a museum piece.”

For Chroma, one of his newest lines, which was unveiled during Dutch Design Week in October and will debut on a larger stage at Ventura Lambrate, Lex designed several pieces of furniture all but pulsing with colour as well as some complementary platters. The commission came from an unlikely source: Baars & Bloemhoff, a Dutch interior materials company, which wanted the pieces to demonstrate creative uses of its products.

Using high-end laminate products from Abet Laminati and Homapal, Lex covered his furniture, constructed of wood chips and medium-density fibreboard, in a rainbow of hues offset by edgings in contrasting shades. The line includes a coffee table, side table and shelves, which can be shipped to order while the collection awaits mass production. Custom prices range from 1,240 to 460 euros.

Piet Hein Eek

Unable to locate the design he was looking for on his desktop computer, Piet Hein Eek turned to an uneven stack of drawings scribbled on pink onionskin paper. “I always find old paper,” he said, when asked about the distinctive material. “This was from the storage space of an old porcelain shop we were clearing out.”

Fittingly, Piet, 48, is known for creative reuse, beginning in the 1990s with multicoloured furniture made from scrap wood. In 2010, Piet moved his design and production facilities to a compound of red-brick buildings that once housed a Philips fact-ory in Eindhoven. He added a cafe, store and sprawling showroom, from whose large windows visitors can look down on dozens of workers building furniture in the slightly more than 21,500-square-foot space below.

Not all Piet’s projects are upcycled. Last year, he was tapped by Ikea to design an entire collection that will debut in 2018, and he is contributing to Ikea’s 2017 Jassa collection, which uses natural fibres and rattan. During the Milan furniture fair, Piet routinely sets up shop at Gallery Rossana Orlandi, run by the noted tastemaker, who has a particular interest in Dutch designers. This year, he introduced three limited-edition lines.

He also showed 2 wooden pieces. One, a cabinet mixing square and rectangular pieces of smooth, dark scrap wood, looks more refined than rustic. In the other, Beam Cabinet 2016, Piet bought about 3,280 feet of old pine beams from a Belgium contractor and decided to riff on one of his older designs. In the new piece, the front shows an unbroken span of wood, though there are hidden drawer pulls, and the sides show the wood’s rings, creating an abstract artwork.