They are the young “Guests of honour” of imm cologne 2019, to which the Creative Director Dick Spierenburg has commissioned the concept for the eighth edition of Das Haus – Interiors on Stage, that this year, for the first time, is located in Hall 3.1, Pure Editions area. With their Living by Moods project, the designers took advantage of an open space measuring 180 square metres, to challenge some typical functions of living environments and propose some alternatives to them, both in the choice of furnishings, selected from limited editions, prototypes created ad hoc and pieces from the catalogues of numerous international companies. Taking from artistic installations and design, abstraction and materiality, as Joel Booy explains, the project analyses the ways living space is used based on the moods that accompany the various daily activities
Kate and Joel Booy, Studio Truly Truly Lutz Sternstein
Why did you call your concept “Living by Moods”?
We had a very open sort of space for Das Haus, a kind of very fluid living space where you can do a lot of different things in a lot of different spaces. Alongside this fluid kind of living, we also wanted to dictate the mood of what’s happening in these spaces. For example, in this age you can use all sorts of digital devices wherever you are and you can do a lot of different things in different parts of the house. We described the house inner spaces into four moods, a Reclusive, more smaller space, and then the Serene space, which is a more calming sort of space, the Reclining space, a more lower and relaxed space, and then an Active space. This house for us was a way to express how we would like to do things.
Das Haus
And how were you able to design a home that is “unfamiliar but inviting”?
We don’t necessarily follow the straight lines of how you normally do something, we wanted to make things our way. Our kitchen, for example, is an active space, but it actually blends into the reclining space; and benches are worked out in three layers, one that becomes the bench you can sit on, one you can sit at, like at a dining table, one which is bar-high, where you can work on or bar sitting. This was our approach, we wanted to make things our way, a little bit different, but did not want to make it in a way that no one would understand it or feel comfortable in it.
You’re proposing an experimental concept for a living space but also for pieces of furniture?
Exactly, the kind of furniture pieces we made is quite experimental. A lot of the pieces in the kitchen are bespoke made. If the cooking element very clearly defines the cooking space, the seating and the benches are more abstract. There’s quite a lot of prototypes, a new sofa we designed, a new pouf, a new glass screen, a sort of cabinet that’s hard to describe, it is a screen, a mirror and a shelf, all these things together to make a divider element in the house, like the giant plant wall. There are also many one-off pieces we have designed in our career as they give that feeling of ‘one’s own home’.
Das Haus
And what about the choice of materials?
We used many materials, travertine combined with aluminium in the table, special glass done with colouring and one way mirror, and rugs. All over the place there are a lot of textiles, a lot of dealing with colour and textiles. All the way around the outside of the house we designed a special wall, a curtain with a series of different colours and really textural materials.
So this project for you has been both a challenge and a chance.
Yes, we’ve never done an interior design project, we’ve done a lot of exhibition and product design, so we treated this interior design as one big composition, where every little element, texture, colour, materiality has to communicate something in the whole. It was a challenge, and it was really a good chance for us, because it gave us better knowledge from the point of view of interior design as well.
Das Haus – Hall 3.1
