The Master of Minimalism Debuts a New Furniture Collection
Dressed casually in a dark sweater over a white Oxford shirt on a recent evening in Copenhagen, John Pawson cut exactly the kind of pared-back figure you might expect of a designer whose name has become a byword for minimalism. The occasion? A conversation about the British architect’s latest venture: a collaboration with the 125-year-old timber brand Dinesen on a new line of just-short-of-austere wooden furniture.
The launch—which includes the Lounge Collection, a stool and a daybed and armchair available in upholstery from textiles brand Kvadrat, and a Dining Collection of tables and seating—is the latest team-up between Pawson and Dinesen, best known for its wood flooring.
The brand and Pawson have a relationship spanning some three decades. It all started with simple furniture made from planks of Dinesen’s signature ash wood for Pawson’s own London home. “I’d always wanted to shout ‘timber!’ and I got my chance,” Pawson joked. On a more serious note, he noted that he and the Danish brand share an appreciation of wood as a foundational material in design, along with an interest in furniture as the stage on which people live our lives.
“Furniture is always our medium for the stories we have together,” especially at home, says Hans Pieter Dinesen, the company’s fifth-generation brand director. Adds Pawson: “Placing furniture is very important—small changes make a big difference.”
The architect will have an opportunity to demonstrate precisely what he means when he and Dinesen transform the brand’s Copenhagen showroom into a model apartment for the city’s 3 Days of Design festival this June for the line’s official launch.
In addition to the furniture collection, Pawson is busy, working on projects of all sizes; surely, an occasional pause would be welcome. Has Pawson, for example, had a nap or two on one of his new daybeds? “Naps?!” he replies in mock indignation, not missing a beat. dinesen.com
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