Les Poupées and Vader
Popular and historic references in a duo of creations by Luca Nichetto
Les Poupées marks the first collaboration between Italian designer Luca Nichetto and French gallerist Pascale Cottard Olsson in Stockholm. Combining a ceramic candle holder with a glass vase, each object blends cultural references from the pure lines of Finnish artist and designer Timo Sarpaneva and the colors of Italian maestro Ettore Sottsass to the silhouette of Japanese kokeshi wooden dolls.
Another new project by Nichetto for David Design, presented at the Stockholm Furniture Fair, is Vader, a lamp that experiments with the possibilities of traditional ceramic production, pushing craftsmanship to the limit in order to create a modern design piece. The range of colors has been chosen with Scandinavian culture in mind, but at the same time reflects the designer’s Venetian origins.
We talked to Nichetto about these and some forthcoming projects.
With Les Poupées, you have been able to merge Scandinavian, Japanese and Italian design. Were you interested in highlighting the differences or the similarities between these three design cultures?
I was mainly focused on understanding how, in a global world, the classic cultures of such different countries could be able to give me some elements, to let me create a functional puzzle and generate objects to be sold. When you buy Les Poupées, you hold a piece of my personal point of view on Scandinavian, Japanese and Italian history.
The Vader lamp is tied to a different, more pop inspiration. Was the reference to Star Wars a starting point or just fortuitous?
This is not meant to be a pop project since the allusion to Star Wars is pure coincidence. The initial intuition was a minimal gesture, just two cuts into ceramics. As a result, a functional light object for the space is capable of underlining the quality of the material itself, a quality which relies also on manufacturing.
Can you give us a preview of the projects you are working on?
I’ll unveil several projects during the Milan Design Week, including new collaborations for Cassina and De Padova. I’m still continuing my research process with Established & Sons, Foscarini, Casamania and Emmegi, but I’ll also be present at Salone del Mobile with small projects for the French editors Petit Friture and La Chance.
Les Poupées are on display at the Hallwyl Museum in Stockholm until 4 March 2012 and sell from Gallery Pascale.
