On September 26, the Red Dot Design Museum in Singapore hosted an award ceremony for the prestigious design award Red Dot Award: Design Concept 2014. Among the winners were two works by Russian architect and designer Arseny Leonovich. “Red Dots” mark projects of KOSATKI lamps (zap), and city benches Bench House. We talked with Arseny about architects who are passionate about design, about Italy, and what needs to be taught to students.
Archi.ru:
What, in your opinion, is the difference between an architect-designer and a “pure” designer?
Arseny Leonovich:
- The industrial designer solves the problem in the format of design needs and requirements. He formulates the technical background based on the scale of the projected model, for example, a chair or a cup holder. When faced with such a task, an architect, by definition, considers it much broader, much deeper, more diverse … After all, an architect is initially taught to summarize any task much more than a design student who is sharpened on specific solutions in the format of "table-opener chairs". This is neither good nor bad. Perhaps in a hundred designers who design chairs, there are only two architects. But something tells me that in the world of design, throughout its history, there have always been a lot of people with an architectural education or, at least, a worldview.
In that case, what would you say about the projects of your Western colleagues, for example Piero Lissoni, Antonio Citterio, who, like you, are architects and are successfully engaged in design?
- For me, they are an example of a nation of designers, for whom, by and large, there are no boundaries. Italians, they were originally born in the font of architecture and design. When an Italian architect creates object design in addition to iconic architectural projects, it is as easy for him as having a cup of coffee. In general, Italy has always produced a huge number of architects. It's no joke, today there are several thousand graduates only at the Turin Polytechnic Institute, and there are a lot of them in Italy. Take the same Florence. Yes, they will all become unemployed there if everyone pretends to build a palazzo or a country house. It is no coincidence that after the war, as far as I remember, the Italian government and its lobbying circles staked out design as one of the vectors of economic development. So that in the world and European consciousness the word "design" is directly associated with Italy. And they did it. Agree, in comparison, for example, with German design, Italian design is a more common concept, and the phrase itself is more stable.
So you seem to associate this fresh win in the two ‘Red Dot Award: Design Concept 2014’ nominations with the architectural style of your design vision?
- Yes, it is possible that they saw in my work a somewhat different architectural view of design. For example, KOSATKI. On the one hand, the project has a poetic and romantic image, and on the other, it is completely technological. A luminaire as an object is rigidly tied to a two-light or very high space. That is, a clearly readable image has a technical and functional shell. The same is in the BENCH HOUSE shops, which are based on the prototype of the house. Agree that, walking down the street, we will unconsciously reach for this “home”, because it gives us a kind of dream, a super-idea, an image of the House. And first they see him, and then the shop.
What is the most difficult thing for you in object design?
- Perhaps guessing the desire, the challenge of time … In each problem, in its formulation, there is an answer. Therefore, students should be taught to guess puzzles. After all, the most difficult and original most often lies on the surface. How is the educational process often structured in our country? - here's a technical task for you guys, you have a piece of land here and you need a seven-story house …
And there is another approach, when the architect comes and begins to listen and hear the place, tries to get used to his feelings in the desires of space, to guess the options for their embodiment. That is, when other categories begin to work on the solution or formulation of purely material spatial problems … You can approach design with the same probe and measure: listen attentively to the challenges of time, place, social needs, and the geometry of space.
Naturally, today no one will allow us to take into account only philosophical and poetic messages. Up-to-date materials, environmental approach, economy in general, minimum budget spent. The best will be the project that is burdened with a large number of stringent requirements and conditions even at the design stage. For example, our last completed project of a private house in Germany.
It was very difficult: it was impossible to move anywhere by a centimeter. So, within the framework of these cut voids, we managed to do what we needed: economically, quickly, modestly and tastefully.
In the field of design, the collection of desktops for the Nayada company has become a landmark for me. We just took and violated the typological boundaries: there were tables with four legs and there were separate partitions, and we just removed everything unnecessary. As my professors used to say, everything new is somewhere on the border of the blurring of typologies. It is no coincidence that today the bench diffuses into an armchair, an armchair into a table, and a table into a wardrobe or bed, etc. Furniture for work flows into furniture for leisure. Today these processes are becoming brighter and larger.
Your design works often win prizes at international and Russian competitions. At the very least, they get shortlisted. Is participation in competitions for you personally vanity, talent or passion?
- It seems to me that over time I became a gambling person, so today design contests are a sport for me. As a student, when I heard about participation in competitions, I thought that it was some superhuman doing it, but it’s too early for me. With experience, fear grew into excitement. Now I eagerly throw myself on almost every topic - if I had time and energy. But if we put aside sports or charismatic motives, then any competition for me is the discovery of something new. In 2003, the task arose to design a handle in a design competition of the Italian company Valli & Valli.
I would have lived for myself and did not know that there is an opportunity to design a doorknob: a thing that is so understandable, ordinary, everyday, but which has inscribed many architects and designers in the context of world design fame. I am very pleased to remember this project. The shape itself was found so many years ago, and today it has become iconic and popular. Today there are a lot of similar models …
What is the ideal embodiment of an idea for you, a design icon?
- The first thing that comes to mind is the work of Aalto, Imzov, Jacobsen. And also Iko Parisi, Carlo Mollino, Joe Ponti. For Ponti, for example, everything is iconic. His modernism meets deep, rooted in the centuries, Italic culture. When simplification of form, rhythm, open color - everything that is somehow connected with the modernist tradition is luxuriously superimposed on drawing talents, heartfelt knowledge of art history … Each name on this list is a kind of human icon, symbol and image of the embodiment of brilliant ideas …
