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Italian designer finds inspiration in Shanghai
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WHO is she?
Simona Auteri is an Italian-born, London-based architect and curator. Before co-founding
Matter Of Stuff (www.matterofstuff.com) she worked as an architect with Heatherwick
Studio in Shanghai and London and with Kengo Kuma and Associates in Tokyo. She has lived and worked in seven countries. Her curiosity for how beautiful things are created in different parts of the world inspires new designs and collaborations with designers and manufacturers, editors and curators around the world.
Tell us about some of your works, and the one you are most proud of.
I am most proud of those products that manage to connect with our collective memory while being reinterpreted in a new way and executed to perfection. I am Italian, and as such, I highly value artisanship and know-how in making. Thanks to our architectural background we have connections with manufacturers from the architectural industry who are able to work on incredibly complex projects.
We designed our first edition of ceramic tables named Mesa Barcelona as a tribute to the city that inspired us, where we used the very same tiles that were used on the colorful roof of Santa Caterina Fruit Market in Barcelona by Muralles and Tagliabue. The result is a wonderfully warm table, that invites a relationship with food, but mostly it creates a connection between the scale of design and the scale of the city.
Are you currently involved with any project?
Yes, several and varied! For the London Design Festival we curated a major exhibition featuring over 40 designers and manufacturers, as well as launching our first line of tables. We are completing a major project for the headquarters of the Kering group in London, where we have designed all the bespoke furniture. On the architecture side, we are working on a number of private residential projects.
Describe your design style.
I like to think of design as a product of different collaborations and as such it cannot be encased in one style. I like geometries and colours — if they bring us to a familiar place in the mind within an unexpected context. I like the unexpected in the ordinary, the extraordinary within everyday objects.
Where are you most creative?
During my time in Shanghai I had an urge to create everything from jewelry to fashion. It was actually the time I spent in Shanghai that empowered me with the confidence to set up Matter of Stuff.
London is a brilliant place to be a creative; it thrives with energy which feeds me for days. The city inspires me and it is where I enjoy taking action and observing the results,
however I equally value my quiet time in nature as that is where I clear my thoughts and plan things out for the months ahead.
What does your home mean to you?
Home is a state of mind for me. I have changed many countries and called 15 places home in the last decade. As much as I enjoy populating my house with familiar objects, over time I have learned to be mobile and to replace objects and physical places with a homely place within myself. Perhaps that is why I chose to create a virtual gallery of beautiful and familiar objects, so that they can travel with me everywhere I go.
What will be the next big design trend?
The market is oversaturated with products that look good as a result of industrial production. These are increasingly losing interest, as the current market is hungry for those things that have a story to tell, special objects that are produced in small quantities if not as completely unique one-off pieces. Is it an oxymoron to say that the next design trend is to be able to transcend trend?
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