Anders Petersen new showroom and workshop

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Following the closure of their gallery and showroom on Kløvermarksvej in January, Anders Petersen has opened a new workshop and show room and on Thursday, Friday and Saturday, 22, 23 and 24 of June, they opened the doors there to friends and old customers to celebrate.

Their large, high industrial unit - with an upper gallery around three sides - gives them space to show their collection of furniture but there is also a work-shop area where they will make some of the pieces in the collection and where they can develop new designs to take them through to production stage.

Again, the new building is on the east side of Kløvermarken but 140 metres further to the south.

note: the showroom is open now by appointment.

A. Petersen
Reffinaderivej 20K (hal K2)
DK 2300, Copenhagen S

email: contact@apetersen.dk

 

design festival June 2023

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In 2023, the annual design festival in Copenhagen - 3daysofdesign - runs through the 7th, 8th and 9th of June.

Exhibitions, launches for new designs, openings, talks and discussions … will be held in studios, design stores, exhibition venues, embassies and courtyards throughout the city.

Every year I try to emphasise just how important it is to plan your route around the city if you want to see as much as possible. This year there are just under 300 design companies, designers, design stores and museums and galleries participating and, just now, when I looked at the programme, there are 549 events listed.

For the first time this year - the tenth year for 3daysofdesign - there will be three official hubs for the festival …….. in the city it is in 25hours Hotel at Pilestræde 65, out on Refshaleøen the hub is Copenhagen Contemporary - Hal 6, Refshalevej 173A and down at Carlsberg Byen the events are centred around Mineralvandsfabrikken, Pasteursvej 20.

Around these hubs are 13 districts, each with a distinct logo, so events and openings are grouped together.

3daysofdesign
hubs & districts
programme

 

Space10 has a new work and meeting area

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Space10 - the research and design lab of IKEA in Kødbyen - in the Meat Packing District in Copenhagen - has been a place to go for good coffee for sometime but the area just inside the entrance has now been rearranged to encourage more people to use it as a meeting and work area with wifi and a selection of books for inspiration.

Opening times have been extended.

The 100 or so books - in striking canvas cradles - are recent publications on architecture and urban design that have been recommended by the staff but there is also a book exchange where anyone can leave appropriate books or take away donated books.

I would recommend signing up to the Space10 newsletter for information about their programme of exhibitions, lectures and discussions about research work in the lab. It is a sharply-designed site and is now establishing a substantial and stimulating archive that is tracking current thoughts and ground-breaking new research on urban living and design.

SPACE10 - library
SPACE10, Flæsketorvet 10, Københaven
open Monday to Thursday 9.00 to 17.00

 
 

3daysofdesign 2022

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This year,  3daysofdesign - a major design event in Copenhagen - has shifted times and days.

In previous years, studios, design stores and venues opened on the Thursday, around lunchtime, with opening parties or launches for new products on the Thursday evening. Friday was a packed day and then Saturday was slower with a relatively relaxed winding down ending mid afternoon.

This year, it seems more focused because events start on Wednesday morning and run through three complete working days .... so Wednesday 15th June, Thursday the 16th and through to Friday 17 June.

In the past, 3daysofdesign was part serious design event - an open house for visiting buyers and professionals - and part a local celebration for people in the city, who work in the design industry, to show off proudly what they have done recently or reveal what is in the pipe line but it was also a chance to see friends and colleagues. People could meet and socialise and I hope that survives.

The official web site for 3daysofdesign is fantastic and it’s absolutely essential if you want to see as much as possible.

This is a design event for and by designers so it should not be surprising that a lot of effort and thought has gone into the web page and the app but they have deceptively simple graphics for what is a very sophisticated guide that has good photographs and a lot of information .... not just addresses and times, but good pen portraits so anyone can track down new companies or just refresh their memory on the hardy perennials. There are also short Journal entries with some interesting interviews.

On the site, Programme is where you start if you want to organise your time around openings or talks or even - just possibly - to find when and where wine and food will be available.

A section headed Search the Exhibitions is the what-is-where section and, even if you think you know which company is where, remember that companies do splash out on some adventurous one-off venues and smaller companies - particularly if they do not have a base here in the city - will open a pop-up shop or will camp out in a design hotel or an embassy.

This year there are 214 sites ... so you can see that - to have any hope of getting around what you want to see - you have to plan your route or your route march with some care .... even if it is only to be in the right place for the right food or the right booze. Your excuse, in that case, is that good design and good food are close cousins that bring out the best in each other.

The entry in Exhibitions will open up a pen portrait of the designer or the design company along with photographs and links to company sites and Instagram pages and so on .... a great way to get the right background information before trying to chat to a designer or the CEO.

There is a useful section on the site where you can Explore the Districts.

Copenhagen may seem compact - if you compare the city with New York or London or Milan - but remember tourists have suddenly been let loose here so, at the very least, plan your route so you only cut across Strøget and not walk along it.

 
 
 


3daysofdesign
15 June to 17 June 2022

Exhibitions Map

 
 

3daysofdesign - eelgrass panels from Søuld

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Søuld have developed and now produce building materials made from eelgrass ... an abundant, renewable and locally harvested sea plant.

Eelgrass has been used for centuries for thatching homes and farm buildings in some coastal regions of Denmark and for the exhibition at the Sabsay Gallery Store in Strandstræde there was a demonstration of the technique by a master thatcher.

The panels that Søuld make replace synthetic materials with a natural material that holds carbon that can absorbs toxins in the air but also absorbs moisture to balance the climate in the room. Salt, naturally found  in the eelgrass, deters insects.

For the exhibition, the architect David Thulstrup, produced tables and plinths and room screens that are made from the panels combined with glass and steel in a collection called MOMENTUM.

Søuld
Studio David Thulstrup
The MOMENTUM Collection

eelgrass ready for a demonstration of thatching

 
 

NÅLEN I HØSTAKKEN / THE NEEDLE IN THE HAYSTACK

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3daysofdesign - the annual design festival in Copenhagen - is a good time for galleries and museums in the city to open new exhibitions.

The major exhibition in the city this year - NÅLEN I HØSTAKKEN / THE NEEDLE IN THE HAYSTACK - opened today at Dansk Architektur Center and shows the work of the Danish designer Cecilie Manz.

In part, the exhibition celebrates the award to Cecilie Manz of the Nationalbankens Jubilæumsfunds Hæderspris and explores her design process by looking at a number of major projects and at "the trajectory from intuition to the finished work."

This is the most elegant and certainly one of the most sophisticated and carefully presented exhibitions that I have seen in the city. Initial models, intermediate prototypes and finished designs are set out on fine, pale grey fabric and these surfaces also act as screens for sequences of images of working drawings from the design studio that are projected down in white outline to show the rational, step by step evolution of a design and the precise and detailed work that is required for each stage to realise the design, and particularly all the modifications required for industrial production and when, for example in ceramic wares for the table, a range of pieces is produced in different sizes.

There are five main sections to the exhibition, starting with the stages for the design of the WORKSHOP CHAIR and then a major project to design an extensive collection of porcelain dinnerware for ARITA JAPAN.

 

The third section, called FREEWHEELING, includes a wide range of furniture and household fittings designed by Manz and the fourth area, under the title DETAILING, has the subheading Purpose, Meticulousness, Dedication and includes glassware and the Beolit speaker from Bang & Olufsen.

The final section of the exhibition is called simply OBJECTS and is a fascinating and revealing collection of things, acquired by the designer over many years. These eclectic objects have inspired a design; triggered an idea; simply been a starting point for a design or suggested a shape or set a tone for the style of a finished product. 

Cecilie Manz - NÅLEN I HØSTAKKEN / THE NEEDLE IN THE HAYSTACK
Dansk Architektur Center, Bryghuspladsen 10, København
16 September 2021 - 9 January 2022

Cecilie Manz Studio

 
 

an interview with Niels Strøyer Christophersen of Frama

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Frama Talk with Dezeen 2.jpeg

One of the first events of 3daysofdesign was this evening when Marcus Fairs - the founder and editor of the online design site DEZEEN -interviewed Niels Strøyer Christophersen of Frama.

The interview was live streamed at 5pm

INTERVIEW WITH NIELS STRØYER CHRISTOPHERSEN

After a short introduction to Frama the interview goes on to look at the philosophy behind this small but important design studio that was established in 2011 and then discussed the release of a new book from Frama - PERCEPTION FORM.

Frama produce distinct furniture and objects for the home including lighting, glassware and ceramics, and they have one of the most stylish ‘eateries’ in the city. Their work has a distinct and coherent design aesthetic where they explore form and re examine function but, above all, their designs, although not minimalist as such, keep the working and manipulation of the material to a minimum to retain and show inherent qualities.

Niels talks here about holistic experiences and about welcoming space and about trying to recapture some of the curiosity and imagination of a child collecting found objects that are then imbued with specific and very personal value. He confesses to being a hoarder … but it is clearly not of objects of high cost but objects where their shape and form or colour and texture fit within what appears, initially, to be his spartan or almost monastic sense of style.

Frama makes an exceptionally valuable contribution to our debate about what we own and what we want and what we need in our day to day life.

Apotek 57 at Frama
Frama Permanent Collection


FRAMA
Fredericiagade 57,
1310 Copenhagen

 

3daysofdesign

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3daysofdesign is now the biggest and the most important design event of the year in Copenhagen.

This year it runs from Thursday 16 September through to Saturday 18 September with events throughout the city.

Design stores and design studios open their doors to visitors and there will be product launches, openings, talks and receptions.

There are so many events that, as usual, I advise people to look carefully at maps of the city and go through the programme of events and exhibitions to work out what to prioritise and to decide how best to zig zag backwards and forwards across the city to see as much as possible.

Above all, 3daysofdesign is when the design community here celebrate and it’s a good opportunity to find out what is happening and where and what is new and what is on it’s way.

Museums and galleries and embassies in the city also take part. There is always a large banner on the front of the French Embassy on Kongens Nytorv. Graphics for this banner and for the posters and so on for events has been designed this year by Ilse Crawford.

3daysofdesign
EXHIBITIONS
EVENTS

the Mindcraft Project 2021

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With restrictions imposed by the pandemic, the Mindcraft Project for 2021 is presented on line.

There are ten pioneering works:

300kg Beauty Bath, by Frederik Nystrup-Larsen & Oliver Sundqvist
Suspense, by Kasper Kjeldgaard
In-tangibles, by Stine Mikkelsen
Bench 01 and Bedside Tables, by Bahraini-Danish
Ctenophora Vase, Echinoidea Bowl, Morning Dip Side Table, by 91-92
Textile Veneer, by Else-Rikke Bruun
Ebano, by Rasmus Fenmann
Architectural Glass Fantasies, by Stine Bidstrup
Chair 02, by Archival Studies
Ombre Light, by Mette Schelde

On the site there is an introduction to Mindcraft and the ‘exhibition’ and then information about each of the works with dimensions and the materials used but the key feature is a short video for each work where the designers and artists talk about the concept and the design process and about the techniques used to produce the finished work.

One characteristic that unites these amazing works is their restraint.


From 2008 through to 2013, the annual Mindcraft exhibitions were organised by Danish Crafts and from 2014 to 2018 by Danish Arts Foundation.
The first Mindcraft Project from Copenhagen Design Agency was in 2020.

The-Mindcraft-Project-2021-group-shot_dezeen_08.jpg

Frama Permanent Collection

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The catalogue for Frama Permanent Collection includes interesting quotations and some short comments or statements that hint at the ethos of the studio and stress the use of natural materials and the ‘simple geometries’ of the designs ‘resulting in a uniquely warm and honest aesthetic’.

Photographs show the furniture in stark and simple interiors so in a strongly defined space but not in an obvious room to blur any sense of a specific place.

The full catalogue has simple, neat, useful, outline drawings and basic information about designers and materials and dimensions but not, significantly, the date of the design. Presumably, it is called the Permanent Collection because the intention is to remove any sense of a specific time.

My impression is that, having brought together a substantial body of work, Frama will now add to or edit this collection with well-measured discernment.

There are four sections in the catalogue with:

ESSENTIALS
described as "utilitarian pieces" that includes the hall-mark, metal-framed, stools by Toke Lauridsen; the low aml stool in wood by Andreas Martin-Löf; benches; Chair 01 by Frama; a daybed; Shelf Library by Kim Richardt; box units in aluminium by Jonas Trampedach and the round and the rectangular trestle tables by Frama Studio. These are the key pieces.

SIGNATURE
pieces are marked out for their ‘extra sophisticated appearance’ and for more challenging and demanding knowledge for manufacture including the Skeleton 021 Chair designed by Elding Oscarsen Architects and the Triangolo Chair by Per Holland Bastrup

HOME GOODS
are ceramics - robust glazed stoneware by Frama Studio - and glassware for the table from 0405 Glass with some kitchen to table pieces such as cutting boards

LIGHTING
is distinct and a very interesting range of pendant lights, free standing spots and a take on the strip light and all with simple, but clever and elegant, geometric shapes in brass or copper, polished steel or aluminium and powder-coated steel or powder-coated aluminium

The Apothecary Collection and the free-standing units of Frama Studio Kitchen are dealt with separately but can all be seen on the Frama site

FRAMA - the apartment

FRAMA Permanent Collection

 
 

apotek 57 EATERY at Frama

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Frama Studio Store in Copenhagen is in what was an old apothecary shop, in a fine 19th-century apartment building on the corner of Adelgade and Fredericiagade, across the road from a row of the Nyboder houses and close to the church of Sankt Paul.

On 1st October, alongside the store but also with it’s own entrance from the street, Frama opened Apotek 57 Eatery under the chef Chiara Barla.

There are two rooms but also tables and stools on the pavement with views across the quiet street to the famous ochre-yellow 17th and 18th-century houses of Nyboder.

Eating here is a good way to not just see but to use or try out furniture from Frama and to eat from and drink from their ceramics and glassware.

The food preparation and serving area has Frama shelving and units from the Tea Kitchen range but the revelation was to see the main table at the centre of the room - a large oak rectangle on Frama Farmhouse Trestles - with eight Chair 01 in light, dark and black-stained finish.

Somehow, for some reason, I had filed away the design of the chair in my mind as a statement piece …. as a chair to be used on its own in a hall or in a room as a desk chair … so hence as a special or statement piece of furniture.

But, of course, at the centre of most Danish homes, and at the centre of entertaining in the home, is the table where you feed family and friends and that means that the dining table and it’s chairs are important and a serious investment.

As apartments get smaller and family demographics are changing - Denmark has more single-adult households than any other European country - so I was beginning to wonder if the idea of the dining table as the centre of the home could be changing. But here, as the main feature of the Eatery, with eight chairs around the table and space for more, this is furniture that justifies and occupies the dining space.

If you are lucky enough to have a large dining room then this is a strong design but because the table top is on trestles and the chairs stack then they could take over a general or a relatively small room for an occasion but be moved back or moved out for the space to be used in other ways.

The menu and opening times for the Eatery are on the Frama site.

Nyboder

Frama Studio Store
Fredericiagade 57
1310 Copenhagen

 
L1165204.JPG
 
 

&Tradition at Lindencrones Palæ for 3daysofdesign

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Lindencrones Palæ was completed in 1753 for Christian Lintrup with the initial design by Nicholai Eigtved the architect who was responsible for the plan of Frederiksstaden and for many of the major buildings in this part of the city. Frederiksstaden was built outside the old east gate of the old city from the 1680s onwards. Much of the interior of Lindencrones Palæ and much of the arrangement of the plan would have been determined by the master builder Christian Conradi.

With its main façade towards Bredgade, with its relatively narrow pavement and heavy traffic and with only an end elevation to Sankt Annæ Plads, a lot of people must walk past the building without fully appreciating the size and the grand design of the Palæ. From 1850, it was the British Embassy but the British sold the building and moved out to Østerbro in 1979. In 2003, the house was purchased by Troels Holch Povlsen - founder of Best Seller - and underwent a major restoration that was completed in 2006.

The splendid main staircase is reached by a short flight of steps up from the arched passageway that runs through between Bredgade and the courtyard and that stair takes the visitor up to a suite of reception rooms that run right across the main floor level with what must have been one of the largest drawing rooms in the city.

Lindencrones Palæ is used as an important venue for 3daysofdesign and this year the main rooms were taken over by the design company &Tradition in partnership with the auction house Bruun Rasmussen the theme "Home of a Collector" showed current pieces from the company alongside classic historic designs.

Many good Danish interiors mix together antique furniture - often pieces inherited from the family - with classic designs from the mid and late 20th century along with the most modern of current designs. Here, that was shown on a grand scale. It is often easier to talk about Danish taste or the Scandinavian qualities of interiors rather than style as such because furniture of different periods are so often mixed together.

Bruun Rasmussen
&Tradition

 

the facade of Lindencrones Palæ to Bredgade

 

Where do we go?

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Around the city, during the three days of 3daysofdesign, there are interesting exhibitions in interesting venues.

“Where do we go?” is a small exhibition in what had been the space of the Menu showrooms in Nordhavn.

Lucie Kaas with the curator Jens-Peter Brask focused attention on the global refugee crisis with 15 works - kokeshi sculptures painted by contemporary artists and designers that took as their starting point the question "When we leave our homes, where do we go?"

The works were to be auctioned through Bruun Rasmussen with the proceeds donated to the Danish Refugee Council.

3daysofdesign
Lucie Kaas - Where do we go?

 

3daysofdesign - 2020 edition

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3daysofdesign is a major event in the calendar for designers and design companies in Copenhagen. It is when people open their doors to visitors, fellow professionals in the design business and to colleagues and friends in the city. It is the best time to see the design community of Copenhagen at home and at their very best.

Normally, events are held over a Thursday, Friday and Saturday in the late spring/early summer but the pandemic has disrupted so much and, for this year, 2020, 3daysofdesign will be on 3rd, 4th and 5th of September.

The theme is Eco Conscious Concepts and graphics for 3 days are by the artist Alfredo Häberli who is based in Zurich.

In normal times, some events need either registration or booked tickets but this year, because of the exceptional circumstances, events will be open and free …. many using the streets and squares of the city.

3daysofdesign
on instagram

 

3daysofdesign

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The annual design event - 3daysofdesign - is just a week away.

With so many places to go and people to see it is worth trying to plan your route but, as they say, the best laid plans of mice and men …..

If this sounds like hype then I’d just point out that, looking at the list of events, there are over 70 companies, studios, designers and design stores taking part this year and some of the larger companies have lectures or discussions or receptions on each of the three days and with events at two more venues.

3daysofdesign

 

SPACE10 redesigned

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Last night was the opening of the redesigned interior of SPACE10 - the Research and Design Lab in the Meat Market district of the city.

They now have a new street-level gallery space and café area - a Test Kitchen that has been developed with Depanneur - and office space on the first floor has been rearranged so the work areas can be reconfigured for an increase from 10 to 30 people now working here.

Spacon & X have designed the area "not to last but to adapt" with a strong steel framework with panels that can be inserted as required, in part to reduce noise, for work pods.

With this project, SPACE10 and Spacon & X have reassessed how people work in flexible common space with the aim to boost "innovation, wellbeing and morale."

 

The opening was also an opportunity to launch SolarVille

 

SPACE10 Redesigned
Spacon & X

KAFFE Cobe

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When work started on the new development on Papirøen / Paper Island at the centre of the harbour opposite the national theatre and the warehouses there were demolished then Cobe - the planning and architecture studio of Dan Stubbergaard - had to move out and they moved to Nordhavn to former warehouses on Orientkaj.

This is more than appropriate for Cobe produced the masterplan for this major area of redevelopment and, of course, designed the restoration of a concrete silo here that is now apartments and slated to become possibly the iconic building of contemporary Copenhagen.

At the old site, behind the popular food halls, they had a fairly open house and here, to encourage visitors, as the new community out here grows, they have opened a café at the entrance from the quay.

In partnership with Depanneur, they serve good coffee, basic but good rolls and cakes and beer and so on. There is a long communal table and also low seating and Cobe show models and photographs of their work around the space and there is a carefully-selected range of books and design items for sale.

Depanneur
Cobe

 
 
 
 

paint from File Under Pop

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The paint range from File Under Pop was photographed in the Stilleben shop on Fredeiksborggade in Copenhagen - close to the Israels Plads food halls.

There are 64 colours in different finishes of gloss from a matt with 1% gloss for walls through to oil paint for wooden floors with 5% or 40% gloss and an 80% gloss for interior woodwork. The paints are produced with Jotun - the paint company founded in Norway in the 1920s. The selection and range of colours is interesting as is the way they are presented as large swatches pinned up as if they are a mood board.

File Under Pop have their studio in Frederiksgade in Copenhagen - close to the Marble Church - and they specialise in tiles and wallpapers in strong colours. The tiles are made in Valencia and the wallpaper produced in Copenhagen.

File Under Pop
Jotun

Flexibility

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A small exhibition - described as a pop-up exhibition - has just opened at Designmuseum Danmark.

With the subtitle The Missing Link in Danish Typography History, it spotlights the new font called Flexibility that was introduced last year as part of an updating of the typography and graphics used for the museum and is to be used across all aspects of their graphic design from posters to signage and display graphics, as the font for the museum's website and for in-house leaflets for publicity. This work was undertaken by the Copenhagen studio Urgent. Agency.

As part of the commission they searched through the archives of the museum and found initial sketches for this font that dated from the beginning of the 1960s and were by Naur Klint - the architect and designer who was the son of Kaare Klint. The designs were digitized and this was the starting point to produce a font appropriate for the museum.

With the exhibition there is a handout newspaper that sets out a good brief history of the design museum and also sets out the iterations of the typeface with various weights and an italic and an outline version.

The exhibition continues from 5 October through to 6 January 2019

Designmuseum Danmark
Urgent.Agency

Signe Bailey at Frue Plads Marked

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This was another brilliant example of ingenuity on show at the market at Frue Plads.

Signe Bailey is a designer who works with ceramics and at the Frue Plads market she showed her tableware, ceramic jewellery and distinctive and very unusual designs including the Platters … a number of spines or spindles in fired clay held in holes in a flexible collar so the angles and spaces adapt to fruit placed on or within the spines.

But I was most taken by the Vue lamp because it illustrates all that is best about good design. 

There are lots of pendant lamps on the market …. most in glass or in metal or plastic and some even in wood or basketwork. The Vue lamp is in thin, self-coloured stoneware and the lamp demonstrates all the best qualities of the material including the fact that it is matt making it seem less intrusive and warmer and much more friendly. It might seem counterintuitive but a hard material like fired clay can look soft.

Obviously it is not transparent - like glass - but here that is seen as an advantage for the primary function of this lamp is as a downlighter when it is set over a table or work surface or it can be hung lower over a side table or close to a chair as a reading lamp.

The shape is deceptively simple and beautifully elegant … in terms of geometry a cone but with gently-curved convex sides; with an open base but cut off at an angle across the top.

But the really clever part is a simple slot that is cut running out from the centre of the top to the highest point of the truncated cone and then half way down the side and this takes the flex for the bulb holder inside the lamp. A retaining ring inside keeps the lamp in position at whichever point it passes through the slot. This means that the lamp can be adjusted - spun along line of the slot - to any position from pointing straight outwards horizontally and through any angle to pointing vertically straight down.

Signe Bailey has her own company - Clayform - but she was also a founding member of Den Danske Keramikfabrik - the ceramic factory on Bornholm - established recently by a co-operative of ceramicists to make available flexible production - in terms of the range of technical production methods and the ability to produce larger quantities - that are not always available to an independent ceramicist working in a small studio.

The lamp is produced in a soft grey or off white but the close link between the designer and the ceramic factory means that lamps in other colours can be commissioned.

The design could hardly be more minimal or hardly more sophisticated and that is an important point that has to be made. The very best of minimalist design is not simple. A designer cannot go straight to simple without going through an incredible and often lengthy process of trial and adaptation and adjustment to take an idea and realise it in terms of what might actually be a complicated or variable function with a form and style that is appropriate to the material and its qualities and then reduce that design to what is essential or rather to take it back to the essence of the idea. A minimalist design of this quality is not simple or quick or easy.

On a very busy afternoon at the market Signe very kindly demonstrated how the Vue lamp can be set at different angles and let me film her. Many thanks for your patience. The Clayform Facebook page has a good video that shows the Vue lamp being made in the factory. 

Clayform
Den Danske Keramikfabrik