“NOMADS”, inspired by the nomadic culture

Photography by Yannis Bournias | Image Source: studiolav.com

Studiolav is an interior and object design studio based in London. Lucas and Vasso, the owners of the space, draw inspiration from stories that combine emotion with tradition. A key element of their creative process is the exploration and study of cultural heritage, history and archaeology as the residue of humanity, and how all these things relate to the contemporary experience. They focus on detail and on the correct and ecological use of materials to create objects characterized by simplicity. However, they are objects capable of communicating - through their form - the stories contained in their core as influences and references.

Their new work titled Nomads is characterised by everything mentioned above. The story they are telling this time -as the title reveals-  is the natural tendency of humans to continuously move in order to discover something that is better, more ideal and more compatible. Permanence is a relatively new way of thinking - always taking into account the age of humanity’s existence, which has a predominantly nomadic history. Thus, Studiolav speaks of the normal state of nomadism as a lost tradition and of the wanderer's communication with the natural element.

Photography by Yannis Bournias | Image source: studiolav.com

The collection’s objects are reminiscent of prehistoric ostraca buried in volcanic ash. Manlike objects seem to possess the ability to narrate an artificial -in this case- past and the relationship between nomadism and the terrain as an element inextricably linked with it. Project NOMADS seems to be geographically and culturally specific but at the same time spaceless, colourless and time-less. It is a futurist hypothesis concerning the new types of nomadism while it also brings forth archetypal forms that take us back to an ultimate past.

It is a reconsideration of nomadic culture and heritage through creating these new objects using traditional and modern methods, talking about evolution as a key element of nomadic cultures. With the use of a 3D printer, objects that are reminiscent of embroidery used in rituals, tattooing and traditional body painting are rendered monochromatic and archetypal with sand as their main material. The texture of the patterns and the intense and rough surfaces of the objects create shadows by shaping the visible and the invisible, and the transitory and the permanent so the objects seem everchanging, like nomadic life itself. The project is done in collaboration with Sandhelden, the leading company in producing and processing sand as a raw material for the creation of 3D objects. 

Photography by Yannis Bournias | Image source: studiolav.com

The combination of sand, a sustainable material, with the latest 3D printing technology is revolutionizing visual and design production while also paving the way for alternative solutions in the manufacture and sale of objects with a zero environmental footprint. At the same time, the inspiration from the nomadic populations and the rendering of the concept of movement through material and touch is a very special way of processing and reinterpreting history and the contemporary political situation by integrating them into everyday life through the utilitarian object.

Studiolav has been nominated many times for important awards in the field of design such as the Young Talent Designer at the Elle Decoration International Design Awards and the BIO23 Design Biennial Award in Ljubljana in 2012. The studio has completed many successful exhibitions at spaces like the Royal Academy of Arts in London or MUDEC in 2015 and it has an active presence in international design events and festivals.

Photography by Yannis Bournias | Image source: studiolav.com

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