Belgian design fair Collectible came alive in its seventh edition last week. Bringing together designers, artists, curators, gallerists and more from all over the world, the platform's home base is Brussels' Vanderborght Building. A visit to the fair, which will make its entry into the American market with a NYC event later this year, revealed the innovation and imagination creators are showing with everyday materials, using a combination of production processes to develop furniture, lighting and design objects that carefully balance beauty, functionality and sustainable thinking.

SOIL

Jalkanen&Keski-Pomppu

Putting a spotlight on craftsmanship and local materials from Finland, the luminaires in Jalkanen&Keski-Pomppu’s Soil collection have textured bases hand-sculpted from Finnish red clay, with steel and glass components born from collaborations with metal artisans and glassblowers in Kiikoinen and Riihimäki. 

A NEW KIND OF WATER

Studio Anna Resei

The mesmerizing fluidity of water is captured by Studio Anna Resei’s latest series, A New Kind of Water. Aiming to translate this element into a tangible object, Resei created lighting and vessels by digitally printing vibrant, aqueous patterns on aluminium – effectively blending the natural and the virtual. 

FLOWER RIVET

Arthur Vandergucht

Finding a balance between the softness of flowers and the hard, industrial character of metal, the intricately detailed Flower Rivet shelf was conceived by designer Arthur van der Gucht for Antwerp gallery Uppercut. Playful blue blooms are affixed to curved-edge planes of white aluminium with silver rivets.

MARBLED SALTS

Roxane Lahidji 

Roxane Lahidiji is on a mission to position salt as a valuable resource for sustainable design. Mixing the natural matter with tree resin and bold pigments, she develops marbled salt furniture evocative of solid rock, which is protected by a layer of eco-epoxy. Shown at Objects with Narratives' new address in Brussels, the Marbled Salts collection starts a dialogue about wielding ubiquitous materials in new ways. 

KNOCK ON WOOD

Basse Stittgen 

Earth’s most abundant natural polymers – cellulose and the underutilized byproduct lignin – go into making Basse Stittgen’s seemingly organic Knock on Wood stool. The designer utilized fibres extracted from European spruce trees to create a plant-based polymer clay, which he calls a ‘new kind of wood’.

TILA

Shepherd Studio

Shepherd Studio’s Tila chair was presented in a curation of objects from Copenhagen gallery Tableau at Collectible. Inspired by the traditional folk game of Tila (marbles), the Bahrain-based studio utilized 210 stainless steel spheres, sculpting a striking hand-finished seat. Its tubular frame lends an expressive profile.

STAPLE

Kooij

Taking advantage of recycled plastic’s inherent aesthetic and functional properties, Dirk van der Kooij conceived the Staple stool – a complement to the Dutch designer’s Menhir bench and Meltingpot table. Its U-shape and lack of joints and reinforcements allows for expressive patterns with the colourful plastic, and additional usability as a side table.

Photo: Relay Design

SOFT SOIL

Niveau Zéro Atelier

Leveraging its extensive research into reclaimed materials, La Courneuve, France-based practice Niveau Zéro Atelier found a way to turn clay sourced from a construction site into a chaise longue: Soft Soil, produced for London's Relay Design. Refined, vacuum-sealed clay – still wet inside its padding-like container – eschews traditional upholstery, layered atop a metal base.

KÖNIGSWINTER TALLBOY

Heilig Objects

The centrepiece of Heilig Objects’ Compagnons de Vie collection, armoire Königswinter Tallboy is formed from an unlikely resource: weather-beaten corrugated sheets, collected from the roof of a hut in a dense private forest. Paying homage to nature’s artistry, the design reflects designer Daniel Heilig’s ambition to find new purpose in patinated materials.

Photo: Pierre Castignola

KIM’S FAMILY HOUSE

Soyoun Kim

Soyoun Kim employed raw aluminium in envisioning luminaires that tell a personal story of diasporic living. Embodying two homes, the architectural table lamps – small yet highly dimensional and graphic – represent the landscapes of South and North Korea, as well as the Netherlands.

PEDREGAL

Maentler

A larger iteration of Biarritz-studio Maentler’s Prieto design, the new Pedregal coffee table nods to architect Luis Barragán’s iconic house of the same name in Mexico City. A pink marble base and mirrored sphere are paired with a stair-like rectilinear top in solid oak, showing the harmony that can be established with the marriage of dissimilar materials. 

NIGHT AND DAY

Hana Hillerova

With Night and Day, Czech sculptor Hana Hillerova pushes the boundaries of glass to achieve mesmerizing colour schemes that change when the lights are on and off. The sinuous pendant lamps show a combination of greens and greys while off, and fiery oranges while in use. This is achieved through layers of semi-transparent glass inside the pendants’ bodies.

Photo: Tijs Vervecken

IN HALE ROUGE

Ben Storms 

In permanent residency at Objects with Narratives' Grand Sablon 40 gallery, Belgian designer and craftsman Ben Storms uses a combination of techniques – from traditional sanding and polishing to 3D- scanning and CNC milling – to achieve unexpected results with materials like marble and steel. The convergence of these process is seen with coffee table In Hale Rouge, the three-dimensional polished copper cushion of which supports a slab of solid red Belgian marble.

Photo: Mego Toumayan

MY DRESSING ROOM

Etienne Bastormagi

Showing the role handmade crochet can play in furniture, My Dressing Room by Lebanese designer Etienne Bastormagi was part of Collectible's Rawad Baaklini-organized Curated section. The tactile, multipurpose space dividers have panels comprised of waxed rope crochet threads produced by Ani Panosian, which mimic a mucharabiyah.

 AURORA

Amca Oval

Aurora, an interlocking modular system by French studio Amca Oval, is forged from aluminium. Influenced by similarly flexible set-ups from the 1970s, Amca Oval devised a playful composition of laser-cut elements that can be used as a screen, table or even the base for a lamp.