Watch ‘The Stuff That Surrounds’ episode three: inside the house of minimalist architect Glenn Sestig

Welcome to the third instalment of the brand new Wallpaper* video collection, The Stuff That Surrounds. Watch as we’re invited into the intriguing and idiosyncratic houses of creatives and makers (equivalent to our debut with Veronica Ditting and our second episode with Yasmin Sewell), catching a glimpse of their inside lives by way of the objects with which they encompass themselves, all of which inform a narrative.

There is a tendency amongst writers to lean on affirmation bias when profiling profitable people, suggesting that their path was predetermined. In Glenn Sestig’s case, nevertheless, the assertion feels apt. His love of structure began as a baby, when his mother and father would touch upon houses that they handed within the automotive. His father aspired to be an architect, however was unable to afford the schooling. Sestig fulfilled that long-deferred dream.

By the age of 13, he had already designed rooms for his mother and father and grandparents. Even then, his work confirmed glimmers of what would change into his signature model – purposeful and tactile, taking cues from the likes of Mies van der Rohe, Frank Lloyd Wright and Carlo Scarpa. ‘After I return to see the designs… it is the identical mind-set and designing as I do immediately. They seem like modernism,’ says Sestig.

That he would pursue structure wasn’t a foregone conclusion, nevertheless. Sestig’s different ardour was vogue, and, for a time, he stood at a crossroads. However he managed to discover a strategy to combine vogue into his follow, working with designers equivalent to Raf Simons, Pieter Mulier and Olivier Theyskens. ‘You can’t actually separate vogue, structure, images, music… all of them want one another,’ he says.

Sestig’s breakthrough got here with the design of the now-iconic Cleaning soap hair salon in Antwerp, and he based his follow, Glenn Sestig Architects, the next yr (1999). In the present day, he’s identified for structure that’s not minimalist per se, however monumental, symmetrical and complex, having labored on tasks such because the Thirty Lane modernist villa, a rural retreat for the Pringiers household, and the La Réserve resort in Knokke.

Sestig’s residence, which he shares together with his husband, Bernard Tournemenne – an artist and artistic director of Glenn Sestig Architects – was initially designed within the Seventies by Ivan Van Mossevelde for an artwork collector. ‘Visually, it’s extremely brutalistic. It’s completely concrete, and the plan could be very minimalistic,’ says Sestig. ‘So after I noticed [it], it was one thing very near me.’

The home first caught his eye throughout a stroll 25 years in the past. He requested the proprietor if he might have a tour, which they declined, however Sestig remembered the residence. Years later, in 2017, he acquired it. What adopted was a restoration that rigorously preserved the constructing’s shell: ‘I did not wish to change something about that stunning, robust structure,’ he says.

Sestig’s house is stuffed with sculptures and sculptural types, from a ceramic by Man Bareff, to a construction from Pierre Caille of which there are solely three on the earth, and stone-hewn Italian road furnishings from an unknown designer. Then there’s the ‘residing sculpture’: Sestig’s cat, Tanit, named after the goddess of Ibiza, the place he rescued her from.

Elsewhere: lighting fixtures from the ‘Tennessee’ assortment that he designed for Ozone, an unlimited metallic candelabra from Aether/Mass, and a chair for the Ostend Submit Workplace designed by architect Gaston Eysselinck. Sestig’s seating assortment additionally includes an Oscar Niemeyer ‘Marquesa’ bench, a Zaha Hadid ‘Moraine’ couch, and the ‘Cornaro’ couch from the ‘Ultrarazionale’ collection, the one couch assortment that Carlo Scarpa ever designed.

Artwork is used sparingly. A portrait of Robert Mapplethorpe shot by Patrick Robyn, the husband of Belgian dressmaker Ann Demeulemeester, hangs on the wall. The one remaining piece from the house’s authentic proprietor is a wall mural by Sol LeWitt.

Sestig chooses his objects primarily based on a sense slightly than standards – what issues most is that an object is well-crafted and resonates with him: ‘It is troublesome to clarify why I like an object, nevertheless it’s essential for me that it is very well finished. You’ll discover a whole lot of completely different objects in the home, however in the long run, you’ll really feel it’s extremely me.’