Draga & Aurel are one in every of design’s most vibrant duos

Draga Obradovic and Aurel Okay Basedow’s studio in Como, Italy, is nothing wanting magical. Coming into the area is like stepping right into a Willy Wonka manufacturing facility for design: huge, summary artworks hold on the partitions, neon lights hum above retro-futuristic furnishings, and vibrant resin surrounds you – stacked in disks, ready to be remodeled, or meticulously moulded and carved into the studio’s signature creations.

Since founding their studio in 2007, the married duo have constructed a apply that resists simple categorisation. Their work sits on the intersection of radical Italian postmodernism, the Twenty first-century collectible design motion and neo-futurism, with nods to the aesthetics of the Seventies and Nineteen Eighties. Obradovic’s background in style and textile design merges with Basedow’s eye for pictures and visible composition (his work and conceptual artwork run alongside the studio’s design apply), creating an alchemical, Arte Povera-adjacent method.

Resin is Draga & Aurel’s medium of alternative, which is endlessly experimented with, yielding varieties that really feel natural, layered and nearly geological. It’s usually paired with textiles, reclaimed surfaces, bronze, brass, solid glass and concrete – these unconventional supplies mix in unpredictable methods, creating surfaces that shimmer, take up, resist and rework, all the time leaving seen traces of course of. The studio rejects inflexible strategies or predetermined outcomes; every object is a document of exploration.

From the very starting, this ethos outlined their work: Draga & Aurel first emerged as pioneers of upcycling, as seen in early collections resembling ‘Deshabillé’ and ‘Heritage’. In ‘Deshabillé’, armchairs had been stripped naked to disclose their inside construction; in ‘Heritage’, midcentury items had been restored and remodeled by means of layered resin, pigment and color.

Draga & Aurel’s debut at Milan Design Week in 2009 launched their work to the broader design world, resulting in collaborations with main manufacturers resembling Baxter, Wall&Deco, Visionnaire, Gallotti&Radice, Poltrona Frau and Giorgetti. With Visionnaire, the studio produced iconic items such because the ‘Mira’ and ‘Aries’ armchairs and the ‘Lego’ console, in addition to the ‘Narrazioni Intrecciate’ (Interwoven Narratives) exhibition – a complete immersive surroundings, relatively than simply particular person design items.

In 2019, Draga & Aurel’s Milan presentation, ‘Transparency Issues’, cemented their popularity as masters of see-through design. The gathering explored how mild, color and quantity work together and refract inside clear supplies, with overtones of minimalism, House Age and optical artwork. In April 2026, the pair will return to Milan at Galleria Rossana Orlandi (the place their 2025 presentation was one in every of our highlights on the gallery) with an exhibition that reinterprets the sliding door, centred round a diptych by Basedow.

​​Draga & Aurel’s work is daring with out being brash, and playful with out sacrificing sophistication. In an more and more seamless, streamlined design world, it’s genuinely refreshing to come across items that really feel like true alchemy – each within the processes behind their creation and within the magical, fantastical outcomes.