The Stuff That Surrounds You: Inside Erwan Bouroullec’s distant artistic retreat

Welcome to the fifth instalment of Wallpaper’s video sequence, The Stuff That Surrounds You. Watch as we’re invited into the intriguing and idiosyncratic houses of creatives and makers (together with, to this point, Veronica Ditting, Yasmin Sewell, Glenn Sestig and Michael Anastassiades), catching a glimpse of their inside lives through the objects with which they encompass themselves, all of which inform a narrative.

Erwan Bouroullec, identified for his revolutionary, minimalist method to furnishings, interiors and industrial design, relies in Paris. However when he must create, he retreats to his distant property within the Burgundy countryside. ‘I’ve been dwelling in Paris for 35 years, however I type of wanted one other place within the countryside,’ he says. ‘I wanted area to work, to experiment, to attempt issues out.’

What he and his spouse (and their canine, Patapouf) found was an deserted farm constructing, steeped in historical past. Quite than erase what was there, they selected to ‘layer’ their life onto it, working with LVA Architects to protect and respect its unique components. A lot of the home’s current options and supplies had been retained, with a number of modern interventions added on. ‘The perfect inside you might ever have is [one where you’ve done] as little as attainable,’ says Bouroullec. ‘Preserve each tiny signal of the previous. Add what it’s worthwhile to add, however don’t take away the rest.’

Half sanctuary, half laboratory, the area he has created – often known as La Grange – is a hive of design experimentation. Tractors, instruments, woodwork, even the grass – every part turns into a ‘toy’ to discover, manipulate and study from, says the designer. ‘After I’m right here, I’m constructing shortly, roughly, however at all times on the lookout for fact within the roughness,’ he displays. ‘It’s grounded, vital and playful.’

For Bouroullec, who has labored with main manufacturers equivalent to Vitra, Magis and Alessi – and in artistic collaboration together with his brother Ronan till 2023 – design is greater than inspiration, it’s ‘extremely necessary for on a regular basis life’. He believes areas ought to supply as a lot stimulation as attainable; sterility, in his view, is ‘dangerous to your physique’.

At La Grange, he surrounds himself with objects that develop into small ‘treasures’, inviting interplay, curiosity and marvel. These embrace items sourced from across the globe – a minimal, vibrant, geometric paper field found in Korea, flea-market finds, and design icons just like the outsized, crumpled-paper ‘Maap’ lamp he designed for Flos, in addition to objects made in his personal workshop, equivalent to a picket stool, alongside his personal work.

‘I like distinction,’ says Bouroullec. ‘Minimal with one thing soiled, geometry with pure imperfection. It creates rigidity, it creates life.’ This sensibility runs by way of his work, which spans furnishings to coding experiments. Take, for instance, the ‘Mynt’ chair, which he developed with Vitra (and which he mentioned with Wallpaper* when the design was launched final 12 months), which resides at La Grange. It blurs the road between a home and a job chair. ‘I attempted to design it like a motorbike,’ Bouroullec explains. ‘In case your physique is in a nasty place, your mind received’t really feel relaxed. Objects develop into lovely when the person shapes them by way of interplay.’

Elsewhere within the designer’s studio are new initiatives such because the Samsung Music Studio 5, developed in collaboration with the tech firm – a wi-fi speaker conceived as a comfortable, round kind, supposed to really feel like furnishings slightly than a chunk of equipment (introduced at CES 2026, it’s not but on the market within the UK).

A go to to La Grange makes evident that, whether or not crafting a high-tech speaker or reimagining a centuries-old fisherman’s device, Bouroullec holds quick to a single perception: that design is a fluid, dwelling and ever-evolving follow.