The architect Mies van der Rohe, in 1928, designed an exclusive onyx wall to divide the living room of the legendary Tugendhat house. With its translucent quality it captured the sunset and breathed magic into a rationalist architecture with an open plan, empty spaces, glass… At the same time it managed to express the opulence of abstraction.
Millennial compression and solidification processes give the marbles exclusive veins and patterns that have always been a symbol of classical refinement. It is precisely from his vibrant drawings that his name emerged, which refers to the sea and the movement of the waves.
Currently, marble and other precious stones enjoy renewed prestige in the design of furniture, lighting and interior coverings. And its unprecedented contemporary profiles introduce a sumptuous synthesis, which recalls the great architect’s purpose of less is more. Whether they are light in tone with streaked capillaries or showy veins, uniform, mottled or dark with mirror polish, their essence is always that of unrepeatable rock fragments.
That prodigy that is the formation of marbles has inspired the emerging German designer Johannes Budde. He summarizes it in a collection of five unique pieces, where he brings together seven marbles from very different places in the world. Combined in 15 layers, when carving the four sides its beauty emerges as a chromatic melting pot. Sabine Marcelis – an artist with a studio in Rotterdam – also explores variety, in her case travertine, in the design of a large table. She gives prominence to the support elements, assembling the legs and highlighting them with tinted glass that accompanies the color gradients, like a sensory experience.
In the Viscolastic Stones lamp collection, the tandem of Valencian creators Mut Design brings together two very different varieties of stone, onyx and volcanic rock. Its play of multiple contrasts: texture and color, translucency and opacity, smooth and porous, clinches it with a forceful effect on a soft stone. It is part of Bruto, their new series of limited editions.
Marble also inspires new textured wall coverings. Or lattice partitions like the one created by the Japanese studio Nendo. The classic Carrara white in two perforated layers lightens the impact of the material.
And it reaches the door handles in a new series from Olivari, a brand with a spectacular catalog of handles created by prestigious architects from around the world. Part of leftover pieces from the Henraux quarries, extruded as cylinders.
Handles and handles, the first element that our hand touches when entering a house or room, initial tactile perception. That functional and symbolic piece of entrance and opening, of privacy and closure, also adheres to marble.