Architectural Digest
Irwin Weiner ASID - The contributions of Belgium designer, collector, furniture maker, architect, and renaissance visionary Axel Vervoordt are exemplary. He combines all the elements I've ever admired in a designer: a love of raw space, a respect for multiple periods and levels of architecture, admiration of objects for their intrinsic interest and beauty, and a love of the eclectic. Everyone has copied the furniture that he made famous years ago - beautiful rustic planking turned into tables combined with contemporary cube-shaped steel frames and legs to successful bridge contemporary and antique. (Recycling old floor boards is a green way of reusing materials, and we should all strive to encourage our clients to reuse existing materials rather than simply tear down and start afresh.)
This video focuses on Vervoordt's headquarters complex in Antwerp, Belgium, the Kanaal, an old brick and concrete cluster of malting plant buildings on a canal. You'll see an interior that respects the original, the raw, the old, and the spare - with furnishings and objects treated as works of fine art. Lovely and inspiring.
