Ed Stocker, Europe Editor at Large Monocle, recounts the first edition of the Salone del Mobile.Milano initiative to learn about the visions, insights and research practices of protagonists from all areas of the lighting world
Objection: the issue devoted to the bathroom
The independent magazine that presents interiors in a multifaceted way and with timeless contents focuses on the bathroom, featuring everyday rituals and interiors with a vintage flavor
“The bathroom is an intimate space, often shared, and the in-home sanctuary honoring corporal well-being [...]. In this edition, we look at this in-home space which is as rich in rituals as it is in tools, wares, and colors. The bathroom inspires and tells stories from its vantage point: artist Pierre Bonnard’s subject of predilection; Hollywood, California architecture; Pierre Marie’s sophisticated stained glass, the myth of Venus and an enthusiastic immersion in African agriculture. We set the scene with traditions, materials, personal trivial things and everyday objects via vraisemblance, with thanks to talented international contributors.” In these words Emmanuelle Goutal, founder and creative director, and Katia Kulawick-Assante, editor-in-chief, recount the second issue of Objection.
The issue opens with an article exploring the history of the bathroom through its representation in the history of art through the words of the artist, designer and architect Marco Mencacci, in a double interview with Peter Ward, author of the book The Clean Body: a Modern History. Starting from the social role of the Roman baths and then noting the absence of a room specially devoted to the rituals of hygiene and relaxation until the last century, this study reveals the bathroom as a spatial element that differs profoundly from one culture to another. And it continues to undergo far-reaching changes especially in relation to the new climatic conditions of this era, which will lead to inevitable changes in the design of its components.
Photographs of the colorful interiors of the bathroom of Pierre Marie’s Parisian apartment, inspired by the film Suspiria and a mix between the decorative arts and memorabilia of the past, are followed by an article entitled “The Inventory”. In this a set design inspired by the cataloguing typical of the world of collecting portrays personal objects for hygiene, displayed or concealed, useful, artistic or subtle, revealing everyday rituals to be viewed in a new light. Pierre Bonnard’s works also depict domestic rituals linked to the bathroom, in the intimacy of his wife’s habits - as do Paul Rousteau’s dreamlike photographs, commissioned by Objection, that today reinterpret Bonnard’s paintings and sketches.
The series of images snapped by Céline Bodin then depict a romantic bath with the Greek Venus accompanied by echoes of hair and shells, while iconic furnishings from the 70s inspire the interior of the bathroom by the duo ODA - Objets d’Affection, made up of Eve Ducrocq and Arnaud Dollinger. Here the organic curves of strong hues and ornamental objects set in large delicate fields of color draw on Gio Ponti’s design world.
The hands portrayed by the photographer Daisy Walker, the artistic vision of the towel by Gaëtan Bernede, and the Haitian bathrooms snapped by Elena Heatherwick, accompanied by the journalist Sally Williams in their “Toilet Stories”, continue in the account of an increasingly many-sided intimate space capable of bringing out details of the tastes, habits and small daily ceremonies of its users. Finally, an article by Rich Stapleton, poetically embedded between interior design and the fashion sphere, recreates a Hollywoodian scenario made up of shafts of light and shadows in one of the most iconic Californian architectural works, the Schindler House.
