Atome Associés emphasises levitating nooks in Gerrit Rietveld-inspired furniture

Inspired by the modernist designs of Dutch designer and architect Gerrit Rietveld, Paris-based creative agency Atome Associés conceptualised the RIET collection, comprising tables and consoles. The furniture collection mimics the abstract geometries and clean lines that define Rietveld's architecture and furniture designs. Natacha Froger, the collection's designer and founder of the interior design, architecture, furniture design and branding agency Atome Associés, shares, "In the RIET collection, every choice of material and colour is part of a search for balance between structure and fluidity, functionality and emotion."

Synonymous with Rietveld's aesthetic, wherein design was reduced to its barest, most essential elements, Atome Associés, too, pivots its creations on the motto of 'Design with Purpose'. For RIET, Froger collaborated with interior designer Aurèle Duhart to sculpt these art furniture pieces that kink at angles, evocative of the levitating tilts that made Rietveld's Zig Zag Chair (1934) iconic. The collection is accompanied by original artworks by New York-based French artist Bénédicte Gerin, who also dabbles in minimalist and abstract art forms. Gerin's paintings for the RIET collection mimic the sculpted movements of the tables and consoles.

The table designs and console designs by Froger are conceived in American walnut, which is considered a noble and durable species. The wood for the coffee table, side table, bench and console table was selected to articulate this collection owing to its chromatic richness and depth, which would enhance the sculptural quality of the pieces. "Its subtle veining dialogues with the rigour of the geometric shapes, creating a tension between the organic naturalness of the wood and the precision of the orthogonal lines," Froger shares with STIR.

Each piece is crafted by artisans from northern Portugal. The woodworkers of the Paços de Ferreira region are the custodians of a legacy passed down from father to son for generations. This traditional craft is rooted in a profound understanding of wood species and techniques honed over centuries. The artisans infused the tables and seats with this traditional craftsmanship while complying with contemporary aesthetics.

While the materiality of the furniture pieces, in tandem with their minimalist structures (as inspired by Rietveld's designs), imbue the pieces with a sense of structure and lightness, the colour contrasts lavished on the tables and consoles are derived from Dutch painter Johannes Vermeer's body of work. "Like Vermeer's work, where colour structures space by modulating light and reflections, RIET's palette doesn't just dress surfaces: it redefines volumes and creates dynamic interactions with the environment," Froger elaborates.

"Inspired by the legacy of Rietveld and the chromatic subtlety of Vermeer, the RIET collection explores an approach in which material and colour interact to reveal light, give relief to shapes and inscribe each piece in an assumed timelessness," she adds, revealing the dual inspirations behind the collection.

One can find shades of orange, green, blue and black in the wooden furniture pieces. While the vibrancy of orange references both the energy of De Stijl and the golden light of the Flemish masters, green is inspired by Rietveld's muted modernist projects while also evoking the hues used by Vermeer to animate shadows and breathe movement into the material.

The dark hues of blue seen in the product designs take after Dutch ceramics and the powerful usage of blue in Vermeer's work that captured and reflected light to give an almost tangible depth to spaces. Lastly, the usage of black illustrates the colour's timelessness, its usage across designs and art forms and its capacity to act as a visual anchor, hence highlighting other chromatic shades and structural lines.

When asked about the story behind his collaboration with Atome Associés, Gerin tells STIR, "During a long period of work in my Majorcan studio last year, Natacha was struck by the correlation between the gestures and colours I had used in some of my works and her line of designer furniture, RIET.” Froger, upon finding Gerin's Sculpted Movements series, realised that the brushstrokes on the artwork were reminiscent of the silhouette of the walnut furniture she was developing. Additionally, the orange-red tones, too, bore a clear resemblance with the chromatic vision for RIET. Hence, she persuaded Gerin to take the artwork forward in conjunction with the furniture collection.

"At her instigation, I produced large-scale works, pushing back the limits of my gestural expression on floor-level canvases. The redefinition of an ample, free gesture through grey, geometric flat tints recalls Natacha's free interpretation of her Rietveld-inspired design line, through its timeless, functional lines," Gerin notes. Sitting at the intersection of functional art, retrospective design inspiration and contemporary culmination, the RIET collection by Atome Associés, despite its calm and laid-back persona, attracts attention with its levitating geometric niches and orthogonal forms.