After featuring at Maison et Objet in September, the minimalist and postmodern design-inspired pieces of ‘Collezione L!PUFF’ made further waves amongst Hungarian audiences at Budapest Design Week in October 2017. Having completed an MA from Central St Martin’s, the designer behind them, Hungarian-born Anna Horváth has since returned to her home country to showcase this unique capsule collection - simultaneously honouring her heritage and bringing new, modern shapes to life. Many have dubbed her the new designer to watch and it’s easy to see why.

Using her architecturally trained eye for design, Anna’s installation projects often have a strong spatial focus. Recognisable as furniture objects, each individual piece of ‘Collezione L!PUFF’ is an entirely handmade, unique design item. Every piece takes Anna’s signature visual language used in her two-dimensional illustrations, and expands it into the third dimension. Bright colours and diverse textures merge in a balanced harmony of minimalist shapes while the two leading colours of the collection are vivid red and cobalt blue.

Admirably, the objects have all been produced with sustainability in mind, and have been constructed from local, Hungarian materials, mostly from the area of Sümeg and Tapolca with the help of local craftsmen. Throughout the pieces, the young designer has achieved a rustic, natural effect by using white cast cement  from the local quarry of Sáska. Interestingly, she also chose to shoot the collection’s lookbook at the same quarry, calling attention to the importance of using local sources and techniques of production.

There are five furniture pieces in the collection. The first piece is a sturdy chair made of a three-sided cube shape and recycled rubber. The second is a monumental circular mirror embedded in a rectangular concrete block which, when in-situ, towers over the other objects. There is also rocking chair, as functional as it is aesthetically effective. The stainless steel frame ensures safe swaying for anyone who may want to test it out and the cylindrical seat back bears the characteristics of postmodern design; it is somewhat reminiscent of the Memphis movement both in shape and colour. These three objects are complemented by a smaller stool and a table. The table looks delightfully like the segment of a sound-clip, where differently sized wooden blockboards form peaks and troughs in a playful rhythm.

This is an exciting start to what we anticipate will be a long and successful design career for Anna and her studio, Anna James Design. Keep your eye peeled for her in 2018!

Anna James Design: annajamesdesign.com

Instagram: @annajamesdesign