Today the boundaries between public and private vanish until they conflagrate. While ‘home’ is becoming more and more a place for work and an instrument of subsistence, ‘domesticity’ invades every field of human activity, with shops that are camouflaged as lounges, offices as game rooms, and restaurants as kitchens. The 'sharing economy' has converted intimacy into an economic asset, forcing large strata of society, if indeed fortunate enough to own a house, to cede a portion of it and taking refuge in the little space left. 'Environments of Resistance for Social Individuals' is an incremental archive of authentic private spaces (private in the sense of ‘deprivation’ of public presence); exceptional pieces of furniture designed with the sole purpose of accommodating the idiosyncrasies of their occupants.
The AIRBNB apartments, in every corner of the globe, all look alike. In bright and retouched wide-angle photos, one seeks to convey a message of uniqueness and domesticity, continuing to recombine inexpensive wood furniture with personal items that help to win over potential clients. Furniture today serves to sell oneself more than to tell a story about oneself; to feel at home anywhere is possible, after all, it is almost certain that the host has a home furnished in the same way.
Endless domestic landscape.
It reminds a lot of places we know: it can be our family house, our friends house or even our flat.
The history of furniture, probably not very relevant but definitely entertaining, is littered with exceptional items designed with the sole purpose of accommodating the idiosyncrasies of the client. These are the last private places. Private in the sense of deprivation of public presence.
The environments we designed so far try to activate a relationship between life and form that is not fulfilled in mere functional terms, but that ‘challenges’ life to survive under abnormal conditions; without any ambition to change the habits of anyone other than perhaps those who designed them.
'Environment of Resistence for Social Individuals' was shown within the collective exhibition ‘Capitalism is Over’, curated by Raumplan during the 2017 Milan Design Week, Cascina Cuccagna, Milan, April 2017.
