Supernova

The cooperation between artist and designer Mike Meiré and the upmarket manufacturer Dornbracht has lasted for 17 years now. It's a cooperation which has led to a number of remarkable projects, going well beyond the usual trade fair participations and glossy catalogues. In his capacity as Brand and Creative Director Meiré is the curator for Dornbracht's culture projects. These 'Dornbracht Edges' are installations which take as their theme the cultural significance of changes in the architecture of functional spaces such as the kitchen or the bathroom. Meiré always succeeds in communicating the content of his interpretation at a highly intuitive and emotional level.

For example, during the imm cologne the installation Global Street Food showed a kind of field study describing the cultural, functional and aesthetic aspects of roadside kitchens from all around the world. Displaying them outside their original context turns these kitchens, some of which are very basic indeed, into research objects. Their improvised nature calls into question our own image of the ideal kitchen and creates space for new interpretations.

At this year's ISH Dornbracht presented "Supernova", designed by Sieger Design, the design studio which has been cooperating with Dornbracht for over twenty years now. Mike Meiré developed the correspondingly multi-facetted presentation architecture for Dornbrachts's new range of bathroom fittings and conceived the company's highly successful trade fair stand – by the way, it was no less a person than Dieter Sieger who brought the promising young artist into the Dornbracht fold in 1992.

We met Mike Meiré at ISH for a brief tour of the Dornbracht stand.