Naturally sophisticated design.
We are drawn to the natural world. It’s in our nature. And yet we live in cities and stare at the walls. With its products, the label U rbanature fills the gap in everyday life between city living and the longing for something more primal.
Urbanisation is a global trend. While in developing and newly industrialised countries megacities are blooming and birth rates are skyrocketing, Germany , like other European countries, is suffering as a result of demographic change, and has been for decades. Germany is contracting - Less people are being born and life expectancy is increasing. A falling birth rate, unemployment and mass migration from rural areas threatens to turn those areas into an “ocean of poverty and dementia”, to quote the drastic assessment of some scientists.
This need not necessarily be a catastrophe. It is also possible to gain something positive from such change. The countryside is stagnating – nature is reclaiming lost ground. In Germany’s Lusatia, wolves can be heard howling once more. Lynx can now be seen in the Harz mountains. Why should Germans go all the way to Tuscany? Holidaying in Germany is more popular than ever.
But for almost everybody, everyday life takes place not in Lusatia, nor in the Harz mountains, but in urban centres and metropolitan areas. It’s where the jobs, kindergartens and schools are. It’s where infrastructure and supply systems function perfectly. It’s home to the arts and culture – to civilisation!
Yet the yearning for green, for nature, for pristine beauty, cannot be satisfied by a few days’ holiday. Urban gardening, neighbourhood gardens, guerrilla gardening; these phenomena are all borne out of this longing. And scientists are seeking new ways to bring horticulture inside urban buildings, with one key thing in mind: More freshness, less travelling. This is why staff at Dresden’s Institute of Horticulture are working as hard as they can to find solutions to the global trendurbanisation . www.BrickBornFarming.de
The label urbanature also attempts to bridge the gap between city life and the rural, in your own home. Urbanature is about products that render the everyday as green as possible. Urbanature brings a little piece of nature into our urban lives.
About urbanature
The label urbanature is a selection of product designer Jörg Brachmann’s ideas. It was founded in early 2013. His designs are inspired by a strong affinity with nature and a passion for cooking, and he has a real eye for the extraordinary. He turns his ideas into prototypes in his own studio on the outskirts of Leipzig, where he then perfects them before creating product series in his own workshops. In collaboration with regional craft specialists, he develops solutions that allow his products to be manufactured in a way that is both economical and high-quality. He uses wood from sustainable forests as well as recyclable materials – even for the packaging.
Made in Germany.
Philosophy
New products need to solve problems, and they need to do so with charisma, humour and charm.
Background
- born in 1977
- College of Applied Art Schneeberg Germany 2001 – 2005
- work experience placement in Oradea, Romania 2004
- since 2005 freelance product designer near Leipzig with private studio and workshop
- 2013 foundation of the urbanature label
- manufacturer of his own product lines, collaboration with regional partner
