Tino Seubert & Theodora Alfredsdottir
Tino Seuabert & Theodora Alfredsdottir have separate practices but came together to create The Corrugation lights featured here. The wonderful lights were recently exhibited in Iceland.
Its a pleasure to have both Tino and Theodora on board to answer ‘The Makers’ Q & A this week.
Explore more of their work on the links below.
How important do you think your working and home environment are to you? ... for example is the work you make reflected in your personal space?
Tino: They are both becoming more and more important to me. I have a tendency towards OCD and need things to be very organised and curated around me to be able to focus. In a studio with limited space and where it sometimes gets messy, this can be a little tricky, but I am trying hard to achieve that perfect workspace one day.
In my personal space so far my work is only reflected through prototypes and samples. I have come to a point though, where I am feeling a strong urge to make my own nest, design pieces for it and fill it with other things that inspire me.
What do you think has informed your personal aesthetic?
Tino: I think the foundation for my work is inspired by a very technical and functional approach. I grew up in the Bavarian or Franconian countryside with my parents working in the engineering field and from young on I just learned how to make things and how to make them work.
When I grew up, I refined this foundation with more playful inspiration, which I gathered while travelling and becoming more interested in culture, history and fine arts. I think this clash often becomes visible in my projects. That's what I hear from people looking at my work.
Do you collect anything/ have a favourite object?
Theodora: I’ve always collected rocks, which is quite a general hobby. I like them due to their materiality, the variation and difference in colours, shapes and so on, but equally, I find them very calming. Rocks and minerals have been around forever, and the story of their formation and how they came into existence is fascinating. My favourite object at the moment is a rock I found on display whilst I was staying at my grandparent's house in Hvalfjörður – in the countryside in Iceland – it is a rock with a pink glass bird on it. The glass bird that had been attached to the rock by my great-grandma, in such a way that it was as if the bird was morphing out of the rock. These two objects initially had nothing to do with one another, the rock is from a mountain close by and the bird was bought in Spain as a souvenir, but the way they come together, the contrast between the refined glass and the organic rock, the colours and textures has really stuck with me.
What is your opinion on taste and style?
Theodora: Each to their own. Style and taste in terms of trends is something that I don’t really follow or buy into, but I think the biggest reason for that is that I don’t buy a lot of stuff, clothes or objects. Style outside of trends is something that I think comes naturally to many and doesn’t require a whole lot for them to achieve, whether it’s in outfits or interiors. It’s always nice to see true individual style – one that is not under the direct influence of media or hype, but unashamedly unique and a reflection of the individual themselves.
Are you interested in trends, both in and out of your field?
Tino: I am interested in them and I observe them. But I try not to follow them too much, as I usually try to produce things with more longevity. Also, as a designer, I think it is our job to be ahead of trends, create them and recognise them before they appear. When a trend becomes mainstream, we often are already a bit over them, because we’ve seen or worked with them so much.
Do you have a dream project or client?
Tino: I probably have two dream projects. One is designing something, which can be produced on a big scale in collaboration with an established company and most importantly will be accessible to a larger community - right now my pieces are rather niche and pricy, which hasn't necessarily been a choice.
Another dream of mine is to create a whole living space - whether it is for myself or someone else. An entire space, where I can design from a bigger scale down to tiny details and where I can combine my work with other designers and artists, I admire and put them into context.
Theodora: Yes, when I worked at Phillippe Malouin we designed a flagship store for Valextra in Mayfair which I really enjoyed working on, and I would love to work on larger scale like that again; designing an installation or creating a retail space. I would relish the opportunity to have complete creative freedom over an interior and every aspect of its design.
I also have a list of companies that I would love to develop a product with one day. This list includes cc-tapis, Hay and 1882 Ltd amongst others.
Do you have a project that was a turning point in finding your creative path?
Theodora: A project comes to mind that is not so much a turning point for my creative path but more for the way I work. One of my graduation projects from the Royal College of Art was a stackable dining set that centres upon the importance of the mineral Feldspar. Making up 60% of the earth’s crust, Feldspar is a key ingredient in many of our most familiar objects within the domestic environment. Each of the objects in the dining set is an example of an everyday material made with this mineral. The starting point of that project was a bunch of rocks that I collected on a hike in the Lake District, for the mere reason that they were “pretty" and I like rocks (as mentioned). Coming back to London I took a deeper interest in them as a material, one that surrounds us (especially in Iceland where I’m from) and wanted to figure out what role it played in our daily lives. Long story short, I worked with various professionals to trace this mineral within different manufacturing processes, and this project came about. What I learned from it is to trust the process – inspiration and projects can start from literally anything, and each step will organically lead you to the next.
How important is collaboration to you?
Theodora: I mostly work alone but I do love collaborations. Projects done in collaborations can often develop a lot quicker than they might otherwise do. Brainstorming and even misunderstandings can spark ideas and interesting paths to explore that you wouldn’t have found or explored on your own. Developing Corrugation Lights with Tino has been a great collaboration. The fact that we share a studio has made it very easy to work on this project together, but the best part is that we play off each other's strengths. Bouncing off each other and solving problems that have come up has taught me a lot, as well as enjoying the shared responsibility – both good and bad – enabling us to build something up together.
Tino: I usually am a bit of a lone wolf and that’s also the way I work, but especially because of that it is important for me to collaborate. It helps me to broaden my horizons and not to get stuck with my ideas and it teaches me to be more flexible and look at solutions, I might have excluded from the beginning. The Corrugation Lights collaboration with Theodora is just the perfect example. I have learned so much more in terms of the process than what I would learn from projects, I did by myself.
Where is your favourite place to be?
Theodora: Anywhere by the sea. Growing up in Iceland I’d see the sea every day and it really helps me to feel grounded. Coming from such a small population my London life can every now and again feel a bit hectic, but a day trip to the coast always gets me sorted.
Form, function or fantasy?
Tino: I don’t think there needs to be an "or". The three words don’t need to exclude themselves. I agree with the quote ‘Form follows function’, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that there is only one way for the form to be. If we take the function as a starting point, there are still a million different ways and forms to achieve that function. And fantasy definitely helps in this process.
