Marcel Wanders

Marcel Wanders is a Dutch designer who initially broke onto the stage working with Droog Design where he created his Knotted Chair- which is one of the most easily recognized pieces of his. Since then he has gone to design for several well known European companies, including B&B Italia, and Cappellini, in addition to continuing to work with Droog. He also founded Moooi and designs for that company in addition to being the art director. Many if his designs are instantly recognizable, some of my favorites below...





Marcel Wanders graduated from the School of Arts Arnhem in 1988. He began working independently right away and became a member of Droog in 1992. In the past decade, his career has skyrocketed and he has won numerous awards, most recently the Visionary! Award from the Museum of Arts and Design in 2007. He has received press in just about every design magazine out there including ID, The mission statement for Marcel Wanders Studio taken from their website is: Here to create an environment of Love, Live with Passion and make our most exciting dreams come true. This statement coupled with a quote from Marcel in an interview with designboom: "I want to make work come alive by participation. there is a sense of love in a product - a kind of energy... (I think I'm responsible for creating an energy).I try with my designs to make a connection to real life and to contribute to the lives of people. ‘real’ products should not be done by half measures." and "I design from a mentality" crystallizes his outlook on designing. Especially in his interiors, you can see that zest for living and enjoying life come out in the overwhelming nature of his rooms. The rooms tend to be aggressive personalities in themselves, not simply content to be there, they want to interact with you and have you interact with them.















In another quote from the designboom interview, Marcel gives this advice to young designers: " I think so many young designers who see their work as ‘artistic’, and see their studio as ‘free spirit places’ won’t grow, they won’t reach a lot of people because it’s an ‘academic thing’ where it’s more done for the designers than the people." This is a very important concept in design- regardless of how "cool" or cutting-edge a product is, it is still a product. If the consumer isn't considered in the designing, it will be a failed product.