Concrete Ideas: 3 Designers Reimagine an Industrial Material

The utilitarian product is getting the high-design treatment.

Jill Krasny

Published Sep 28, 2018 4:57 PM

White Graphic — Ovid Vessel, Concrete Cat, $60; Wall.01, Iwan Pol; *Armored Emptiness* by Simon Anund, Artworks.

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Concrete—the industrial building material composed of gravel, sand, cement, and water—is being given a design-forward makeover in colorful, handcrafted works.

In Living Color

Canadian duo Matt and Shawna Heide of Concrete Cat began experimenting with vibrant pigments—from electric mint to moody indigo—after growing bored of the black-and-white palette that had come to deﬁne their architectural details business.

“We felt like a lot of the things you can do with ceramics you could do with concrete,” says Matt, so the Edmonton-based couple branched out, casting side tables, catchalls, and even pipes in eye-popping patterns. All the pigments are applied to the concrete by hand, and the colors are stacked and mixed for a psychedelic effect.

Delicate Touch

Inspired by the Japanese architect Tadao Ando, Dutch designer Iwan Pol sought to “create a fur for buildings” by casting concrete in tactile textures that highlight a “softer” side of the material.

“I looked for qualities that would surprise me,” says Pol of his Happy Concrete II series, in which the tiles resemble delicate eggs and water drops more than durable ﬂooring and wall accents. After drawing the pieces in his software, a plastic model is 3-D printed and used to make a silicone mold, which Pol then ﬁlls with concrete in soft pastels and speckled patterns that look as cool as they feel.

Blank Canvas

“It’s difficult to know exactly how the castings will turn out,” says Simon Anund from his home in Stockholm. The artist’s concrete sculptures, seen in his recent solo show, “Post Amorfa,” began with a series of discarded vacuum molds. After placing a colorful blob of concrete in one, Anund poured white concrete around it for a minimalistic look.

“It’s not as direct as painting,” he says of casting heat-sensitive concrete (which takes more than a day), but he loves the “dramatic change of texture” between the misshapen splotch and the whiteness.

Shop the look:

01 Concrete Wallpaper by Piet Boon for NLXL, The Future Perfect, $299