Clean break

Interiors, particularly the bar/ restaurant/ leisure market, can be a bit of a free-for-all. Architects, artists, furniture designers, sometimes it seems as if anyone but actual interior designers are picking up work. And it appears to be easier for relatively unknown designers to get a start in this diverse sector than in retail or commercial office design.

Design Week takes a look at some of the up-and-coming designers working in interiors, ranging from youngsters such as At The Third Stroke, which is just starting out, to architect Andy Martin, the designer behind many of Oliver Peyton’s swanky bars and restaurants, and who, despite these considerable successes, is still striving to raise his profile. While Martin and architecturally-trained Waugh Thistleton tackle interiors from a spatial perspective, furniture-turned-interior specialists such as Precious McBane is taking a “curatorial” approach, commissioning and selecting work by others as well as themselves. Collaboration is also high on the agenda for Emulsion, a new consultancy that is hoping to work in tandem on their interiors with both graphic designers and photographers.

Few young consultancies have the benefit of Antarchitecture’s regular commissions from the thriving Belgo Group; many, like General Practice, often team up with start-ups, hoping that as they take off, they’ll take their designers with them, propelling them out of the up-and-coming into the here-and-made-it.