Editorial
By: LASVIT Team & Eva Slunečková
Photo: Maria Makeeva
How do people relate to their privacy and surroundings? What differentiates it from a space and which roles do uniqueness, symbolism or craft play? We discussed all this with leading interior designers George Yabu and Glenn Pushelberg in New York.
We also had an open dialog with the Campana Brothers who are part of the Lasvit design family since 2016. Together, we explored the design process in relation to traditional crafts. In our exclusive talk we also entered Humberto’s and Fernando’s homes, minds and imaginations. The interview was conducted by our long-term collaborator, Stephan Hamel, who also contributed to Spacial with an extensive essay on the forms of private space. Among other subjects, Hamel highlighted the strange dichotomy of the seen and the carefully hidden in our households, as well as living as a specific expression of one’s personality, similar to fashion. An overview of residential installations by Lasvit offers a glimpse of interiors as mirrors to who we really are.
We also celebrate the recent 90th birthday of Vladimír Kopecký, the one-of-a-kind genius glass artist, professor and poet. He is renowned for turning technical glass into a worldwide phenomenon and establishing the technology of ‘ugly glass’ to the level of a sophisticated artwork, the execution of which is second to none. Expressive painting on glass surfaces is seen as a controversial attack upon valuable materials: It causes a storm of emotions and is sure to raise your enthusiasm for years to come.
The disruption of the concept of luxury is also the theme of the essay by Maxim Velčovský, Lasvit Art Director, reacting to the Manifest of Luxury by the Hungarian philosopher and art dealer Carl Laszlo. Laszlo’s text from 1943 is a timeless statement, challenging the usual understanding of comfort, associated only with financial capital. He sets this term into the broader context and uses its individual characteristics as a springboard to more precisely define the essence of luxury.
This first edition of Spacial Magazine was produced under the auspices of a man no less radical — Daniel Libeskind, a world-renowned architect and a member of the Lasvit design family since 2014. As a youngster, Libeskind was forced to leave his home in Łódź, Poland, and set off on a journey into the unknown. In a dialog with this celebrated visionary and philosopher of spaces, we introduce key concepts that link stories in Spacial Magazine like a silver thread. We’ll be glad if you find them inspirational and continue coming back to them.
