Here, we ask designers to take a selfie and give us an inside look at their life.
Occupation: Designer.
Instagram: @sophieloujacobsen
Hometown: Paris, Seattle, London, and Brooklyn. I’ve lived all over.
Studio location: Brooklyn.
Describe what you make: Delightful everyday home goods.
The most important thing you’ve designed to date: In 2018, I created a set of vessels designed to elevate the rituals of cleaning your home (All Purpose Set). It was part of a group exhibition called “Furnishing Utopia,” and it was the project that sparked my love affair with glass. Since then, I’ve been primarily working in glass, so that project was a major turning point for me. It also laid the groundwork for the visual language that would become my first collection of ready-to-buy objects.
Describe the problem your work solves: My goal is to create objects for the home that are accessible and useful, but also delightful, special, and unique. My greater intention is to create a relationship of mutual respect between object and user. I hope to trigger an emotional response with the objects so that their owner is always conscious of the material energy that objects possess.
Describe the project you are working on now: A collection of hand-blown glass vases that’s launching during NYCxDesign at Assembly Line in Brooklyn. These pieces are the result of a process of self-inquiry sparked by the darkness of societal conditions of the past few years—in trying to find meaning in my work when the world seems to be falling apart. Questions such as “What are the physical properties of joy?” and “How can an inanimate object express optimism?” have been key in informing this work.
Studying objects and vessels throughout history and looking at forms that have been repeated over and over again, the collection aims to be an expression of much-needed lightness, positivity, and renewal. Working with local glass artists on these one-off pieces has allowed me to dig deeper into these questions from an aesthetic perspective than I’d be able to with my collection of everyday objects, with the ultimate intention of this exercise informing the design of future larger-scale production pieces.
A new or forthcoming project we should know about: A very exciting collection of lighting in collaboration with In Common With, which will be launching this September!
What you absolutely must have in your studio: A million samples and scraps, daylight, upbeat music, and my partner Adrian who shares my studio for his own graphic design practice, and who is my sounding board for absolutely everything!
What you do when you’re not working: Hopefully eating good food with good friends, dancing, or traveling.
Sources of creative envy: The Gropius years of the Bauhaus and 1970s Italy.
The distraction you want to eliminate: Love Island (UK).
Concrete or marble? Concrete.
High-rise or townhouse? Townhouse.
Remember or forget? Remember.
Aliens or ghosts? Ghosts.
Dark or light? Light.
(All photography by Jen Steele.)
