Our goal at Naum House was to capture Métier’s sense of exploration within a timeless world, whilst honouring their commitment to uncompromising quality and artisanship. Our mutual obsessions with material and craft created an immediate synergy between Naum House and Métier from day one. 

 

We started with an archival Riva blueprint, inspired by the internal construction of a Riva speedboat. The pinnacle of Italian design and engineering, the Riva boat epitomises a golden age of travel, where the journey is just as exciting as the destination.

 

The structure was first drawn, then simplified, rotated and compressed to fit into the exact dimensions of the shop window spaces. Forced perspective with enhanced foreshortening and exaggerated twisting were employed in our three dimensional sketch to enhance a feeling of depth and torque in the relatively shallow window volumes.

 We then created a 3-D printed model to identify glitches in the composition and areas where the perspective could be further enhanced. Scaled plans of each wooden component were then extrapolated from the 3-D model.

 

Given that the bags are entirely stitched by hand, it was important for us to find the right people to bring our structure to life with their hands. The design was built by a husband and wife team with experience of boat building, using traditional skills and construction methods. Blocks of open grained teak were selected. Each solid member was individually hand carved then assembled with teak dowels, using as few fixing points as possible.

 

                

 

 

 Because the design calls for two mirrored symmetrical structures, apart from the horizontal “hull” there are no replicated pieces and no square sectioned elements. The resulting inverted triangles had a lovely echo of the the double M composition of the Métier logo.

 

The sculptures can be completely disassembled into their component parts by the removal of 16 pegged fixing points concealed in the rear of each structure. The wood was treated with a finishing wax which was buffed to a dull lustre to showcase the natural characteristics of this beautiful wood.    

Denuded of external finishes - the keelson, ribs, stringers and frame of the boat form an elegant, abstracted, skeletal sculpture - hinting at nautical origins and the glamour of international travel and providing horizontal surfaces and hanging points at three levels to display a range of Métier bags.

 

Externally we removed the existing palm and ivy and replaced with a characterful strawberry tree that had interesting negative space in its branches complimented with a range of deciduous and evergreen draping and climbing plants that each bring different character in different seasons, whilst providing a textured tapestry of dark toned leaves to frame the warm golden wood glowing in the windows.