SWING
Designer
Aldo BakkerManufacture
Rutger GraasCirca
2014
Description
The minimal wood construction of Swing brings together three U-shaped pieces of wood to mimic the act of sitting on a swing. One of Aldo Bakker’s iconic designs, the Swing seat has been widely exhibited in European museums as part of retrospective exhibitions of the designer’s work. MUSEUM COLLECTIONS CID Museum, Grand Hornu Centraal Museum, Utrecht EXHIBITIONS U-Joints Exhibition Milan, 2013 Cuypershuis Roermond, 2015 Harrie Tillie award MUDAC Lausanne, 2017 Hermes Tokyo, 2017 CID Grand Hornu Museum, 2017 MUDAC Museum Lausanne, 2017
Aldo Bakker
Aldo Bakker
Born in the Netherlands in 1971 to Dutch designers Gijs Bakker and Emmy Van Leersum, Bakker grew up in an environment infused with a strong aesthetic sensibility. Rather than a formal design education, he forged his own path by training as a silversmith. Bakker set up his own studio in 1994, later moving into furniture and product design.
Bakker is interested in organic forms and movements that defy time, zeitgeist, functionality, and purpose. Those who see Aldo’s design for the first time are often drawn to the form or the materiality before they wonder what their purpose is.
This engaging and intriguing moment is important to the designer who grew his own unconventional approach to design in the scholarly household of two Dutch design icons. As opposed to most designers, Bakker rarely starts a design idea from the desire to solve a problem or address practical needs. Most of his objects start from the fascination for the timeless beauty of a form and the movement it may suggest; the form and its movement would then inspire a function. The cleverness and oddity of Aldo’s designs give his objects some type of natural legitimacy and timelessness.
Bakker’s pieces result from the dexterity of his master craftsmen collaborators — silversmith Jan Matthesius, ceramicist Frans Ottink, woodcrafter Rutger Graas, urushi master Sergej Kirilov or metalsmith Andre van Loon among others.
Widely published and exhibited in Europe today, Aldo held his first large exhibition at the Amsterdam Gallery ‘Binnen’. Invited by Ilse Crawford of the Eindhoven Design Academy in 2002, Bakker has fulfilled a successful tenure at the Design university for over ten years. Today the designer continues selected collaborations with renown manufacturers while further completing his personal collection with master craftsmen and galleries around the world.
Aldo Bakker
Born in the Netherlands in 1971 to Dutch designers Gijs Bakker and Emmy Van Leersum, Bakker grew up in an environment infused with a strong aesthetic sensibility. Rather than a formal design education, he forged his own path by training as a silversmith. Bakker set up his own studio in 1994, later moving into furniture and product design.
Bakker is interested in organic forms and movements that defy time, zeitgeist, functionality, and purpose. Those who see Aldo’s design for the first time are often drawn to the form or the materiality before they wonder what their purpose is.
This engaging and intriguing moment is important to the designer who grew his own unconventional approach to design in the scholarly household of two Dutch design icons. As opposed to most designers, Bakker rarely starts a design idea from the desire to solve a problem or address practical needs. Most of his objects start from the fascination for the timeless beauty of a form and the movement it may suggest; the form and its movement would then inspire a function. The cleverness and oddity of Aldo’s designs give his objects some type of natural legitimacy and timelessness.
Bakker’s pieces result from the dexterity of his master craftsmen collaborators — silversmith Jan Matthesius, ceramicist Frans Ottink, woodcrafter Rutger Graas, urushi master Sergej Kirilov or metalsmith Andre van Loon among others.
Widely published and exhibited in Europe today, Aldo held his first large exhibition at the Amsterdam Gallery ‘Binnen’. Invited by Ilse Crawford of the Eindhoven Design Academy in 2002, Bakker has fulfilled a successful tenure at the Design university for over ten years. Today the designer continues selected collaborations with renown manufacturers while further completing his personal collection with master craftsmen and galleries around the world.
Aldo Bakker Collection
SOY POURER
SILVER SALT CELLAR
CONSOLE BLACK
ANURA WHITE
URUSHI CONSOLE
TONUS INDIGO
PINK URUSHI STOOL BON
FAT ONE
WATER CARAFE
THREE-PAIR | IVORY MARBLE
PIVOT
TONUS URUSHI
LAC TABLE
VINEGAR FLASK
PIPE
POSE
CANDLE
THREE-PAIR | BASALTINA
ONE LEG MAHOGANY
SWING
SUPPORT
THREE-PAIR | BLACK MARBLE
GREEN LOW TABLE
CONSOLE GREEN
OIL PLATTER
BLACK SALT CELLAR
SQUARE POURER
SILVER POURER
MILK | OIL CAN
TONUS WOOD
A. BAKKER | CHALICE
RED URUSHI
CONSOLE TABLE
ANURA BLACK
SILVER CARAFE
REIGEN | A. BAKKER
ONE LEG URUSHI
STOOL BON
A. BAKKER | ARTEFACT
JUG+CUP
GREEN SIDE TABLE