Their stylistic and functional flexibility does not mean they lack character. This transparency of the design, purity of form and lack of ornamentation define the parameters of the multi-functional world created by Kuchciński’s products, a world in which there is a room for the designer's intense vision as well as for freedom of interpretation of the user.
Piotr Kuchciński, a trained architect, received his diploma with honors from the Poznań University of Technology. His portfolio includes urban and graphic projects, as well as designs intended for industrial production. He began his career with regular architectural projects, designing housing estates. However, Kuchciński discovered relatively quickly that it is furniture design that has special value for him. He designs furniture intended for offices, homes, and even public spaces.
Kuchciński is the ’golden boy’ of contemporary Polish design. In 2012, he won the Designer of the Year title, bestowed by the Polish Institute of Industrial Design, but he can be easily hailed as Designer of the Decade, as, from the beginning of his adventure with furniture, his designs received top honors and prizes at international competitions. Since 2004, his collections have been selected annually to the finals of the Dobry Wzór (Good Design) competition. They were awarded with the PRODECO emblems and with the title of the Product of the Year. He has collaborated with the most renowned furniture companies on the Polish market. He has designed for NOTI, VOX, and Balma, contributing to establishing their prestigious brands.
What distinguishes the works of Kuchciński is a sort of timelessness. The designer asserts that he wishes to create a product whose forms are not dictated by trends, thus he creates objects which exist beyond the scope of a particular moment in fashion. He is also interested in ‘innovative functionality’ [www.exspace.pl], the expression of which is to be found in his early collection (designed together with Joanna Leciejewska) 4 YOU for Vox. The employment of modular solutions allows composing easily not only the interior, but even the shapes of furniture. Versatility is key in the creation of this collection, in which the bed itself can be used in more than eighty different variants.
The H2 tables feature a similar freedom of arrangement . Their different heights, top shapes and colour combinations allow very precise adjustments according to particular needs. The bases of tables built on a pyramid plan are simultaneously graphic and delicate, giving the whole design quite surprising lightness. On the other side of the spectrum there are Trefle whose bases are also built on pyramid plan, but they take the form of fairly massive rolls. Here, however, Kuchciński achieves the lightness through the use of felt, which gives the whole structure unexpected softness.
In addition to the flagship grey, Trefle are produced in a palette of vivid colours, and the user can select any final finish, type of suture, so as to best suit his/her taste.
In the recent projects Kuchciński more easily reaches for colour and experiments with it in a much bolder fashion. It is these very colourful designs that received recognition from the jury of festivals and earned him the Must Have distinction at Łódź Design Festival and awards at the prestigious Red Dot . The latter has been given for the collection Clapp which refers to the aesthetics of the 50s and to the methods employed in the construction of the iconic model of the 366 chair designed by Józef Chierowski. Inspiration by the design of that period can be also discerned in the colours of upholstery, used for chairs and sofas. Yellows, creams, and even controversial roses successfully interact with wooden skeletons, creating sophisticated sets.