DESIGN HEROS - ILSE CRAWFORD
It’s fair to say Ilse Crawford is a huge inspiration to us here at Louise Holt Design and we’ve loved watching her hone her intelligent, anthropological approach to design over the years.
photography Leslie Wilson
The founder of Elle Decoration UK, with an MBE for outstanding services to interior design, has run a multi-disciplinary team of twenty-plus at her Bermondsey-based practice - Studioilse - since 2003. She and her team focus on creating environments with human feeling and behaviour at their core, as well as designing furniture and products that elevate everyday life.
perching stools - photography courtesy of STUSDIOILSE
TIMELESS, SENSUAL, LIVABLE AND JOYFUL
Ilse Crawford considers vital human needs such as happiness, beauty, comfort, fun, conviviality and atmosphere from the outset, skillfully blurring the lines between architecture and design, commerical and domestic. As a result, her work is timeless, subtle, sensual, liveable and, moreover, gently joyful. With the onus on well-being Crawford’s work isn’t just aesthetically pleasing, it always feels good too.
embassy house - photography courtesy of STUSDIOILSE
ST CUTHBERTS - photography courtesy of STUSDIOILSE
As Crawford herself explains, quoting Nietzsche, “All evidence of truth comes only through the senses.” Her work is, indeed, emotional stuff.
holocene no 1 - photography courtesy of STUSDIOILSE
INTERIORS THAT PROVOKE AND EMOTIONAL RESPONSE
A sense of time and place is also always in evidence, with spaces rooted in their location and history. In fact, Crawford’s work is aimed squarely at all the senses. Not only do they look beautiful, with their muted, nature-inspired palette and occasional splash of considered colour, they smell and feel beautiful too.
Natural materials are allowed work their magic, using their power and integrity to provoke an emotional response, or ‘memory’ as Crawford calls it, in a way that soulless, man-made, mass-produced pieces never do. Touch also plays a big part, with layer upon layer of textures providing a rich tactility.
milan apartment - photography courtesy of STUSDIOILSE