Dutch artist-designers Kiki van Eijk and Joost van Bleiswijk have an enviable working partnership. Based in Eindhoven, the Netherlands, the husband and wife co-direct the studio Kiki and Joost. But when it comes to their projects, they work separately, producing sculptural furniture that reflects their distinct skills and aesthetic tendencies.
Van Eijk, 46, has a rich imagination and an eye for detail. She develops tactile furniture, objects and textiles infused with emotion, narrative and a sense of whimsy. The work of van Bleiswijk, 48, is more architectural: his furniture and lighting combine ambitious volumes with clever construction details. The contrast underpins the success of their collaboration, inspiring and challenging one another. “The basis is that we keep each other free,” says van Bleiswijk. “There is no ego involved; we just want to help each other,” adds van Eijk.
The pair have just opened the doors of a new joint endeavour. At their canalside studio, a 1,000 sq m former industrial site in the east of the city, they have built themselves an exhibition gallery. It marks the realisation of a dream that started taking shape when van Eijk and van Bleiswijk bought the property in 2019. After eight studio moves in 18 years, they wanted a permanent space that would give them freedom to design, make and exhibit their creations.
Their first step was to install a workshop, filled with machines for cutting, shaping, drilling and welding, and drawers stocked with every kind of handheld tool imaginable. “If you have to go somewhere else every time you need to cut a piece of wood, you cannot be expressive,” says van Bleiswijk.
The gallery is the final piece of the puzzle. Featuring a modular Douglas fir structure, a plywood interior and full-height cupboards that double as extra show space, it allows the couple to present works immediately after they have made them. “It’s a direct transformation from workshop to exhibition,” adds van Eijk. “It means we can work fast and show things when the paint is still wet.”
Exhibitions have always been central to the Kiki and Joost identity. The couple met as students at Design Academy Eindhoven (DAE). Van Eijk graduated in 2000, followed by van Bleiswijk in 2001. It was a time of crisis for Eindhoven; electronics group Philips — which once had around 100,000 staff here — had just closed its factory, leaving major unemployment in its wake.
In a bid to put the city back on the map, DAE decided to stop staging its end-of-year show in Amsterdam, as it had done for the past decade, and stay local instead. Van Eijk and van Bleiswijk saw this as an opportunity to make a name for themselves. In 2002, the pair rounded up some designer friends and put on a coinciding exhibition titled Greetings from Eindhoven, promoting the city as a hub of burgeoning talent and enterprise. “We wanted to make a statement,” says van Eijk.
The couple have exhibited in Eindhoven every year since then, including in the provocative Design Sucks group show in 2003 and the punk-themed London Calling in 2006. Other creatives did the same, providing the foundations for what is now Dutch Design Week, a festival that takes over the city for nine days every October. It enabled Eindhoven’s resurgence as an international design hub and cemented Kiki and Joost’s reputation within it, alongside fellow talents such as Piet Hein Eek, Maarten Baas and Nacho Carbonell.
If there is one thing that unites their work, it’s an ethos of “learning by doing”. They both believe in the power of serendipity, of experimenting with materials without a fixed idea of what the result will be. “Not everything has to have an end goal; sometimes it’s good to just go for it and see what comes out,” says van Eijk. This approach is evident in their latest works, which they unveiled in the new gallery during this year’s Dutch Design Week.
Van Eijk’s offerings included “Sprout”, a set of plant-inspired vases combining blown glass with a Japanese ceramic technique called raku, which she uses to create graphic patterns, and “Stripes and Bubbles”, a blanket inspired by the same glazing process. Van Bleiswijk showcased “One Sheet”, a series of shelving units made by cutting and folding single sheets of steel, and “Funky Punky”, a collection of furniture formed from neon-painted shards of leftover plywood.
The couple’s creative pursuits don’t end in the studio. Their home, a converted 19th-century barn on the edge of the city, is their most ambitious project to date. The structure was barely standing when they took it over. They effectively constructed a new building behind the old brick facade, framed by exposed timber trusses. It gave them an expansive double-height living room and kitchen, which they have filled with furniture by themselves and other leading Dutch creatives.
A highlight is van Bleiswijk’s “Construction Lamp”, a Meccano-esque design for Dutch furniture label Moooi, which creates a playful juxtaposition with the custom Lego station installed for the couple’s two young sons.
With the exhibition space now complete, van Eijk and van Bleiswijk are already looking ahead. Since 2021, they have run a DAE teaching unit of their own called Thinking Hands, where they encourage students to follow their experimental approach. In January, these students will showcase their own work in the Kiki and Joost gallery.
The duo have also been working with the municipality on a vision to transform the entire neighbourhood into a “design haven”, attracting more creatives to the area. “We hope we can inspire by doing this,” van Eijk says. “Eindhoven is rapidly growing — there is still momentum to do things here.”
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