In Conversation: Rio Kobayashi
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‘The art scene is witnessing a lot of influences from craft and design. I guess people are removing labels and divisions between disciplines.’
Things are hectic in the world of Rio Kobayashi. The London-based Japanese-Austrian designer has been on an accelerating trajectory ever since 2023, when he staged his first solo show for London Design Festival, Manus Manum Lavat (“one hand washes the other” in Latin), at Cromwell Place in west London. The display turned heads: his wooden furniture, covered in distinctive colourful patterns, exuded warmth and humour. Now, as he wins the Emerging Design Medal, he is operating at full tilt. ‘It does feel like the momentum has been building up, and I'm grateful to be busier than ever,’ he says.
It’s not just the volume of work but the breadth of directions he is stretching into – in scale, in medium and in field. In October he will debut a new range of objects at Frieze London with the East London-based contemporary art gallery Kate MacGarry, which is also planning a solo show of his work in November. It’s a significant step into a world that many designers strive for decades to enter – one he is modest about. ‘The art scene is witnessing a lot of influences from craft and design,’ he observes. ‘I guess people are removing labels and divisions between disciplines.’
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Then there are the projects taking him in other directions entirely. In Amsterdam he is designing the interior of a new audio broadcasting room for the concept store Future Days Shop, which asked him to model the space after the retro-inspired speakers he made for the Austrian company Wiener Lautsprecher Manufaktur a few years ago. ‘Wooden, curved, tram-like’, is how he describes the concept – which sees him designing a space rather than just the objects within it. ‘I really enjoy the challenge. It’s totally different from my other work – so large you need a team, proper drawings, proper communication.’ Meanwhile, at luxury Tokyo shopping centre Ginza Six, Kobayashi is one of six designers transforming timber from a single tree into seating for visitors in its central atrium. Unlike his usual hands-on approach, here he is producing a maquette for others to fabricate – an exercise in ceding control.
For Kate MacGarry, though, his approach is one of pure intuition. Over the summer he has been repairing and transforming broken furniture – ‘collecting things from auction houses or from the street’. The process, he says, is fast and instinctive. ‘If you hold the material for five minutes wondering what to do, it’s too late. And then you never need to do the same thing again – it’s a one-off piece.’ It’s as pleasurable as ‘massaging my brain’, he adds.
Kobayashi insists that the pace of success hasn’t pulled him off course. ‘I’m just focused on making things I really like or that inspire me, and not overthinking or getting distracted.’ He has always forged his own path: rather than going to university, he built his practice by honing his craft independently. The medal, he says, feels like an endorsement of that choice.
For all the ambition, there are still flashes of improvisation. He recalls an incident when designer Bethan Laura Wood had a magazine shoot in her home and asked him to quickly build a screen to conceal some possessions.
‘I had to make it right before the shoot,’ he says. He laughs. ‘They should name me “emergency designer of the year”.’
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