Isn’t it Romantic?: Contemporary Design Balancing Between Poetry and Provocation

Offering an alternative heritage to the precedent of modernist design

In literature, music and art, the term ‘Romanticism’ refers to an era that began around the time of the French Revolution and continued into the Victorian period. Today we associate the word with attributes such as ‘dreamy, ’ ‘rhapsodic’ and ‘poetic, ’ but also with ‘self-absorbed’ or even ‘kitsch.’ This volume identifies a shift in contemporary design toward themes of metamorphosis, heroic individualism, reverie and pastoralism–all key concerns of the Romantic era, which may be seen as offering an alternative heritage to the more austere precedent of modernist design. Products by Atelier NL, Barnaby Barford, Pieke Bergmans, Tord Boontje, Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec, Hussein Chalayan, Formafantasma, Martino Gamper, Max Lamb, Doshi Levien, Makkink & Bey, Ingo Maurer, Jo Meesters, Nendo, Bertjan Pot, Philippe Starck, Mats Theselius, Ionna Vautrin, Sylvain Willenz and many others are surveyed.