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BOOMWEHMEYER

Q _ Questions by Pia Johnson

A  _ Answers by (G) Gunter & (J) Judith

(Q1) Can you introduce yourself, what is your background and roots ?

(G) My name is Gunter Wehmeyer (Germany). I can say that I was creative from my childhood on, but never really put this into constructive channels until after high school. At begin I studied Economics in Germany, but was more searching for something creative studies. Coming from an background where my father was Architect and my brother building Engineer the step to Landscape Architecture was not very far away. I finished my Studies at the University of Kassel with a Master in Landscape Planning and a 2nd Advanced master in Landscape Urbanism in Urban Design.

I'm very much influenced by the Kassel School in terms of interdisciplinary study between Architecture, Urban Planning, Landscape Planning, Product Design and Arts with very close correlation between teaching and research, political and social responsibilities of planning and learning by doing self determined studies. In the last years I got more and more into the Interdisciplinary Design and Research in the Concepts of Urban Landscapes and Landscape Urbanism (Detlev Ipsen & Lucius Burckhardt) and currently working on my MBA Sustainability Management CSR in Germany.

(J) My name is Judith van den Boom. I am from the Netherlands and have been working in the creative fields for as long as I can remember. Before my academy study I had big interest in art & design and worked in organic/green design-related fields. I finished my MA study at the Royal College of Art in London at the Applied Arts departments. Here I had a really good time living and studying in London, it was a real pro-active period for activating my passions on deeper level.

Previous I studied for several years at the Design Academy in Eindhoven (NL) and switched to the Academy of Art & Design in Arnhem (NL) to graduate for my BA in Product Design. My first BA product collection was built in cooperation with the Royal Delft Blue factory and this started off my journey in ceramics & cultural processes and quality. I have a fascination for material, developed during studies but even more with the relations the material contains.

As designer I'm trying to expand new design work fields and make design more a tool and useful approach for others. Design is in the end a service for people, to bring a deeper quality to life, and this quality lies not merely in a 3-dimensional product but even more in the living ways, systems and philosophies we carry with us. I am a designer but work beyond 3D and also active as design tutor, writing, curator and board member in slowLan. It is about working out the new fundaments and needs for life, building together with other creatives and local communities create a better future and this can’t merely be done in 3D work.

(Q2) Where do you live/work at the moment ? How does that influence your work ?

(G) At the moment we live a bit mobile between Germany and China, we have been very much on the road to be at location with projects. Since the lasts years I worked merely in Hong Kong, Dubai and Shanghai as Urban Designer on large scale Landscape- and Urban Planning projects. My first contact with China was in 2003 while doing a University research within the Pearl River Delta about the Highspeed Urbanism and Change of Landscape within Chinese Megacities and deepened that in 2004 working for 4 Months in a Design research Group with in Tongji-University in Shanghai.

All these experiences and the Interrelations within those processes are some of my driving factors at the moment and now with working on my MBA it's a great chance of bringing Design and Business together in new ways, more sustainable strong strategies.

(J) As Gunter already said, we are in between locations, it gives us a strength of not being tied to one specific workplace. However we also long to be more in one locality and are focussed to settle the core of our studio in Berlin and work from there on design and academic projects. This winter I will be mainly in China again for working on new collection of work for a German design shop and in 2010 germany/ england and holland will be a bit more on our agenda. The last years I have travelled a lot with my collection for exhibitions in Frankfurt, London, Shanghai and New York. I have been working as a independent designer and lived and worked a lot in China. This made a big influence on my work and keeps on being a fundament in the projects we carry out.

(Q3) Why do you want to create?

(J) There is not some forced will to create, but it’s a natural process, in my life it is a natural thing. My thoughts and work have been involved in creating since I can remember, even if this was a drawing I made when I was a little kid. Creating is something part in my life, I could not live without this. A 24/7 engine in my mind, but I love it. It’s for me the best way to express and share my thoughts, plans with the world around me. I always say it's the balance between hands and mind that works the best for me.

(G) Similar to Judith its implanted into my heart, I can not shut it off. The main reason is that I want to influence my environment, people around me and myself. Creating things without leaving a positive and changing influence is useless and time wasting for me, secondly I think creating things is putting things back into a specific order, how it was meant to be. There are products around us, are here for our need, they have this natural efficiency.

(Q4) Why do you come to this BoomWehmeyer cooperation, would you like to do more of these matchings in future ?

(J) This cooperation was something I hoped for a long time, we had an intense match on the creative fields and discussed deeper design subjects for many times. Our interests are really wide, my fascination for XL urbanism and society and Gunters ideas about smaller and humane design made this change ideally to cooperate. I really enjoy working together, the discussions and differences, the brainstorms and using each other strengths can make a cooperation strong. When you share a same energy or passion the commitment with another person can really build your own work and views on design and life. Design is about sharing and questioning subjects, what better is this to do with a some other person next to you?

(G) There's not much to add to this, only that I would like to do this cooperations much more in the future.  As BoomWehmeyer we are really focusing on being a active mobile work team and we work with people around the globe. It's always a great synergy bringing the discussion on the table and come to active combines approaches. Its been on my heart for quite a long time to work in a interdisciplinary way between different Designers, Artist and Architects. I think this way of working can produce an immense Boost of creativity and new design parameters. Hopefully our cooperation is some sort of catalyst project for more to come…

(Q5) What do you want to achieve in future, and this in relation to your work (Could this be critical,unconventional, to respond, decoration, functional) ?

(G) I'm longing to get a deeper understand and meaning of Design. Creating a better place where design can function in new ways. Maybe the biggest part in future will be to reveal my inner chaotic creative world and feelings; using this to design and reorder things around me for a improving quality of life.

(J) What I want to achieve? There are many things in me I would like to try and find out. My hands and mind are curious about many things. But not in the borders of the supposed idea of what design is, it's great taking the responsibility and opening new ways of working for design.

(Q6) What is design for you? (It's such a wide meaning, but what's the closest relation for u with this word?)

(J) Design is a word what I in first response never really liked, it has so many values to people. Some of these values I don’t want to relate to, they are out of balance. Design is for me a wide world, it’s our world. Everything that affects us, from daily use, expressions, tools, objects to how we behave in the streets. The closest relation for me to design is the act. The creation of thinking and peoples growth. Design should be always a tool that makes people grow from the inside.

(G) I also don't like the word very much, its too blurry for me. Coming from the original meaning of 'designare' or 'disegno' there has been an inflation of this term in all relations and interactions. Everything and nothing is Design. Design for me is creating spaces and places with a distinctive identity, something like 'Gestalt' or 'Form'. We can make a separate debate on this word in a other conversation.

(Q7) How important is the process of design for you, are you really strict or more experimental in this?

(J) The process in design is one of the most inspirational parts for me, the moment of the search and definition, seeking the depth of the subject you work on. Some ideas can be good from the start and just need good research to finnish other need time and process to really deepen it in the right way. Processes are inspiring, every person takes this in their own ways.

(G) I'm very much open to everything around me, what could inspire me; therefore most of my ideas coming from other areas of Design, Environment or Architecture. From my background I really learned a good depth and research that really is the fundament but I also love to be experimental in the process maybe getting more strict to my initial idea towards the end of this process.

(Q8) How do you compromise together, how do you see this in BoomWehmeyer, are you comfortable with making new rules in design?

(J) I think I can compromise easy, but maybe it’s better to question others for this! I am open for a lot of options but I do need the have the best in the final result. Compromising is good, even completely switching ideas just before  deadlines. In cooperations you have to work with this, it’s one of the challenges. I think you always have to be open for new views, it’s a key in cooperation.

(G) I don't like to compromise in my work and there for rather have as team first the good base set up together. Having a good group idea of the project we work on. Within a design process it can take quite a long time where I rethink, reorder, design and draw only within me before I firstly take those ideas out. Mostly than is already detailed. Switching ideas just before a deadline wouldn't work quite good for me, I’m too perfectionistic in those processes (laughs). Compromising only for the intention to bring in all possible ideas and viewpoints weakens the whole outcome, but if it is really a way to concentrate and boil down things to a sharper output its ok for me…

(Q9) So looking at your practice we can assume that we can meet and work with you around the world? Mobile workplace and being between Europe and Asia a lot of the time. It must be very challenging. Is it easy to deal with the stress this brings. It's easy to assume that living out of the studio 'suitcase' is also not always easy.

(J) That's true, we have worked like this now for the last 5 years and we also really want to invest more long term in our local environment, working on more sustainable deeper local communities connections. In the last years we have to be to much on the travel to be in local places for work. Some things still go like that, also because we work with others who are not based in Germany but in England or China. So there are also new ways of working on our work floor.

(G) Yes, it's what Judith also said, it the approach we need to maintain and keep sharp on our own work floor. When internal we have good balance then this reflects in the projects. At the moment we are looking more in other ways of working, for example, how we took a Dutch student with us to Shanghai this summer for a month period of intensive real life lab studying on the road, street and with a unknown local culture. It was a great opportunity to discuss new ways of working and learning. Keeping yourself open for a new approach for our work field is important. Design is about creating, it's a moving work field and constantly changing. We need to look for quality and sustaining ways of life.

Moving beyond our borders !