Through space and time... with Space Copenhagen

The design duo from the Danish capital appreciates the stillness of Scandinavian modernism - and yet struggled with it at first. The future, say the space cadets, is uncertain, but it will also be very exciting.

AD: Who or what was your first great design love?

Peter Bundgaard Rützou: Stonehenge! I was about six and living with my parents in England. Stonehenge was like a revelation to me, the pure manifestation of design; yet no one knows what exactly it was built for. At that time, you were still allowed to climb on the stones. I have never experienced anything like it again.

Signe Bindslev Henriksen: My grandmother. She was an architect and had worked for Kay Fisker for ten years. She was very calm, downright quiet, but she knew how to open my eyes to the little things and craftsmanship details.

Signe Bindslev Henriksen and...

... Peter Bundgaard Rützou 1997.

Signe Bindslev Henriksen and Peter Bundgaard Rützou, graduates of the Royal Academy in Copenhagen, founded their architectural firm Space Copenhagen in 2005. Since then, they have accompanied the Danish gastronomic miracle with immaculately reduced interiors (from the bar of the "Hotel d'Angleterre" to the restaurant "Kul"). After the "11 Howard" in New York, the duo is working on designs for hotels in London and Tokyo. In addition, they create furniture for brands such as Fredericia Furniture and Gubi.

The design duo today.

Joachim Wichmann/Wichmann + Bendtsen

Is there a design that you only learned to appreciate later?

Peter Bundgaard Rützou: Don't laugh, I had a problem with Shaker chairs. I probably saw a horror movie as a kid that had these huge chairs in it. I think I was scared by the silence emanating from this furniture. Later, that turned into the opposite, and I realized the closeness to Scandinavian design.

Signe Bindslev Henriksen: When I started studying, all the minimalism seemed inhuman to me. It took me a while to understand the beauty and clarity behind it. Seeing Mies van der Rohe's Villa Tugendhat in Brno was a turning point. Suddenly everything fell into place: the clarity, the proportions, the details.

What was the most unusual place you have lived?

Peter Bundgaard Rützou: When I was little, we lived in a Tudor-style house that was supposedly haunted. But much more disturbing was a house I later lived in with my wife. It had been shot at with cannons in the 17th century, and three bullets were still stuck in the wall. They were not allowed to be removed either - two in our room and one in the wall of the house. Through the high windows you could only see the sky, not the street. We lived in the middle of the city and yet felt like we were in a bubble.

Signe Bindslev Henriksen: My parents were real kids of the 70s - not exactly hippies, but I guess they wanted to be. So they moved us and a few other families into a villa in conservative Frederiksberg to form one of those shared flats. Things were pretty crazy there. Somebody had a yogurt maker, somebody else had a knitting machine so the kids would knit their own stuff ... Basically, though, everybody was a little too grown up for that. In the end, everyone watched to get out of this nightmare and endless discussions.

Your first expensive design piece?

Signe Bindslev Henriksen: "The Chair" by Wegner, a gift from my grandma.

Peter Bundgaard Rützou: Kjærholm's "PK9" chair. I will always love it because of its aesthetics, but it must also be said: sitting on it is incredibly uncomfortable. That's why I sold it again.

"The Chair" by Hans J. Wegner Hans J. Wegner's iconic chair "The Chair" is an heirloom from Signe Bindslev Henriksen's grandmother.

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