BATH TIME GOOD TIME MILAN DESIGN WEEK 2016

VitrA, a leading brand of the Turkish industrial group Eczacibasi, is the only brand in global markets offering every component of the bathroom as well as an expansive range of ceramic and porcelain wall and floor tiles. In addition to lines intended for residential use, the brand provides an extensive range of professional series designed for industrial and commercial establishments.

Since its launch in the 1950s, VitrA's strategy has continuously evolved in accordance with opportunities for growth. Currently, the brand is focusing its innovation on creating both the best possible solutions for current demands and design projects that anticipate bathrooms' future scenarios .

Design workshops organized for this purpose in Istanbul aim to position VitrA at the center of research about the products, spaces, behaviours and rituals that might define the bathroom of the future.

The results of these workshops will be exhibited during the Salone del Mobile in Milan in April 2016 under the headline BATH TIME GOOD TIME. The exhibition will take place in a former art gallery at foro Buonaparte 60, in the heart of Brera Design District. The space is very appropriate for VitrA's innovative approach: neutral and minimal, leaving the main focus on the results of the conceptual design research.

The event - curated by Erdem Akan, VitrA Art Director - will focus on eight projects created by the VitrA Design Team and international designers Sezgin Aksu, Jozeph Forakis, Diego Grandi, Setsu & Shinobu Ito, Sertan Özbudun, Terri Pecora and Mario Trimarchi.

BATH TIME GOOD TIME, as its title suggests, will investigate a new criterion - time - as a source of inspiration for designing new spaces and products that promote intimacy, beauty, relaxation, meditation, privacy, care, memory and balance. Not only will the exhibition feature innovative concepts about future products, it will also introduce the new design approach behind VitrA's ambition to become a unique think tank in the field of bathroom spaces.

Projects:

TIME

The link between time and bathrooms is evident: when we close the door of the bathroom, we finally obtain time for ourselves, without disturbances from the outside.

Time is also a great concept for communicating values and behaviors related to the bathroom environment. In the bathroom, we generally don't have a clock, and so we're able to enjoy our time between functions and rituals. Our mood changes with the hours of the day: being in the bathroom in the morning, in the evening, or during the weekend are entirely different experiences.

TIME and RELAX
Sezgin Aksu

What would you like to do after having a shower, a bath? What's better than passing some time in a space that gives you peace, total relaxation, the opportunity to be with yourself, to find yourself? I tried to create a landscape that encourages these emotions: small hills to lie down on and observe surroundings, pebbles to feel underfoot when walking, a forest to glimpse different colors of light during the day.
1
TIME and BEAUTY
Design Department - VitrA

Everyday, you see yourself various times in the bathroom mirror - in the morning, during the day, before you sleep. You watch your reflection washing its face, brushing its teeth, shaving...You try to change what you see; you change your mind about what you want to see; you observe the transformation of your face and body during the hours, days and years... In short, you define your time with the images of your body in the bathroom mirror. VitrA designs beautiful bathroom products, spaces, and experiences. Now, it's time to focus on the beauty of the users: how our perception of beauty changes and is shaped over time and how it defines our "time".

TIME and MEDITATION
Jozeph Forakis

Koza is a Turkish hamam, a steam bath re-invented for private, luxury homes. Translated as "cocoon", Koza is a space for meditation, reflection, reconnection and rebirth. Classic elements of material density and penetrating light are transformed into a solid transparent volume using thick slabs of layered glass. The inner chamber provides comfort, detachment and refuge, while maintaining an essential connection to the external environment and natural rhythms. Traditional "Marmara" Turkish marble is used for the base, which also houses the steam control systems. Koza is a new essential tool for fast-paced lives, to be enjoyed in solitude, with partners or close friends.

TIME and BALANCE
Diego Grandi

A graphic abstraction of natural elements becomes the starting point to convey the idea of showering in a forest. Two digitally printed glass walls suggest a walk in suspended time, a subtle atmosphere of a space in balance between static and dynamic, obtained through transparent and reflective materials. The rhythmic sequence of lines and colors produces a tridimensional illusion, a vibrant surface created by superimposing different layers on a modular grid. While walking in the installation, the user follows the printed pattern and can perceive its changeable pace. Movement is used to perceive the depth of the surface, to give a different interpretation to everyday materials.

TIME and MOTION
Setsu & Shinobu Ito

Why are toilets always trapped in obsolete patterns? Why are they often found in a small room, placed against the corner? Is it because of repetitive ideas about the nature of a toilet? And if the toilet becomes the center of the space? Although its essence remains the same, wouldn't it be interesting to see other unexpected attributes, a varying landscape, the toilet as not just a place for fulfilling needs but also for having new experiences, relaxing, adding value to time?
The private component of this design is essential: a 180° rotatable screen creates the emotional experience of traveling to a place of "Good Time", like your personal garden - a place of relaxation and reflection.
The toilet is the center of this place, where users can sit and set the cushion at the back of the lid when it is opened. The "wall" is padded, like a bed headboard, to give the feeling of being wrapped in kindness. A "seat-side table" creates continuity and organic form to provide a sense of freedom: to sit, lean, lie down on, read, place a cup or a tablet. The "Zen floor" produces calmness and consciousness. A "tree" functions as a hanger while providing a sense of nature.

TIME and MOMENT
Sertan Özbudun

I tried to design a bathtub in which you can recover memories of loved ones.
In the space of two years I lost my father, got married and became a father myself. During this period, when many changes in my life happened, I thought a lot about deep affection in the past, present and future.
The experiences you have may not seem very important at the moment they are happening. But after the years pass and you gain more life experiences, you realize that some moments become very important. Even something which seemed very stupid at the moment can become an important moment and memory in your life. You realize this later.
So my idea was designing a place that you can use with others to enjoy good moments in the bathroom. Who knows? They might become nice memories.

TIME and INTIMACY
Terri Pecora

Menagerie is a group of sinks combined together to create a unique, shared space inspired by the communal bathing rituals in Turkish culture, a space to share with your loved ones, full of warmth and domesticity, which enables "intimacy and togetherness" at the same time.
Each element is assigned a specific task to form an overlapping composition, a sort of spatial island you can move around and enjoy spending time in. It is a comfortable and "furnished" gathering point for the beginning of the day, or at the end, to share dreams and happenings, a magic place that accommodates all your needs.
Menagerie includes a low table area and stool "for taking care of yourself", a foot bath for relaxation, a deep free-standing sink for multi-tasking, a spacious shallow-sink to indulge in, and a step for "little Junior" so he can reach his very own place to wash.

TIME and CARE
Mario Trimarchi

This project investigates the activities performed inside the bathroom, in order to change our perception of time we normally spend in this environment.
We imagined a bathroom that enables us to live like we do in the whole house: taking care of ourselves, relaxing, doing yoga, listening to music, even feeding fish or cultivating salad greens. We imagined a space where all the containers, shelves, washbasins, chaises longues, showers, and partitions are designed and connected to each other through a simple and continuous structure of white tubes.
In our memory, the white tubes represent fresh water, with its meanings of hygiene, cleaning, and eternal precious value.

www.bathtimegoodtime.com
www.vitra.com.tr

Press Office and P.R.
Gagliardi & Partners
Tel. +39 049 657311 e-mail: gagliardi@gagliardi-partners.it