2000 With its designer piano Pure, Sauter ventures into one of the last design-free zones. – Extratapete makes even wallpaper mobile, urging people to take a “different view of things”.

 

2001 In the light cube EO by Wulf Schneider, another variation on the theme of the wall unit system, high-tech sets a soothing mood. – Schöner Wohnen gets company. When a wave of new home furnishing magazines floods the market, the Hamburg doyenne is still the oldest, but no longer the only one. “Cocooning” is the buzzword of the day, a withdrawal back into the comforts of one’s own four walls.

 

2002 A steady progression of new, transformable “miracle sofas” come out of Germany. To name just two examples: Lobby by Siegfried Bensinger and Scroll by Studio Vertijet. – Silver by Hadi Teherani contradicts the general prejudice that swivel chairs can’t be sexy.

 

2004 The Milanolight chair by Wolfgang C. R. Mezger is a masterwork of laminated wood, another material that has long been known but whose history is by no means at an end. With seasoned command of his metier and new digital tools, the designer pushes the limits to new extremes.

 

2005 Reiner Moll reacts to demographic change with Aquamove, the first hydraulic shower tap. – Kitchen maker Alno is the first furniture manufacturer to set up production in the Arab state of Dubai. Three quarters of a century after the invention of the Frankfurt Kitchen, innovative German kitchens are an international export hit. Key players are companies including Bulthaup, Eggersmann and Poggenpohl, as well as Gaggenau and Miele.

 

2007 The claim that nothing really new is presented anymore at the Cologne Furniture Fair is put to rest by  Nuf, the laterally sliding drawer system from Performa. – The Deutscher Werkbund celebrates the hundredth anniversary of its founding, when Germany succeeded in taking the lead, in particular in the key design discipline of home furnishing and decoration, producing a number of designers of international renown. The fact that this is also the case today is evident when we take a look at the wealth of design talent available. Seasoned industry figures such as Jan Armgardt, Siegfried Bensinger, Konstantin Grcic, Gerd Lange, Peter Maly, Ingo Maurer, Wolfgang C. R. Mezger, Reiner Moll, Ulf Moritz, Anita Schmidt, Dieter Sieger and Burkhard Vogtherr can always be relied on to create cutting-edge products. At the same time, the eminence grise of the second wave of Modernism, including designers like Luigi Colani, Jürgen Lange, Peter Raacke, Dieter Rams, Hans “Nick” Roericht, Richard Sapper, Arno Votteler and Otto Zapf, have no intention of disappearing into quiet retirement anytime soon. Finally, the eruptive 1980s gave rise to personalities with their own unmistakable signature. Among them are Uwe Fischer, Stefan Heiliger, Axel Kufus and Christian Werner. The technological paradigm change of the 1990s, during which the credo “Anything goes” was suddenly made possible by digital tools, engendered a disciplined, but by all means experiment- happy generation. Some talents have yet to impinge on the broad public consciousness, such as Thomas Althaus, Martin Ballendat, Norbert Beck, Justus Kolberg or the studios Lepper Schmidt Sommerlade and Neunzig° Design. Others have already made a name for themselves, including Werner Aisslinger, Stefan Diez, Tobias Grau, Gioia Meller Markowicz, Torsten Neeland and Studio Vertijet. The reinvention of our interior environment that was already initiated by the “room artists” of the century before last, and which made enormous progress in the first and second waves of Modernism, is still in full swing today. Comprehensive information on German design for living can be found at: www.formguide.de.