Holistic and Authenticity:

​

Interview with Creative Director
Esther Weise from add it+

“Why do you speak of happiness instead of beauty? Wouldn’t beauty be a more fitting term?”

Thank you for asking me that! We focus on the emotions that the residents should/may feel in their homes because we want to ensure that more than just a beautiful space is created. Our goal is to enable our clients to perceive their own homes as the most peaceful and relaxing place in the world, to experience deep happiness when entering.

We are familiar with these deep, reliably recurring emotions. They are often awakened in us when we behold untouched landscapes.

Therefore, the organic and natural completeness that underlies the composition of all natural landscapes is our guiding principle. We apply all the design principles we see here when developing individual spatial solutions.

“How do you answer this very individual challenge in each case?”

First, we gather all the information about individual design and functional needs in a very intensive process of conversation, and then we connect this information with the location. The architecture of the building and its surroundings play a significant role. Since we are talking about very abstract things, verbalization is not enough (laughs...), as it can easily lead to misunderstandings.

Therefore, we describe the design vision of the task in a mood board, where a few images precisely depict the feeling of the space to be designed, the specific style, and materiality. Only when the client feels engaged here do we begin the actual design process.

“You mention materials - how important is this aspect?”

For us, materials are the pivot point. There are few decisions in the design process more important than the selection of materials used in the space. Materials provide us with tactile stimuli and moods—it all needs to be in balance, then it is almost irrelevant what furniture is placed within (laughs again)... well, not entirely irrelevant.

“What is the biggest challenge for your clients?”

Abstraction and spatial visualization! In the past, persuasion and trust alone were the means of advising clients, but today we are additionally aided by excellent visualizations to present abstract questions such as spatial proportions, lighting, or the design of intricate visual axes in a way that allows the client to experience a simple decision-making process. In this context, digitization has gained a very high importance for our work.

We create highly elaborate, realistic 2D visualizations or 3D renderings upon customer request.

The level of detail is so high that interactions of subtle questions can be easily assessed, and once the complete design is available, the decision-making process becomes child’s play. Very important in this context... The costs of implementation can be conservatively estimated with the existing design.

Another indispensable aspect is that the expectation and the result are aligned.

“Can you summarize your design approach in one term?”

One? (laughs...) that’s not enough... try two terms... Holism and Authenticity.