Hansgrohe’s new shower control design is ingeniously simple
London-based design duo Edward Barber and Jay Osgerby have racked up an impressive assortment of designs and accolades since establishing their studio 20 years ago. The multidisciplinary team has created collections from furniture and lighting to glassware and tableware for the world’s top brands and its work is held in collections from London’s Victoria and Albert Museum to New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art. And now they’ve turned their attention to the bathroom, pioneering their revolutionary concept for a shower control element commissioned by Hansgrohe for its Axor line – the Axor One.
Osgerby points to the problem facing every hotel visitor trying to negotiate the perils of an unfamiliar shower: frequently, a bracing burst of cold or a painful attack of scalding water. His and Barber’s approach was to work as though they has never seen a shower before. “We firmly believe that we shouldn’t just restyle stuff – we believe an object should bring something new,” he says. “It is the first thing we ever designed that involved water. The advantage was naivety – but we had to ask a lot of questions.”
After extensive consultation with Philippe Grohe, vice-president of design management of Hansgrohe and his team of water experts, the result is an enchantingly simple and elegant all-in-one water control.
“It is really obvious what to do when you confront it,” says Osgerby.
It is the unification of the water outlet activation, volume and temperature controls that make the panel unique and Osgerby sums up its attraction in a single word: tactility. An additional benefit is that the all-in-one system makes it easier and cheaper to install than regular shower systems.
Could Axor One become the standard for shower controls – and the end of our naked fear of hotel bathrooms? Computer says yes.
Hansgrohe
