By: Maria Tibblin, Founder and Holistic Design Director, Maria Tibblin www.mariatibblin.com
The role that conscious, sustainable, and sensible interior design will play in creating beautiful and aesthetically healthy spaces for the future has never been greater.
Aesthetics lie at the heart of every business and is particularly important to those in the luxury sector. It is one of the first points of contact clients have with a brand or business, and it’s often where the first impression is created. As an interior designer for premium brands and businesses, I work closely with investors and clients on commercial, medical, retail and hospitality projects to deliver a new kind of experience, one which celebrates ‘positive luxury’, putting wellbeing, beauty, functionality, and sustainability at the core of the design solution.
Increasingly consumers are demonstrating that they care deeply about wellbeing and sustainability, prioritising products, and brands as well as services that are working in a more holistic and beneficial way.
Businesses needs to carefully consider how this follows through to all touch points of their core, and the environment is a fundamental part of any business that plans to have longevity.
Companies should carefully consider a human-centric design approach as part of their future strategies and re-evaluate roadmaps to see where further opportunities lie for introducing spaces and design concepts that resonate with those seeking a positive experience. Brands will attentively have to think about how to be purposeful by creating winning business models that elevate aesthetics as part of the overall corporate climate.
By creating deliberately designed environments, graceful mindful spaces that celebrate and encourage human connections and solace in equal measure, a sense of true wellbeing can be achieved within a commercial context.
As we see more product-based businesses go online, the need for high quality authentic experiences in retail and commercial buildings will increase.
Businesses, which provide spaces that increase the feeling of relaxation and creativity, will outlast those that don’t. For offices, this could include personalised mindfulness zones or breakout areas that offers both employees and customers a boost of nutritional complements or other wellbeing focused benefits.
For retail businesses, creating safe environments with natural materials, finely crafted products, tactile materials, responsive lighting, and acoustic layering will be key.
Additional features such as designed hands-free sanitisation areas, air filtration and extraction systems for pure air zones, and soothing ambient audio systems will offer both personalised, health promoting and memorable experiences.
This kind of approach ensures that people can find balance, connection, and an enriched state of being. This new kind of positive luxury actively encourages inhabitants to truly ‘blossom’.
Investors are increasingly cause-driven and looking for opportunities in purpose-driven models that respond to the evolved outlook of today’s luxurians. Long-term thinking, which celebrates social and environmental choices, will underpin good business practice.
This has become particularly poignant as we elevate out of the recent pandemic, and for which businesses have had to revaluate knowing that they will never return to the status quo.
By drawing on my knowledge and long experience in public health and medicine, our studio can create designs with a mindset to help minimise the risk of infections. Always with the delight of guests or clients in mind and with a design signature that eschews positive design deluxe.
With our design approach and concept as such, at the height of the UK pandemic, we fully redesigned a commercial project for a client, which led to our design concept being rolled out on an international basis, as the investor saw first-hand the extra value and safeguarding it added to the overall business proposition.
In design terms, sourcing commercial design products which are sustainable and ethically sourced but which also meet health and safety guidelines can often be challenging. A wider shift to localisation will also affect supply chains and product availability, which is why the Maria Tibblin studio tries to work with local suppliers and craftsmen where possible.
I believe that by combining ancient thematic design principles with new innovative and contemporary design solutions this can imbue design schemes with deep meaning creating a unique experience and impact for the users.
I really believe that ‘design matters’, and that the new kind of deliberate luxurious interior design has the potential to stimulate the senses and increase human wellbeing.
This new kind of luxury is one where effortlessly elegant, toxin-free, and nourishing calming environments are highly sought after. From corporate environments to hospitality, lifestyle and the wellness sectors, the link between healthier spaces and our own wellbeing is undeniable.
Aesthetics is the perceptual resource that allows the creation of artistry. I believe that by honouring the value of traditions and craftsmanship and by allowing the inherent beauty of natural materials to shine through, it adds to the brand’s story and client interest.
By working sustainably with a trusted network of artisans, as designers we have the ability to preserve vital and often traditional skills alive and keep them relevant. This ensures these skill sets are celebrated, cherished and protected for future generations. This kind of approach is paramount in any project the Maria Tibblin studio undertakes.
This approach also follows when we are sourcing or curating interesting antiques, products with vital provenance and heritage and fits our ‘buy less buy better’ mantra. By handpicking from international galleries and unique antiquities dealers we ensure that only the most beautiful culturally relevant objects are included in our projects. These always help to pique the interest of the viewers and add important credentials to the overall brand design ‘story’.