LEDS Clay Dressing Mirror by Bertjan Pot and Maarten Baas for DHPH
  The Exceptional

Bertjan Pot was born in 1975 in Nieuwleusen, the Netherlands. He graduated from the Design Academy Eindhoven in 1998, and began working under the name of The Monkey Boys with fellow designer Daniel White. In 2003, Pot started working under the name Studio Bertjan Pot, which he continues to use, working alongside Vladi Rapaport and Marjolein Fase. Based in Rotterdam, the studio produces interior products marked by a highly experimental approach and a fascination with technique, texture, structure, pattern, and color. In addition to self-initiated pieces, Studio Bertjan Pot collaborates with studios, companies, and institutions such as Moooi, Montis, Nike, Established & Sons, Alturo Alvarez, Richard Lampert, Maarten Baas, Den Herder Production House, Cassina, Wrong for Hay, Lensvelt, and the AUDAX Textielmuseum Tilburg.

Notable pieces include Pot’s Random Light (1999), a resin-drained, glass-fiber yarn randomly coiled around a big balloon; Carbon Chair (2004), a hand-coiled carbon fiber and epoxy chair that exists without a metal frame; and Downstairs (2012), a chandelier composed of an inverted safety ladder decorated with carnival lights.

Pot’s work is included in the permanent collections of major institutions such as the Museum of Modern Art in New York (Carbon Chair); Victoria & Albert Museum in London (Shrunken Bench and Random Light); Museum Boijmans van Veuningen in Rotterdam (Random Chair prototype, Carbon Copy, Excavated Vase, Old Fruit Versatile, and Downstairs); the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam (Random Chair, Carbon Copy, and Carbon Chair); the French National Art Collection (Old Fruit Versatile); and the Textielmuseum Tillburg (Jumper, Font of the Loom, Pocket Light, and Masks). 

Maarten Baas was born in Arnsberg, Germany in 1978, but moved to The Netherlands as a child. He studied at the renowned Design Academy Eindhoven and became widely recognized for Smoke, his 2002 graduation project, in which he used fire to “re-sculpt” a series of Victorian furniture pieces until they became charred. The school project evolved into a highly successful collection titled Where There’s Smoke, which museums, critics, and collectors swiftly deemed to be an important icon of 21^st-century design.

Since Smoke, Baas has regularly launched new collections, always introducing imaginative approaches to forms, materials, and processes and almost always in partnership with Den Herder Production House. Limited-edition collections include Sculpt, Clay, Real Time, and Haphazard Harmony. Baas has also created a number of special commissions for museums and private collectors.

Dutch design atelier and brand Den Herder Production House (DHPH) launched in 2012, but its roots run much deeper. Since 2005, founder and consummate maker Bas den Herder has been the creative partner of designer Maarten Baas, with a relationship that has been defined as, “Maarten designed, and Bas created.” Together they originated and produced some of Baas’s most beloved and iconic designs, including Clay, Sculpt, and more. They also collaborated on product development for brands like Moooi, Established & Sons, Skitsch, and Gispen, to name a few, as well as a number of bespoke commissions and installations, such as the Gramercy Park Hotel lobby in New York, the Groninger Museum restaurant in the Netherlands, and the Designer of the Year Award at Design Miami/ 2010.

In 2012, in an old farm in the Dutch countryside—at a time when Baas’s practice was moving away from furniture and product design—den Herder set up his own production house dedicated to not only the ongoing fabrication of existing Baas designs, but also to providing design development and fabrication services to other innovative designers. Since then, DHPH has debuted new designs from the likes of Bertjan Pot, Fabien Dumas, Nightshop, gt2P, and Max Lipsey. Everything from DHPH is handmade, often made to order, and embodies den Herder’s unique, technical expertise with all manner of materials and processes.

* All images courtesy of DHPH