The duo behind Periphere and Domison is back to launch a new brand encapsulating their vision of the future of furniture design. Sister and brother team, My and Thien return to the Montréal design scene with a new offering: élément de base (EDB).
As Thien puts it, “there’s a lot of decent furniture, but nothing with that edgy and cool factor. Nothing designed locally and definitely nothing that both has that ‘je-ne-sais-quoi’ and is affordable. We felt we had to come back to fill that void.”
With élément de base, My and Thien set out “to create a sustainable online company that inspires creative interiors through stylish, renewable, locally designed furniture at prices to suit any budget.” They do this by disrupting the traditional distribution channels, selling directly online to consumers and designing their own products in-house in collaboration with designers in Montréal.
“In developing our new collection,” says co-founder My, “from the moment we started sketching again, we decided to design our products to be renewable, in other words, furniture that evolves and transforms over time making it longer lasting, durable and thus sustainable. The longer our furniture lasts, the less waste for our planet.”
Armed with this philosophy, EDB sofas are produced with slipcovers; tables are made with interchangeable tops; small items have no specific functions and can be used in a plethora of different settings. “Our spirit of design is to enable you to give our furniture a second life, a third life, as many lives as you wish. In a world surrounded by fast food, faster technology, disposable clothes and disposable furniture, we propose a slower pace. We are proposing renewable furniture,” says Thien.
