A talent for design

RE-OPENING LAST week with a fresh modern look, the newly refurbished Siam Discovery is promoting itself as the biggest arena of lifestyle experiments for urban shoppers. Packed with many laboratory-inspired interactive exhibitions on fashion trends, one of the highlights in this retail space is the multi-brand Object of Desire Store, home to 130 new-wave Thai brands offering unique home decor items, furniture, handcrafted ceramics and jewellery.

Located on the third floor, ODS occupies 600 square metres and serves as a new platform and playground for the Department of Export Promotion’s young designer members to showcase their ideas for smart living. 

“We’ve teamed up with the DEP to build a new community for young Thai designers who have plenty of talent but nowhere to display their innovative products,” says Parisa Chatnilbandhu of retail business development. 

“We want to help them reach the international retail market. Here customers can really see Thai designers’ potential. Some have won both Thailand’s DEmark and Japan’s Good Design awards, so customers can be sure that the products are of top quality.”

The products are divided into seven categories – garden decoration, ceramic-ware, lifestyle, skincare products, stationery, furniture and handicrafts.

Among the award-wining series are Cordesign Studio’s portable wireless speaker Klank made from aluminium and ABS plastic and adorned with Thai silk, and the Thumm iPhone dock by Pana Objects that looks a little like a small cave and uses a beechwood slab to enhance acoustic sound without any electricity. 

Lukyang stimulates environmental awareness with a Let’s Grow Plants calendar that contains seeds of local vegetables and herbs for planting at the end of each month. Pinsel on the Shelf introduces carrier bag-like leather Coffee & Tea clutches fashioned from recycled paper, a mixture of used tealeaves and coffee pulp and coated with plastic, while Srinlim uses aluminium coated in vivid shades as a new material to revise its Inner Light ceramic trays. 

The eco-garden corner is home to Wunderkammer Studio’s vintage-inspired flowerpots and lamps made from several materials which resemble a man with a moustache and A Land Before Time’s colourful dinosaur-like, rubber-resin flowerpots in different designs and sizes. 

Tua Pen Not from Chiang Mai underlines the environmentally friendly theme with benches, stools, lamps, backpacks, handbags, notebooks and soap holders made from recycled pushcarts, plastic bags, plastic crates, coconut shells and wood scraps. 

Osisu and Scrap Shop offers document folders, iPad cases, coin bags and totes made from recycled plastic bags and the drainage bags used in kidney dialysis. Boy Bathroom has organic shampoo, body lotion, soap, hair oil and treatment made with extracts of flowers and herbs for sensitive skin. 

The T-Style Isaan Object zone, which brings together young designers and artisans from Thailand’s Northeast, showcases handcrafted furnishings and accessories that include stools, fruit trays and carpets made from water hyacinth and krajood in metallic silver and red. There’s also buffalo horn bracelets coated with rose-gold, silver and gold, brooches and bracelets made from silver beads and two-tone handbags fashioned out of hand-woven textiles and matting. 

  

ECO EASY

Object of Desire Store is located on the third floor of Siam Discovery. It’s open daily from 10 to 10.