Bring the Outside In
I was lucky as a child to have a lot of time outside. I had neighborhood friends, and my best friend lived close enough to easily convince my mom or his to come pick me up. Our backyard abutted a lagoon that connected to a large tidal wetland, all accessible via a dinghy shared communally by a group of neighborhood friends, gifted to us by a legendarily cool older brother. The feeling of freedom and independence provided to us was immense, as was our parents' benign negligence and oversight while they dealt with their lives and thought we were safely playing Nintendo in the air conditioning somewhere.
Suffice to say, we were outside as much as possible, barring debilitating Florida heat and storms. Sometimes, we would sneak out at night, and tool around with the small electric motor using only moonlight. At night, the wake of the boat, and our hands trailing in the hot water, would transform, becoming a liquid, silvery, shape- a sine wave forming behind us and marking our path. This feeling of effortless creation has always stuck with me. It looks and feels the same to me as tracing a growth ring on a tree, or the outline of a mushroom, or the way a fish creates a sunken area to raise its young.
It has always struck me as a maker and craftsperson that so many of the objects of use and beauty come from outside our homes. At the same time, so much of the quotidian, emotional, beauty in our lives happens within the walls of our home. It’s where most of us spend and build much of our lives.
With much of my design, and specifically the Ripple collection, I am trying to recreate the beauty of the outside world and it’s natural phenomena and bring it into people’s homes. It occurs to me that as soon as we as a species began to build homes, we probably began filling them with beauty from outside. Unfortunately, flowers and small natural objects rarely appear in very old archeological records- they are too small, ephemeral or too common, and are lost to us. Did neanderthals make flower arrangements? Was a cup’s first use to hold some flowers? Who knows. But I do hope that when you use our Ripple Plates or Vases to brighten your table, they bring the joy of the outside world into your home.
Mark Warren, Co-Founder and Creative Director
