Coffe table in travertine noce and cast glass
BR 03 - BR 01
2025
Brutalist-inspired cuboids shape the coffee tables, where material expression unfolds along a fragile line between control and unpredictability. The studio presents two pieces from the collection—crafted from hand-cast glass and natural Travertine Noce—which explores moments of tension, encounter, and transformation embedded within the materials themselves.
Rather than treating limits as fixed, the work approaches them as shifting thresholds. It investigates the precise moment where matter begins to change—where glass holds or collapses, where stone fractures or resists, where surfaces soften, open, or react. These moments are not failures, but transitions: bubbles, pores, cracks, and irregularities become records of time, chance, and making.
The collection embraces a delicate balance between intention and release. Control is asserted through geometric clarity, while unpredictability emerges through the inherent behavior of the materials. This interplay reveals a fine and unstable line—one where authorship is shared between designer and matter.
Each piece becomes a site of encounter: between mass and transparency, precision and accident, control and its loss. What appears as a boundary transforms into a generative condition—where form is not imposed, but discovered.
Studio Alessandra Hofmann is an interdisciplinary design practice based in Basel. Starting from an experimental approach, the studio uses chance as a central design principle and actively lets processes, materials, and unpredictable reactions co-shape every result. Instead of merely dictating forms, Alessandra Hofmann explores the inherent intelligence of materials – their natural behavior, transformations, and subtle effects – thus revealing design as a dialogue between intention and creation. Currently, the studio primarily works with glass and natural stone and collaborates closely with local Swiss producers. These materials are selected not only for their expressive and tactile qualities but also for their ecological safety.