While at NeoCon, we had a chance to talk with Boris Berlin and Aleksej Iskos of Iskos-Berlin Design about their new company and the design process behind the Allround Chair, a first for them as Iskos-Berlin.

1. What is your design background, and how did you come to work with Stylex?

Boris Berlin:  I am an Industrial and Graphic Designer, born in St. Petersburg. After graduating from the Institute of Applied Arts and Design, I worked freelance, designing a wide range of industrial products and graphics. In 1987, I co-founded Komplot Design where, over the years, we were honored to receive numerous design awards and distinctions as well as being represented in several design museums around the world, including the MoMA.

Aleksej Iskos : I was raised in the Ukraine where I studied architecture and, later, education theory. After moving to Denmark in 1991, I graduated from the Institute of Industrial Design at Denmark’s Designskole and worked at Komplot Design in Copenhagen.

Berlin:  We began working with STYLEX in 2005 through a Danish veneer molding technician/expert. We designed the Avo and Luna chairs while working together at Komplot Design, and the Allround chair is our first since we co-founded our own studio, Iskos-Berlin Design, in 2010.

2. From where do you draw your inspiration when working on different projects?

Iskos :  What a question! From everywhere… from the beauty of nature in all its shapes, constructions and materials, to industrial processes including their possibilities and their limitations, in addition to art and literature, and, not least of all meetings with interesting people.

3. What goals did you have in mind when designing the Allround chair, and what was the greatest obstacle you had to overcome during the design process?

Berlin: One of the biggest challenges for a designer is to create quiet objects that don’t intrude with their egocentricity, don’t compete with the surroundings or the architecture, but still carry a strong identity and are easy to recognize and remember.

We wanted to make the Allround chair very friendly and welcoming, not noisy. We tried to make it free from unnecessary detailing – very clean and sculpturally simple. Just two elements – a well shaped shell and the flowing loop of the frame.

5. If you weren’t a designer, what would you be?

Berlin: There are thousands of ways to realize your potential, not only the one “written in the stars”.  I studied art since my childhood. Both of us love architecture. Aleksej even started his formal studies in architecture…but as life happened, we both ended in design.