Industrial Designers of the Year 2024: New Format Studio

Henry Norris’s journey began with simple curiosity: “I was always interested in how things worked and how I could make them better,” says our 2024 Western Living Industrial Designer of the Year. It’s this drive that fuels New Format Studio, the Vancouver-based design firm he founded in 2016.

The studio’s story is one of constant evolution and exploration. “I am continually deepening my knowledge of the materials we work with through experimentation,” Norris says. With a foundation in industrial craft and a background in metalwork, Norris is otherwise a self-taught designer. He created New Format’s offshoot, Henry Norris Workshop, in 2020 out of his “desire to explore more conceptual work in which process can dictate form.”

New Format Studio lives up to its name through relentless experimentation and discovery. Case in point: the Borrowed Forms credenza, one of our inaugural WL Design 25 award winners. Inspired by stones collected over dozens of foraging trips across the Pacific Northwest, the design process involved hot jeweller’s wax poured over those stones to create a tapestry of textures cast in solid bronze. “I wanted to show the memory of the stones, expressed in a cabinet that distills what the landscape is like here,” says Norris. Judge Marjan van Aubel, founder of the solar design practice Marjan van Aubel Studio, praised the work as “a beautiful mix of design and craftsmanship that poetically brings natural stone formations into one’s home.”

Natural Beauty
Crafted from cast bronze, steel and cherry wood, the Borrowed Forms credenza is the result of dozens of trips to forage for suitable stone formations in the Pacific Northwest. Norris used jeweller’s wax to cast the stones in bronze.

The Froe table was also developed after a series of experiments. “This one took a couple of years because I discovered the process of glass enamelling and then worked on it to find the limitations,” says Norris. The first piece in a series that integrates glass enamel on solid copper, the table features hues from soft pinks to deep purples. “The glass is painted onto the surface and fused to the metal by firing the copper red hot. As the enamel melts, one intuitively directs the torch to change the final coloration,” explains Norris. This transforms copper into a warm, tactile surface.

Turning Tables
The Froe table captivates with its unique texture and mesmerizing pink and purple hues, a result of innovative glass enameling applied to solid copper. The design embodies Henry Norris’s artistic vision of transmuting materials into visually arresting, functional art.

The Mini Plano credenza pair originated from the discovery that flat glass could be curved, leading to furniture that softens this hard material. By heating glass to bend under its own weight, the studio creates beautifully refractive panels. The piece features hand-cast reeded glass, textured bronze and blue Tlupana marble from Vancouver Island. Despite the range of materials, it feels cohesive thanks to innovations like aged, stippled bronze on the frame, designed to complement the handmade curved glass and rough marble top. The nine-sided tapered bronze handles are hand-carved sculptures, necessary, says Norris, “because the design made it near impossible to machine them.” He developed a special technique using an angle grinder to achieve machine-perfect precision with human hands. Over time, the patina finish will literally and symbolically blend the maker’s touch with the user’s, creating a harmonious design. Judge Toby Barratt of Propellor commended the work: “New Format’s sensitivity to both the technical and poetic potentials of materials creates pieces with a unified and timeless quality.”

And the Cirrus console, created in 2023 from Norris’s explorations in bronze casting done out of the more experimental Henry Norris Workshop, reimagines his 2021 Cirrus coffee table but with a focus on scale and a more delicate form: one that’s hand-sculpted. The bronze legs create a seamless base for the black Carmanah marble top, with visible vestiges of the sand-casting process.

New Format Studio exemplifies what can be achieved when passion, creativity and meticulous craftsmanship come together. “I have a deep personal interest in going all the way,” says Norris, “to fully understand a material that takes many lifetimes to know.”

Q&A with Henry Norris

What was your first design project?

Built-in wooden shelving for a friend’s retail store. I winged it in two evenings with a Skil saw, maybe a hand drawing and a rudimentary understanding of how a level functions.

Who do you admire most as a designer?

Piet Hein Eek is on another level for his work and his big vision.

What books are on your nightstand?

The Creative Act by Rick Rubin.

What music are you listening to right now?

Country music from the ’70s and ’80s: Lucinda Williams, Townes Van Zandt, Blaze Foley, Emmylou Harris.

Any podcasts you follow?

Right now I’m listening to Acquired, and I’ve listened to many, many episodes of How I Built This.