WL Designers of the Year 2024: Ones to Watch

One to Watch: Furniture

Studio Heidle

Heidi Rey’s love for tactile creativity started early—in fact, it reaches right back to an unusual childhood pastime of carving shapes from soap or turning carrots into dining utensils while she sat in front of the TV. “I would get some tools and carve them because they were what we had around,” says the Studio Heidle founder. “To this day, my curiosity loves setting the parameters of projects by defining a few materials and figuring out what I can come up with.”

Take Bouba, her table and modular chair set. The curved seating and forced proximity of sharing a bench encourage social connection and togetherness. Dining as a family was a foundation in Rey’s life growing up, so the circular set was deeply meaningful in helping her process her sister’s passing. “We don’t regret the moments we were present for,” Rey says.

Her projects are collaborative with the clients (“the project is the leading factor, not the deadline,” she explains). They are also iterative, changing to suit each client’s needs—a process she dubs “the Heidle Method.” Take the Amoeba coffee table, where every new version is adapted to the client’s space—like an art installation. “What’s the point of doing things custom if it’s not actually for you?” Rey says. —Sandrine Jacquot

One to Watch: Maker

Pablo Mariano

Pablo Mariano’s designs radiate simplicity and express a deep understanding of what it means to be resourceful. “After closing my shop in Buenos Aires, moving abroad, and no longer having any power tools, I had to get particularly resourceful and start making things with less to keep my practice alive,” says the now-Vancouver-based furniture designer. He adapted out of necessity and became proficient in the art of traditional woodworking; that less-is-more ideal is reflected in pieces like his Tronco stool, the first wooden piece he created by hand: for this project, he used chisels, handsaws, scrapers and other manual instruments to shape the solid movingui and African mahogany.

Judge Sumer Singh of Mercedes and Singh praised Mariano for demonstrating a “deep connection with materials, their effects, and how to harness their properties in designed elements and spaces.” Even without drills and buzzsaws, that connection is a powerful one. “It is almost like a meditative practice, working with my hands as tools,” says Mariano.—Lea Krusemeyer

One to Watch: Fashion

Orri Design

For designer Stephanie Geracitano, the creation process is rooted in her background in both sculpture and industrial design—that pairing of the organic with the architectural that gives jewellery by Orri Design its unique quality. Traditional metalsmithing coupled with 3D printing technology allows the designer to innovate forms that would otherwise be difficult to achieve by hand. Take her own favourite piece, the Helix cuff: a sterling silver bracelet, inspired by the helix shape of DNA, that angles fine lines against each other and naturally curves up and down, making you instinctively want to turn it. “It’s interesting from all angles,” says Geracitano.

Judge Gabrielle Bayona of Truvelle commended Geracitano’s approach. “Using both modern and classic techniques gives the final result a clean finish and symmetry that isn’t always possible without the use of software and 3D printing,” she commented. “Yet, there’s something in the curvature of each piece that feels natural and elemental in origin.”—Tia Sacks

READ MORE: Meet the Winners of Western Living’s 2024 Designers of the Year Awards