The numbers game: BoConcept

BoConcept needs little introduction to an audience fluent in interior design. From its artisanal Jutland roots in 1952, the Danish furniture maker has scaled-up its production over the years, grown its collections and disseminated pared-back modernist Scandinavian design around the world, bringing hygge to houses from Manhattan to Melbourne.

With uncompromised quality and design values that are timeless, it’s the brand young homeowners might aspire to and evolve into as incomes grow. A lesser-known fact, however, is that BoConcept’s fine-tuned global network is also set up to do contract furnishing. Since 2014, teams across 65 countries have been introducing the brand’s homely Danish style on a grander scale to residential complexes, offices and hospitality venues.

The advantageous scale of BoConcept’s business, converging with a new world order that, even pre-pandemic, sees the blurring of the boundaries between where we work, eat and play, makes conditions ripe for BoConcept contract to flourish. On the one hand, the brand has all in place to offer economies of scale, efficient supply chains and local expertise from concept to completion; and on the other, the merging functions of interiors mean that the inherent homely qualities of BoConcept product are in demand across the board.

Contract for BoConcept doesn’t have to mean shifting its design focus to more commercial functionality; it can work largely with what it has got. Residential projects, hotel lobbies, dining rooms and bars, waiting areas are natural candidates, but, increasingly, also offices and studios, where relaxed breakout zones that put workers at ease are now recognised as spaces that foster more and better creative thinking.

For now, though, the place where BoConcept contract is shining brightly is in the residential sector. ‘When working on residential developments such as furnished apartments, student accommodations, co-living scenarios, holiday home schemes and all kinds of real estate collaborations, we can always offer a one-stop solution. If the customer likes the concept in general and all the remaining parameters match as well, then there is a good chance that we will deliver everything – from bed to fruit basket. So, what we do is the result, and not only part of it,’ says Christian Hiller, who joined the company as Contract Director in 2017. ‘The power and possibilities for individualisation, for creating very specific interior design, are still exceptionally strong.’

This one-stop solution came into play when Get Living awarded BoConcept’s London team the contract to furnish 482 apartments in London’s Victory Plaza project, its build-to-rent property occupying the former Olympic athletes’ village in East London. Initialised three years ago and completed in spring 2019, the entire project from design to installation was handed to BoConcept. The job began with the compilation of a trend report, then the production of mood boards for three distinct interior designs, followed by 3D visualisations.

The inventory amounted to 10,000 pieces of furniture, some with customised elements, all to be manufactured, delivered and installed. Having control of all stages, however, not only translated into a financial advantage for the client, but meant efficiency at every turn. ‘We are vertically integrated which means economies of scale and complete service with no subcontractors,’ says Michel Baumgart who oversaw the project. The installation was organised with military precision over 13 weeks, with 37 apartments completed daily.

The three apartment styles, Nordic Light (a monochrome blank canvas), Botanical Vibe (a biophyllic design) and Understated Luxury (with rich, warm tones and textures) were split evenly across the building and commended by the developer for their polish and versatility ‘BoConcept’s design combines personality and functionality, offering distinct looks while maintaining versatility for people to make it their own,’ says Sylvana Young, Get Living’s then Chief Design Officer. For the demographic who rent here, BoConcept furniture would usually be another life-stage away from attainment, so the end-user enjoys the advantages too. Generation Z may struggle to achieve ownership when it comes to property and its contents, but the desire for quality and style is equal, if not surpassing, that of previous generations.

This sort of local acumen is replicated in BoConcept’s residential projects around the world, whether it’s an elegantly sustainable holiday rental complex in Germany’s Timmendorfer Strand, orchestrated by the Kiel team, or state-of-the-art new housing for a growing workforce in industrial Karawang, West Java, where the interior design was led by Jakarta’s team in conjunction with local designer Alex Bayu. There’s a place, it seems, for high-functioning hygge under rooves everywhere, whatever the weather.

@ Architonic