Turning what was until very recently a service area into a domestic space in its own right, a fully integral part of projects for interiors, was one of the major emerging themes from the latest edition of the International Bathroom Exhibition. All 243 exhibiting companies showcased the best of contemporary production in rooms with a strongly architectural feel, equally devoted to wellness while serving as a statement of both taste and a specific lifestyle. The key element is rigorous COMPOSITional order, in which the exception (a shape, a colour, a treatment) never proves the rule, elegance being the synthesis of measured equilibrium.

Homes are exercises in total living, with spaces flowing seamlessly into each other, calling for finely thought-through finishings – from ceramic coverings to marble, wood and wallpaper – with a marked predilection for continuous surfaces boasting an overtly textural effect, sometimes “imperfect” and almost always dense and precious. Furniture and accessories are conceived as furnishing elements in their own right, often elongated or suspended, designed in minute detail and available in all the colours of the rainbow so as to coordinate with the overall layout. There are also openly sculptural pieces, designed to take pride of place in the room, but which seldom detract from the overall harmony of the proportions.

Nowadays, more than ever, bathroom furnishing is an expression of personal taste, with concepts ranging from the minimal to the decorative, but which always have their own particular part to play in an overall project that is both controlled and sartorial. 

Arbi; Photo: Andrea Mariani

ARLEX; Photo: Andrea Mariani