A Touch of Romance

A Touch of Romance is a furniture collection that relates to a personal family history of traditional craftsmanship, transposing its contrasts and similarities. Barbara Pruszyńska's great-grandfather made everyday objects and tools from metal and wood. Her great-grandmother worked with decorative textiles and ornamental embroidery. As a furniture designer, Pruszyńska explored a possible connection between these two practices and imagined how their contrasts could inform a collection of furniture, as a metaphorical 'romance' between two strands of traditional craft. A Touch of Romance takes materials out of their usual contexts and applies embroidery patterns as technical drawings. As inspiration for the form and function of furniture pieces, the softness of embroidery becomes a conceptual reference to address the roughness of metal and wood.