Please Please Please + Bergman & Co., Poodle
Tasked with designing a ‘new neighbourhood local’ within a double-fronted terrace on Melbourne’s iconic Gertrude Street, Bergman & Co. sought to create a unique identity for the hospitality venue, differentiated from its established neighbours. A key tenet in achieving this vision was to create bespoke elements to bring Poodle’s imaginative interior identity to life.
As life partner to Bergman & Co. director Wendy Bergman, Paul Grummisch of Please Please Please became a key collaborator, developing and executing an expansive collection of signature ‘Poodle’ pieces.
Drawing on the much-loved character of Fitzroy and the clients‘ Italian heritage, the design team developed a narrative around authenticity, effortlessness, and nostalgia. References to the classic Italian diner were interwoven with hints at the 20th century Aussie-Italian suburban experience.
Trent Jansen Studio + Johnny Nargoodah, Ngumu Janka Warnti Collection
The Walmajarri phrase ‘Ngumu Jangka Warnti’ meaning ‘whole lot from rubbish’, is the title of a furniture collaboration between Nyikina man and saddler, Johnny Nargoodah, and furniture/object designer, Trent Jansen.
The collection began with a trip to the local scrap metal yard, in a vague search for anything interesting. Johnny and Trent salvaged a selection of discarded aluminium mesh and used this found metal as the starting point for experimentation. The duo designed these pieces as they made them, starting with a mesh substrate cut vaguely in the shape of a chair, and together beat the material with hammers, concrete blocks and tree stumps until it took on a form that they both liked. This beaten geometry was then softened by laminating New Zealand saddle leather to skin the mesh, masking its geometry and softening its idiosyncratic undulations.
Johnny and Trent created their designs remotely, developing a collaborative ‘sketch exchange’ system to ferry prototype designs between Johnny’s home in Fitzroy Crossing in Western Australia, and Trent’s on the south-east coast of NSW.
Cart 
