ART DE LA TABLE @ PARIS DESIGN WEEK
Welcome to our ONLINE STORE and blog.
As a barware, lighting and home accessories design company, at Thomas Fuchs Creative we specialize in handmade goods.
Every week, we take you behind the scenes to explore the people, places, and things that inspire us. As a tabletop and barware company, we are continually captivated by what Americans call "Tablescapes," but the French, more fittingly, refer to as Art de La Table. It truly is an art form—how you set a dining table and what you choose to adorn it with. Drinking glasses, dinner plates, and cutlery are key elements in this process, and when each of these items is a work of art in itself, the table becomes a canvas.
There is no such thing as coincidence, and with the magic of Paris buzzing during Paris Design Week, we wandered the streets, allowing our curiosity to lead us to the people and shops that inspire us in between our meetings.
Each discovery fills me with excitement to share this inspiration with all of you reading my blog. Whenever we're in Paris, we always make a stop at the Le Bon Marché food hall to gather supplies, as Thomas and I love to host a dinner party at our dear friend’s home, affectionately named "Chez Godon."
Within a two block radius we came upon the most wonderful bijoux of a gallery appropriately named "Good Day Gallery". We popped in introduced ourselves and asked her 5 key questions to get an idea of her genius and background.
Is there a common theme in the items you pick for your Gallery?
It was a great joy to be thus complimented by a customer: “what is in your Gallery is to be seen nowhere else.” Indeed,I would say that the objects are unique as they are vintage and share common features: colors, personality, memories and the dynamics of LIFE. I am particularly attracted by paintings and lamps. Furniture serve to enhance them. When you enter my gallery, you enter my home.
Tell me a little about your fashion background and transition to Gallerist.
My immersion within the world of Fashion, where my collaboration with the Christian Dior Couture House, Sonia Rykiel and Alberta Ferretti revealed my passion for luxury, and my capacity to pick up trends and understand customer’s needs. I have developed those skills to create personalized Couture services for a privileged VVIP clientele, offering bespoke sales services and style consulting. I have been deeply involved in the selection of new collections, always bringing the most cutting edge styles whilst never compromising with elegance. The transition arrived at the age of 40.
I discovered that I had a talent for designing and became more curious than ever about Art, furniture, exhibitions, books. And my transition was completed with meeting an Antiques Dealer. He suggested I attend a professional fair along with him. I went and it was enlightment. I wanted to open my own company, my own Gallery. This new path was a perfect resume of my all life. It turns up as a Passion. It is hard work though.
How did you find your Gallery space and what made you pick this area?
The Gallery is next door to my apartment. Rent is for a short period of time which made it easier f or a start. I have been living in Paris VII for some 15 years now so it was just natural for me to open up my Gallery in my own “village”.
How do clients hear about you or is it mainly walk in traffic?
Mostly by walking past it. French and Americans mainly. There were also press articles which brought up customers from other parts of Paris. My customers are very faithful. They know that there are always finding new things in the Gallery. I should be more involved in social medias…It will come.
Tell me about some of the areas you go hunting in for treasures you bring back to your Gallery. Is it mostly auctions and estate sales?
I never go/buy to auction sales. I am hunting mostly in France and Spain. We have great professional fairs in Chartres, Le Mans, Béziers, Montpellier…where I met international buyers! I have sometimes customers who are asking if I am interested in looking at their estate, but it is not really my thing.They are sending me pictures. I need establishing a direct contact with the piece. On the fairs you have to be quick. All I am buying is a “coup de cœur.”
Since its humble origins three decades ago on the sixth floor walk-up on Rue de Rivoli, Marie Daâge's hand-painted ceramics have blossomed into a sought-after luxury by every designer, event planner, and hostess in the know. Daâge's delicate designs are hand-painted painstakingly onto each Limoges plate, using colorful pigment glazes as an expressive form of watercolor that requires multiple layers of firing and polishing. Now Marie's Flagship is located on one of our most favourite secret doublewide streets in Paris and is a site to behold.
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Inspirations for the Designs: The designs at Marie Daâge are deeply influenced by personalization and heritage, with each collection being an artistic creation. Inspiration often comes from a blend of traditional French aesthetics and modern interpretations. The process feels organic, and it’s fascinating to see how spontaneously certain patterns and colors suddenly appear so obvious. Each season presents an opportunity to innovate while staying true to the timeless elegance of hand-painted porcelain.
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Common Threads in Collections: While every collection has its unique identity, there is often a subtle common thread across them—whether it’s the use of specific motifs, color palettes, or the balance between modern and traditional elements. It’s a mysterious result of personal feelings, which may be influenced by a book, a film, travels, exhibitions, etc. I’m constantly driven by creation, and every beautiful pattern I see in nature, architecture, or textiles sparks an obsession to translate it onto the round surface of a plate! The 68 colors and 230 décor options we work with create endless possibilities, making each piece feel both cohesive and individual.
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Balancing Creativity with Logistics: Balancing creativity and logistics is delicate but essential for a business like ours. The artistic process is the heart of what we do, but logistics—production, supply chain, delivery—are just as crucial. The key is having a well-structured team where everyone plays a significant role, allowing the creative process to flow without being hindered by daily operations. We’re fortunate to have such an excellent team. I am highly involved in our clients' projects since each order is a new creation, determined by how we mix colors and patterns. That’s probably why I love to oversee them all. I guess that’s what makes us the haute couture of tableware.
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Love for the New Location: Our new location brings fresh energy and excitement to what we do. It’s in a vibrant part of the city—what I consider the most beautiful street in Paris—and we love that we can offer our clients a more intimate experience with the brand. The space allows us to showcase our collections in a way that feels personal, inviting, and reflective of the craftsmanship behind every piece. Whether selecting a single cup or a full set, the experience must be lovely. I believe it's essential to teach our clients to appreciate the beauty of handcrafted items, the virtuosity of freehand painting, and even the beauty found in imperfections, which are tied to the human touch. Today, it is so rare to find 100% hand-painted porcelain.
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Online Presence vs. Retail Vendors: We don’t sell online. Our online presence is primarily through Instagram, and we’ll have a website launching soon. The website will serve as a working tool, like a library of photos, where clients can choose assortments of colors and patterns, especially for our private and professional clients. We work closely with designers who love creating bespoke sets for their clients, matching their mood boards. While there’s something irreplaceable about touching and feeling the porcelain, we do a lot of video calls to collaborate directly with clients on their sets. Younger generations are increasingly comfortable with online purchases and social media like Instagram, but they also value storytelling and authenticity, which we strive to convey both online and in-store.
Philippe Sinceux of Bellechasse 29
The third and most impressive gallery we visited was one we stumbled upon while wandering the streets of Paris. Bellechasse 29 is one of the city's most discreet galleries—the kind of place where, as they say, "if you know, you know." As soon as we stepped inside, I was captivated by a serving set designed by Miguel Berrocal.
I had long admired his sculptures and always dreamed of owning one. But now, being in the tabletop business, I couldn’t stop thinking about his flatware. Back at our apartment, the set remained on my mind. Both Thomas and I, sharing the same birthday and wedding anniversary, often agree on our art purchases, and this time was no different. We both instantly fell in love with the flatware and knew it had to be ours.
Michou & Thomas' new Miguel Berrocal Flatware
Alain Demachy and Philippe Sinceux, a renowned designer and gallerist, have joined forces to create Bellechasse 29. The Bellechasse 29 gallery showcases furniture and decorative objects primarily from the 19th and 20th centuries. With a focus on refined eclecticism, the gallery curates a collection of pieces selected not only for their aesthetic appeal but also for their authenticity. The uniqueness of their selection stems from a shared passion for a distinctive style of decoration, influenced by a rich variety of inspirations and perspectives.
Spanish artist Miguel Berrocal is best known for his interactive sculptural works, which range in scale from the miniscule to the monumental, and depict abstract or figurative forms that can be assembled like puzzles. Fascinated from an early age by analytic geometry, science, and drawing, Berrocal quickly turned to sculpture after his schooling.
Berrocal’s practice was driven by a strong personal philosophy highlighted by the desire to connect with the viewer through sculptural objects, leading to an analytical, complicated process of study and the construction of touchable works. Berrocal believed that in order to truly experience form, it must be “observed with the hands,” thus emphasizing the viewer’s role in the mental and physical construction of an artwork.
Bellechasse '29 - 29 Rue de Bellechasse +33603127821
Next stop was mozing after a boozy lunch at La Societe in Saint Germain de Pres passsing by Signé Gallery, which always have the most avant garde young designers, run by the very handsome Maxime Bouzidi. Signé Created by Maxime Bouzidi in 2021 and located in the heart of Saint-Germain des Près, Signé is acontemporary design gallery whose mission is to support a new generation of architects, designers,artists, and to produce their creations. Signé aims to promote a perspective over the decorative arts and design fields, their surrounding territories, and the inseparable link they maintain with artisanal and manufacturing expertise.
It is there I came across the new work of design duo Marie & Alexandre. I had mentioned to Maxime I had seen the Chanel Spring Summer show online which took place at "Apartment 50" the iconic Le Corbusier Building in Marseille he mentioned that the "art de la table" items were part of an installation from Marie and Alexandre that took place in Apartment 50 in the building.
When Apartment N°50 was restored by two enthusiasts, Jean-Marc Drut and Patrick Blauwart, they feltthat it would be selfish not to share the results with the world. As a way of inviting the public in, they cameup with the radical idea of inviting a new designer each year to refit the listed space and then showcase the results to the public as a summer exhibition.
Listed as a historical monument, the impeccably preserved N°50 opened to the public biennially from2008 to 2018 when it hosted summer exhibitions from some of the design world’s biggest names.These have seen Jasper Morrison, the Bouroullec Brothers, Konstantin Grcic, Pierre Charpin, AlessandroMendini and Normal Studio pitch up within the original 1952 space to stage an unconventional installationof their works.For the 2024 relaunch of the exhibition cycle after a six years hiatus, designer duo Marie & Alexandre have been invited to take over the space, creating a scenography for the Apartment N°50, featuring new site specific works, alongside existing pieces.
Marie Cornil and Alexandre Willaume met in 2018 during their participation at Design parade 13 at theVilla Noailles in Hyères. Their backgrounds are indicative of complementarities, Marie studied visual arts at HEAD in Geneva before joining Ecal in Lausanne, while Alexandre completed his training in industrial design at ENSCI - Les Ateliers, also benefiting from a university exchange in San Francisco at theCalifornia College of Art.In 2018, Alexandre had already been working at the Bouroullec studio for nine years, when Marie joined the studio for two years.
Each developing their personal practices, that of painting and sculpture for Alexandre with WANC andtextile and color work for Marie, they present together during the summer 2021, the Mobile series at theVilla Noailles which marks the beginning of their work around the red clay of Salerne. The particularityand the strength of the duo are based on the dialogue that Marie and Alexandre establish betweenthemselves and craftsmen-artists.
This relationship of curiosity between the two designers is the bearerof fertile collaborations. They apprehend each situation by discovering the mate- rials, their techniquesand the know-how of the craftsmen to design objects by an approach that is not hylomorphic. Theyimplement the art du terrain, in which Making is central. Their itinerancy leads them to imagine objectsas landscapes or living collections. Their current collaboration with Editors encourages them to thinkof objects with a wider distribution that complement the collectible approach of the very small seriesimagined for the gallery.
That wraps up our Art De de La Table Tour of Paris Design Week!
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