Architect Paloma Cañizares opened her studio in Madrid in 2005, working simultaneously in the fields of architecture and interior and furniture design for offices, public spaces, private homes and temporary installations. She teaches projects on the MA Interior Design course at the design college IED Madrid, gives lectures in various teaching establishments and has sat on judging panels for national and international competitions.
In 2011, she set up Madrid-based furniture design company PCM Design – a platform for manufacturing work by highly talented, young designers and a company sensitive to the possibilites of local manufacturing in order to promote Spain’s craftsmanship and industry. In 2012, Cañizares won the Heineken’s New Talents Award.
Paloma Cañizares, the studio’s founder, talks to us about its design approach, interior design work, product design and latest projects.
Interiors From Spain: How did you come to found your studio and what’s your main method of working?
Paloma Cañizares: After finishing my studies, I combined collaborating with other studios with taking on my own projects. After three years, the number of commissions I was getting allowed me to become independent and set up my own studio.
Our approach to our work is very logical. Firstly, we need to analyse all the information we have and fully understand the client’s expectations. After considering all the parameters of the job, we draw up a list of priorities which we base our work on. Then comes communication, that’s to say how we communicate with our clients. This is essential as it allows them to become fully involved in a given project. Our overall objective is that the results of our work exceed our clients’ expectations.
Interiors From Spain: You trained as an architect but now mainly specialise in interior design and product design. Why are you interested in these fields of design? What new qualities do you think an architect brings to them?
Paloma Cañizares: From the start of my career, I was regularly asked to refurbish buildings and very often doing so involved me being asked to design furniture for them. This seemed very interesting since it enriched the project’s final design. In any case, architects have always taken on interior design and product design as additional creative disciplines. What’s more, an architectural education is applicable to other disciplines since it’s founded on rigour and functionality – essential qualities when taking on any job. My work is always based on analysis and an understanding of clear limits whether I’m working in architecture, interior design or furniture.
Interiors From Spain: How do you approach your interior design projects? And what do you try to achieve with them?
Paloma Cañizares: No one doubts an interior’s ability to affect our moods. Interior design can communicate ideas and offers many creative possibilities – it’s a medium in itself. As a discipline, it’s usually seen as inferior to architecture but it has the potential to transform spaces and make an emotional connection with people. It doesn’t claim to compete with architecture but complements it. It can also be a great branding tool – the image a company can project to others, an embodiment of its ideas, a kind of set design…
One of my clients once told me that in the two years he’d worked in his office, each day he walked into it he felt a great sense of calm, that he never felt tired there and that his whole team found the office environment energising – all very cheering for an architect.
Interiors From Spain: What do you teach your students at IED Madrid about how to undertake their own interior design projects?
Paloma Cañizares: I try to give them a realistic idea of what to expect on leaving college. I explain how to think about and develop projects, how to relate to clients and present and communicate ideas to them, the types of problems they’re likely to face when embarking on projects, and so on. When I teach I also make lots of references to other interior designers and other disciplines so the students acquire a broad vision of their profession and leave college with a whole range of resources that helps them develop their careers. Overall, my approach is very practical and creative.
Interiors From Spain: Tell us more about your design and furniture. What are your inspirations? What are your aims and what do you think appeals about your furniture in particular?
Paloma Cañizares: Given my training, the starting point for any of my designs – be it architecture, interior design or furniture – is to fulfill my client’s requirements. When designing furniture I need to keep to certain clear parameters: the budget, the materials, the environment the piece is destined for – all these factors shape the design. Product designers start from a blank sheet, then impose restrictions on their designs. For me, it’s the other way around: I start by working within certain limitations when I begin creating a design. I never produce the same design twice as no two projects I work on are ever identical.
Interiors From Spain: In 2011, you founded the furniture company PCM Design. Tell us about its aims. Also, have you worked with or plan to work with young, Spanish designers?
Paloma Cañizares: PCM is a personal project which aims to rescue projects by designers which I feel the public and media should know about, which should be made and be available to buy. All the products combine hand-crafting and industrial manufacturing – the objective being to create a ‘semi-industrialised product’ or ‘industrially produced hand-crafting’. Everything we make is produced in Spain, each product takes about a year to develop, and we regularly visit our suppliers – usually, small, family-run businesses – in order to understand and resolve any problems as we’re going along. High standards of production are essential to us and our manufacturers are extremely dedicated to their work and are prepared to spend many hours of trial and error to realise our designs. It’s a hugely rewarding experience which has led me to meet many extraoardinary experts.
As for your question about young Spanish designers, I’m always being asked this and I always say I believe creativity transcends nationalities, religions or whatever. A person either has a creative spark or not. And I sell creativity and quality. When I come across a design I like, I don’t look at its creator’s passport, even though the quality of the product is 100 per cent Spanish. That said, we are developing a design with a Spanish designer which we’ll be launching in 2014.
Interiors From Spain: What projects are you currently working on? Are you planning to undertake any project abroad?
Paloma Cañizares: Apart from our architecture projects and work with PCM, several companies, one of them from abroad, have contacted us to be creative directors of their new product ranges. Our work also encompasses artistic and corporate direction as many of our clients ask us to do these for them.
Our other news – in relation to PCM – is that Starbucks has used our Terracotta pendant light (by designer Tomas Kral) for one of its cafés in Denmark.
