The Importance of Knowing Guilherme Wentz

Guilherme Wentz received his design degree in 2012. Six years on, he has a career’s worth of awards, was twice recognized as a rising star and leads his own global brand. Image: SOSSEGO

Guilherme Wentz decided after two years at university that a business degree wasn’t for him. Born the second son of a couple making their living in a southern Brazil factory town, his pursuit of a steady career in business appeared certain. Except in telling his parents about going for a design major, he was the one who got the shock, not mom and dad.

“My father told me, ‘Maybe you thought you should do the same work your brother and I have been doing, but I always thought you should take a creative role,’” said Mr. Wentz. “He knew me better than I knew myself then.” His parents’ support hasn’t wavered since.

How his father got that notion about his youngest son’s future isn’t clear. The boy who would become the disruptor prince of Brazil’s design establishment did the usual childhood things. Only his drawings gave a clue.

“I would draw things, nothing particular,” said Mr. Wentz, dodging connections between youthful doodling and his adult reality. “I don’t know for certain. Maybe it was less about what I was doing and more about the way I made choices, how I saw life.” Big decisions came after he saw life from a surfboard.

“I was unhappy studying business,” said Mr. Wentz. “That was when I began traveling to surf, and it changed my perception of where I should take my life.” But what connects Guilherme Wentz, surfing, and a design career?

Getting at that answer means looking past surfing’s mystique to understand the sport as a nature-based physical activity. Some call it “the blue gym” because the sport’s demanding physicality acutely focuses the mind and pushes out everything else. Research backs up this idea.

The Post-Tropical Vase, created for the Collector’s Club of the São Paolo Museum of Modern Art, has become an icon of Guilherme Wentz’s work. Made of Sucupira wood and copper, it stands approximately 12” high with a width of about 5”. From the Wentz Collection and shown with Corda Lamps and a Folha Dining Table. Image: SOSSEGO

Surfing cultivates a “fully embodied feeling of release” according to studies with combat veterans in the United Kingdom. Leading this research was Dr. Nick Caddick, a postdoctoral research fellow at the Veterans and Families Institute for Military Social Research on the Chelmsford Campus of the UK’s Anglia Ruskin University.

Writing for theinertia.com, Dr. Caddick relates how surfing “immerses veterans in the natural environment, which has mental benefits.” The concentration surfing demands renewed the veteran’s sense of pleasure and intensity. “There’s also a connection with nature that helps to bolster veterans’ sense of mental well-being.”

Brazil’s coastline is peppered with beaches of exquisite natural beauty and the big waves surfers crave. The experience gave Guilherme Wentz inspiration and, perhaps, a little nudge toward both a design career and a significant design influence.

“I had this contact with nature,” said Mr. Wentz in talking about a primary driver of his design philosophy. Being simple, close to nature, making non-traditional choices. These ideas became the basis for his constellation of design values.

While he seeks a lightness and freshness in his concepts, they also display a complex primitiveness. It finds expression in how Mr. Wentz creates relationships between natural shapes. Some designs manifest primitiveness as planned coincidences. This is an observation the designer himself recognizes.

Mr. Wentz explains: “It gets to a place where something is so simple, so primitive that somewhere there in the brain you will relate to a design without knowing why.”

The Corda Lamp from the Wentz Collection employs an aluminum structure with a microtextured powdercoat finish around a blown glass sphere with LED lighting. The sphere has a diameter of approximately 8.5”, and a cord length of 21.5”. Image: SOSSEGO

Blame it on the lizard brain, known formally as the amygdala, which helps process responses to the shapes humans see.

Eric Jaffe, writing for Fast Company in October 2013, implicated the amygdala in how humans respond to design. He concluded humans are attracted to objects that don’t appear threatening, notwithstanding the perceived beauty of said objects. “We prefer curves because they signal a lack of threat.” Findings from a study at Harvard Medical School agree.

The research found that objects with sharp elements activate the brain’s fear center, the amygdala. “Sharp objects have long signaled physical danger,” wrote Mr. Jaffe. “Human brains associate sharp lines with a threat.” He contends the brain interprets curves as harmless, therein a preference for the curvy shapes from nature.

That helps explain the human attraction to shapes found in nature, but does little for another uncertainty facing Mr. Wentz.

It is the paradox facing minimalists in general and designers in particular.

Mr. Wentz creates objects for a casual, minimal lifestyle to be produced, acquired and owned. Many in that market niche are living in smaller spaces, holding fewer possessions and preferring experiential pursuits to building collections.

Solving that puzzle led Mr. Wentz to fuse nature’s shapes with basic constructions, ones that make plain the earthly forces working upon them.

The Tombo Lamp, shown on the table top, emits a soft light using a brass and blown glass fixture in diameters of approximately 6” or about 8”. The Tombo Pendent features a sphere of approximately 6” suspended from a cable of about 118”. From the Wentz Collection and shown with Folha Side Tables. Image: SOSSEGO

“My thinking starts in simple concepts, like gravity,” he said. Mr. Wentz demonstrates this idea using the Adobe Floor Lamp. A marble block stabilizes a slim steel rod that supports an opaline glass sphere. The way that one depends on the other makes clear gravity’s effect on the composition of elements in the design.

“There are simple concepts like gravity, wind, weathering that we don’t concern ourselves with,” said Mr. Wentz. “We’re able to work and live indoors where we don’t have to think about it, right? We’ve evolved beyond it.”

The Tombo Pendant with Matte Black powdercoat over aluminum. The fixture is also available in Brass. From the Wentz Collection. Image: SOSSEGO

He doesn’t mean that humans have evolved beyond their humanity, nor that the laws of nature are any less applicable in architecture or planning. Some efforts by the modernists prove it.

“In modernism,” said Mr. Wentz, “they made these perfect cities, perfect furniture where everything is very steady and rational.” He never mentioned it, but one shouldn’t be faulted here for summoning Brasília as a point of reference.

Filmmaker Bart Simpson made a film recently about Brasília as a hometown, rather than an architectural icon. Titled “Brasília: Life After Design,” the film shares the experiences of three citizens living in a city that became a UNESCO World Heritage site in 1987.

Mr. Simpson said that the people of Brasília take pride in living there and participating in “the experiment.” They know of Oscar Niemeyer, the revered architect who created Brasília along with urban planner Lúcio Costa and landscape architect Roberto Burle Marx. And, they are a citizenry engaged in ways of improving their city.

“By design, Brasília is very isolating,” said Mr. Simpson, remarking on the disconnect between its “brutalist concrete” structures and the culture associated with the country this capital city represents. “When we think about Brazil, we think football, the samba, beaches, the Amazon,” he said. “Brasília is the opposite of so much of that.”

Mr. Simpson’s comments come from his interview for the “Monocle on Design” podcast recorded just before his film’s London screening in May 2018.

Filmgoers leave understanding how Brasília’s residents are committing to the city and redefining it to the present day. Pop-up parties, for example, gather the citizenry and visitors alike into warm embraces with their surroundings. Mr. Simpson added, “People will ultimately decide what to do with their environments.”

Detail of the Solo Floor Vase, showing the opening of vase and the point of wall attachment. Concealed from view is a wall-mounted steel pin that stabilizes the vase when installed and allows easy demounting to change water. From the Wentz Collection. Image: SOSSEGO
The Solo Floor Vase brings nature indoors in a delicate and unconventional way. Other work with cane and bamboo inspired the cut in the tube, forming the curved detail. Approximately 40” tall. From the Wentz Collection. Image: SOSSEGO

Enter Guilherme Wentz, not a modernist, but one who sees a role for himself in creating ways people can individualize their environments. That role expresses a contemporary bent that’s starting anew in Brazil.

“I feel design in Brazil is somewhat closed in a bubble since the mid-century masters, the modernists,” said Mr. Wentz. Though he holds the Campana brothers in high esteem for all they did toward changing the perception of design in Brazil, he says today’s designers there “have to look for more ways to make a difference.”

Mr. Wentz believes that he and his Brazilian design peers have arrived at a critical moment. “I’m not the only one,” he said. “There are other new designers in Brazil looking at how we can make a difference.” This searching is top-of-mind for his generation of designers, weighing how “Brazilian” their work should be, how connected to nature, how inclusive of the “old references” and what’s the right fit with international references.

As Mr. Wentz describes it, he is trying for a mix of what it means to be a designer from Brazil and an entrepreneur leading a global brand.

The designer answers questions about the Wentz Collection, his collaborations and life so far with the relaxed manner of chatting with an old schoolmate. It’s easy to forget he’s received a career’s worth of recognition since earning his design degree in 2012, never mind that he launched two awarded designs before he graduated from Universidade de Caxias do Sul.

The first, being the Officer Desk for Decameron Design, received an idea Brazil 2012 award. This desk marked the start of a collaboration between designer and manufacturer that has produced a variety of furniture, lighting and accessories. Decameron makes a range of products for contemporary living.

The Officer Desk, designed for Decameron, received an idea Brazil award in 2012. A tabletop section slides to reveal a storage compartment. Guilherme Wentz completed the project during his college years. Approximately 65” wide and 30” deep. Image: guilhermewentz.com

The Collection K in 2012 for Riva, a Brazil-based purveyor of luxury tabletop accessories, was Mr. Wentz’s second undergraduate effort. After two years at Riva as a graphic designer, they suggested he design a series for them. It launched just after his college graduation. The Collection K received an iF Product Design Award and a Brazil Design Award in 2013.

Worth noting is the powerhouse of design intuition Guilherme Wentz brought to his early designs. What he bestowed on those projects came from within, as inspirations he might have drawn from the world’s great design centers were out of reach. “I was far away from the design markets,” he said. “The shops, galleries and museums weren’t available to me.” Nonetheless, the commissions continued, as did the attention from award juries.

In steel, wood and upholstery, Join is a modular seating system designed for Decameron. This is another example of the many design projects Guilherme Wentz has completed for Decameron. Image: guilhermewentz.com

Decameron Design invited Mr. Wentz to design a modular sofa group in 2017. “The brief call for a generously-scaled family of upholstered pieces, with small details,” said Mr. Wentz. “I began with the L-shaped structure to serve as both table and console.” He then arranged the back and seat cushions to where they extend beyond the “L” in places. While this project is suited to large residences, working spaces haven’t been neglected.

For the Decameron Office Collection, Mr. Wentz designed a modular seating collection in 2014. Using steel, wood and upholstery, the collection provides benches with or without backs, and assorted in-line and freestanding tables, all scaled to applications in the workplace.

Another furniture design scaled to specific applications is Hibridos, designed in 2013 for Carbono, specialists in goods for urban lifestyles. “This is a multifunctional design usable in a hall or corner of a smaller space,” said Mr. Wentz. The design integrates coat rack, magazine rack, catch-all and bench. In a pinch, it provides an extra place to sit.

Designed for Carbono, this multifunctional design from 2013 called Hibridos is well-suited to smaller spaces. It serves as coat rack, magazine rack, catch-all and bench. In steel and jequitiba wood, with a footprint of about 63” x 16”. Image: guilhermewentz.com

Useful as a bench or low table is Três, a 2015 Wentz design from sustainable furniture maker Tora Brasil. The bench has three components: a sizable prism-shaped section, held in place by two smaller prism-shaped parts. He established the largest prism on edge, lending a fragility and instability to what could be a heavy looking, hard sculpture piece. Fallen trees provide the design’s pequiá and cumaru wood. Mr. Wentz sees this as a “very specific project” that mixes Brazilian materials and references with geometric forms and international design cues.

Mr. Wentz wanted to design many different products. A proper next step following accessories and furniture was lighting. “When I moved to São Paolo, I came to a lighting company called Lumini,” he said. “I always liked their designs, their market positioning, their graphic design; I admired everything about them.”

What happened, he said, is that he knocked on their door and told them he wanted to work there. With the portfolio Mr. Wentz had amassed by 2015, it’s likely that Lumini jumped at the chance. “They gave me the opportunity to spend one year in residency to learn their process, understand LEDs and design for them.”

Considered an interactive light sculpture, UM is a 2015 design for Lumini. A device affixed to vertical surfaces allows users to rotate the approximately 60” fixture for different lighting effects. UM received an iF design award and a First Place Award from Museu da Casa Brasileira. Image: guilhermewentz.com

He designed UM for Lumini, a maker dedicated to the lighting needs of architects and lighting designers. The fixture mounts to vertical surfaces via a “turntable” that allows users to rotate it to “appreciate different indirect light positions.” In 2016 UM received the top award from Museu da Casa Brasileira and an iF Design Award.

When he launched the Wentz Collection in 2016, he applied his knowledge of lighting to three designs: the Adobe Floor Lamp; the suspended Corda fixture and Tombo in pendant and table models.

He’s elevated the benefits of diffused lighting in his designs, believing that it reduces shadows on faces and works far better over tables than a direct downlight.

Tombo’s table model is a particularly fun design, with Mr. Wentz himself saying that it looks like a “fake light” until it’s turned on. He envisions lighting a room with Tombos alone and having the effect of candlelight.

Lighting from the Wentz Collection in the United States is exclusive to Sossego, offering exceptional designs by acclaimed product designers from Brazil. Founded in 2015, Sossego has a newly opened showroom among the 125 others comprising the Design Center at the Merchandise Mart. Incidentally, one can enjoy the smoothest coffee in North America while a guest in Sossego’s 14thfloor showroom.

Recognizing the crossover of residential into commercial, some of Design Center showrooms on the 6thand 14thfloors participated in NeoCon for the first time this year. “Both floors experienced strong traffic,” said Lisa Simonian, Vice President of Marketing, NeoCon. “The Design Center showrooms are emerging as an increasingly vital complement to NeoCon’s traditional exhibitors.”

What Ms. Simonian underscores is the relevance of products that bridge conventional vertical markets, because “specifiers are tasked with delivering rich, multi-disciplinary interiors.” At least one office furniture dealership has arrived at the same conclusion.

A 2017 collaboration with Decameron produced Border, series of sofas and chaises. Asymmetrical upholstered blocks surround a structure of freijó wood which serves as a table and a console. Image: Guilhermewentz.com

Forward Space, a leading Midwest Steelcase dealer formed in 2014 by the merger of Office Concepts and OEC Business Interiors, has opened a 4,100 square foot showroom on the Mart’s 6thfloor. The move, says the dealer’s announcement, “points toward a progressive fusion of residential and workplace design.” To that end, the dealership represents “crossover” brands including BluDot,Mitchell Gold + Bob Williamsand FLOS.

A steady flow of NeoCon attendees filtered through the Sossego showroom on the morning that Guilherme Wentz sat for his interview. Not once during an hour-long retrospective of his portfolio did he present the affectations one might expect from a 30-year-old recognized twice as a rising talent. The first came in 2016 from Maison&Objet Americas, followed in 2017 by the Casa Vogue Design Award.

For Tora Brasil, producers of furniture from sustainable Brazilian woods, the Três bench features pequiá and cumaru wood. Prisms in large and small sections compose the design. Approximately 79” wide and 16.5” high. Image: guilhermewentz.com

Thus far, 2018 has been a year of exhibitions and events. Mr. Wentz was among 10 product designers from Brazil invited to design for the curated Artefacto DNA Project. Mr. Wentz proposed an outdoor chaise framed using a tubular aluminum structure, webbed by handmade threads and functionalized with a small round table top of marble. Artefacto offers upscale furniture collections defined by international cues, refined materials and rich finishes.

Exhibits of Mr. Wentz’s designs in 2018 include Sossego’s booth at the AD Show in New York City where the firm was awarded Best in Show, the Brazilian Embassy in Washington, D.C. and NeoCon 50 in Chicago. His Estio Lounge for Saccaro received a Casa Vogue Award for Outdoor Furniture.

Mr. Wentz would say that his recent designs come closest to his goal of being disruptive and simple. “It is a tricky thing, trying to be simple, but not too simple – to find the balance.” That, he said, is something he’ll be working on for the rest of his life.