Ves-el © Gareth Neal & Zaha Hadid, 2015
This stunning piece of tableware is a perfect example – beautiful to look at, meticulously crafted and very far out of the ordinary!
Ves-el — a limited edition piece created by artists and master craftsman Gareth Neal in 2015 for the V&A during the London Design Festival from a very simple brief: to create tableware made from wood. He was fortuitously paired with Zaha Hadid (lucky boy) and this is the stunning result.
They combined computer modelling with traditional carving techniques and robotic machines to create this wonderfully subverted understanding of what’s handmade and what’s not.
Viewed from the front, it’s a beautiful fluted wooden vase, viewed from the side, its elongated form reveals a different story – less practical, more improbable. Quite stunning!
This piece really speaks to me – if you don’t like it, we can’t be friends. Sorry.