This year when Thomas Coward joins the parade of designers on pilgrimage to the Milan Furniture Fair, he will not be trying to make a name for himself. He’s done that, head down, through a stellar body of work.
Designer Thomas Coward with his Gem Stool.
Over the past eleven years, Thomas has been recasting the Australian bathroom as the most intimate room in the house. When he began his career as a design student at Ravensbourne college in the UK, the bathroom was “all utility.”
“Even now, there are only a few companies doing interesting things with bathroom products. There’s still so much to be done,” he says of finding his niche. “People spend a lot of time in the bathroom. They share quite an intimate relationship with the things inside that room.”
The son of an English doctor and Australian nurse, Thomas moved to Australia in 2004. He soon stumbled across Omvivo, an Australian bathroomware company that shares his passion for refinement. He knocked on their door and the rest – a series of international hits including the sculptural Latis Basin (2009) and hand-etched glass Motif Basin (2011) – is design history.
Experimentation is key to his process. “With bathrooms, function is easy. Making a form that hasn’t been seen before is the exciting part of the equation.” If it sounds as though Thomas likes to push boundaries, that’s because he does. But he also knows what works and what doesn’t.
Now head of his own studio, Thomas is creating designs to treasure. His aim is to create pieces “that are made well, to last for a long, long time, to be timeless and yet to have an identity that speaks to people in the moment.”
This astute approach allows him to crossover from design innovator to commercial hit-maker. One minute he is creating a playful series of decorative hooks, the next he is unveiling the Dolmen Table for Artedomus – a serious marble slab table inspired by megalithic tombs. Oh, and he also teamed up with interior design practice Studio You Me to redesign the Artedomus Melbourne showroom – all warm textures, exposed beams and Instagram-worthy graphic details.
With new products, residential spaces and a new Artedomus Brisbane showroom in the works, 2015 is set to be a big year for Thomas.
So Milan, then? “The further I get on in my career, the less important it gets,” he says. “It seems so odd that we all look to Europe when we have a thriving community here.” Of course, Thomas doesn’t need a plane ticket to get to the inner circle; he’s already arrived.
