Jakub Szczęsny, an architect from the Warsaw studio SZCZ, has designed for the company Fototapety ROOM4 a collection of unique designs that will not only decorate the interiors of apartments or offices, but also help you move to the adventurous world of imagination.
Ola Kloc: Is the fashion for wallpaper returning to Polish apartments?
Jakub Szczęsny: Certainly, it's a worldwide trend by the way, stemming from the need to give residential interiors, but also workplaces, an individual character without high costs. Besides, this type of decoration is not only photorealistic palm trees, which we remember from Polish apartments of the 1970s, but also a whole wealth of patterns, illustrations and textures of the medium itself! Krzysztof Ciesielski, owner of the company ROOM4 Photo Wallpapers, approached me with a proposal for cooperation just when clients ordering interiors in our studio suggested to me pinterest photos of rooms finished with wallpaper. From word to word we came to the conclusion that it was a great opportunity to do something new and exciting!
Ola: The wallpaper patterns you design are full of details, worked out to the smallest detail. Where do you get your inspiration from?
Jakub: Before I became an architect, from the age of 15 I worked as an illustrator for Fantastyka, Playboy, Fluid and I also did advertising illustrations, conveying all sorts of content. I was always attracted to 19th-centuryengravings, engravings, pen illustrations, but also to the interesting concepts of illustrators such as Richard Scarry, Saul Steinberg or Moebius. I also loved the prints of Jozef Gielniak, several of which we had at home. I very much always liked the thousands of details, I think many architects are attracted to the labyrinths of building plans they create themselves.
The collection "Where will you take us tonight?"
© Jakub Szczęsny
Ola: Some of the wallpaper patterns you design are meant to help parents tell bedtime stories to their children. How would you like parents to use this "tool"?
James: As a father of three sons, I went through various stages and patents for preparing them for bedtime. With the first one, I quickly saw what a challenge it was to come up with new stories every night, especially since for a good five years we became fixated on the fictional adventures of an authentic Norwegian Resistance hero character, a certain Max Manus. My son remembered all my improvised stories, so there were times when I had to put Max Manus in completely crazy situations of the type of marrying a mermaid queen at the bottom of a fjord. Since then, I've been convinced that for pre-sleep stories, or fairy tales, we need help. Hence the idea of wallpapers, which include details that can support improvisation and enrich the narrative. There is no need to bury desperately in memory, just look at the wall next to the child's crib. On the other hand, over-impulsed children need peace and focus before bedtime, so wandering the wall with my eyes, which I myself remember as a pre-sleep ritual, is very helpful. I'm an occasional escapist, as I'm sure many children and adults are, I like escapes and places to hide, why not hide in wallpaper?
