Concrete doesn't lie

Pulpo presented two new collections at Maison&Objet. One is called "Industrial Art" and means it. The other makes glass square. Both work – for one simple reason.

There are product categories that should have been exhausted long ago. Side tables. Mirrors. Lounge chairs. Then a label from Weil am Rhein comes along and turns structural steel beams into furniture – and it doesn't feel like a provocation. It feels like the only logical conclusion.

At Maison&Objet earlier this year (Hall 1, Stand D84–E83), Pulpo showed two things: the new "Industrial Art" collection and an extension of Sebastian Herkner's Alwa series. Both are worth a second look – especially for interior architects and specifiers who are quietly tired of furniture that apologises for itself.

Construction materials. For living spaces. Why not?

The idea behind "Industrial Art" is straightforward: don't clad concrete, steel and aluminium. Don't prettify them. Don't dip them in colours they're not. Just leave them as they are – and see whether furniture can come of it.

It can.

Kai Linke takes the classic I-beam in structural steel and turns it into side tables. Hot-dip galvanised, two heights, no ornament. The K Table looks like something an architect rescued from a construction site – and that's exactly the point. For projects that want an industrial character without quoting it: this is the real thing, not a reference to rawness.

Samuel Treindl combines concrete with galvanised steel in the S Table. Rough, heavy, unambiguous. A table that doesn't pretend to be made of something else. That's rarer than it sounds.
Xaver Sedelmeier works with bronze-tinted mirrors carrying deep black pigment marks – produced by the manufacturing process, not by intention. Every piece looks different. Alongside these: wooden benches and tables skinned in chrome, powder-coated metal or hot-dip galvanised steel. Objects that oscillate between function and sculpture without fully arriving in either category. Meant as a compliment.

The Cut Chair by Paris-based Studio BrichetZiegler closes the collection: welded and ground aluminium, a bolted-on cushion in leather or fabric. Light. Precise. No drama – none needed.
The collection is explicitly built around limitation – small runs, developed with contemporary designers and artists. So if you're specifying: there's time pressure. Or call it exclusivity. Depends on the budget conversation.

Alwa grows. Now also square.

Sebastian Herkner's Alwa tables have been one of Pulpo's calling cards for years: thick, hand-cast glass, dyed through, combined with a delicate metal frame or a mouth-blown glass cylinder. The new Alwa Square translates the principle into a square format. Three sizes, various finishes.

That sounds like line extension. It is. But it's good line extension – because the source material holds up. Cast glass is inherently inconsistent; each piece varies slightly in colour and structure. That makes Alwa Square a piece that behaves like an art object in a room while functioning like a table. For interior architects who want both: useful.

What this means

Pulpo doesn't make living room furniture for people who want living room furniture. It makes objects for spaces that need a language. Industrial Art delivers that language with a heavy accent – loud, material, uncompromising. Alwa Square whispers at the same level.

For project planning: both collections assume the rest of the room can carry this kind of independence. If that's the brief, Pulpo offers arguments – not claims.