This Kitchen is on FIRE

For the discerning design lover, Tom Dixon needs no introduction. From his polyethylene Jack light in the ‘90s, to his reboot of the Habitat brand as creative director in the early 2000s, to the launch of his eponymous international design brand, Dixon’s world is one we like to live in. 

Which is why, when offered the chance to sit down with the UK lighting legend in his custom-built, fire-themed Caesarstone demo kitchen at IDS Vancouver last week, we literally let out a little squeal. 

The conceptual kitchen was one of four designs—based on fire, water, earth and air—within Dixon and Caesarstone’s “THE RESTAURANT” collaboration. Initially revealed at the 2016 design festival in Milan, this was the FIRE kitchen’s first appearance in Canada, and it wowed with walls, stools and tabletops encased in Caesarstone’s Vanilla Noir, Raven and Coastal Grey slabs, alongside accents of gold, copper and blackened steel elements (to suggest charred wood, flames and smoke). 

Next door was the ethereal ICE kitchen from IDS Toronto, and items from Dixon’s new home accessories line were also on display. 

As for the interview score, Dixon lived up to expectations, offering dry, sardonic responses to every Q, followed by thoughtful insight into his design process, and the applications of a manmade material like Caesarstone in the home. 

IDS Vancouver may be over, but an all-quartz kitchen is forever. Read on! —Kelsey Klassen

Caesarstone’s FIRE kitchen as seen in Milan. Image: Caesarstone

Kelsey: When one hears the term “concept kitchen”, it could’ve gone very well or very badly—

Tom: Well, what happened? [Looks around] Did it go well or badly? 

Kelsey: Ha. I think it went pretty well. And I’m just wondering where you started? Were you given the theme of the elements? 

Tom: I wasn’t given that. It was something I was fiddling around with anyway and it ended up that the briefing was very different than what actually happened, you know? We were asked to do four different events, and then I came up with the idea of four different events—four different kitchens—that culminated in Milan. 

But with the reality of the schedules, and they changed their minds a few times, we ended up doing the big one in Milan, and now were doing the smaller events. So this is a quarter of the whole, and it was a whole restaurant in Milan: four kitchens that reflected the the traditions of their own country—and this is sort of the American kitchen, sort of like barbecuing and this idea of people gathering ‘round the person the cooking. They’re participating, which is why it’s sort of a deconstructed kitchen and you have these columns of fire. 

I kind of like that idea that there are no barriers, no front and no back in this kitchen. There’s not even a kitchen island where you have sides, you just sort of wander through it while you’re eating. And that was what was nice about it in Milan. […] I’ve spent far too much time in very boring dinners where you’re [trapped] for the whole evening. And I thought it worked really rather well. You had four different restaurants in one evening, and four different sets of friends. And it stopped being a concept kitchen and started being a real restaurant at one point, to answer your question. 

ICE by Tom Dixon. Image: Caesarstone

Kelsey: And why did you link up with Caesarstone; what appeals to you about the material?

Tom: Well, it didn’t, at the beginning, you know? It’s like, ehhh, I prefer marble… [Smiles] But the thing is, when you start thinking of it as ‘not marble’, is when it becomes interesting. It has different qualities from an engineering perspective. You can glue it together seamlessly. You can cut very fine, thin lines in it in a way that a real stone might collapse because it’s got natural veins in it. This is much more consistent. You can make it thinner as well. So it was the non-natural aspect of it that appealed to me at that point.

And so what I was intent on doing was showing it not just as a surface, counter material, but as a kind of in-the-round material. That was my idea with kitchens, where you aren’t really, any longer hugging the wall. The kitchen is the best place for a party in your house. 

Tom Dixon at IDS Vancouver 2016. Image: Caesarstone

Kelsey: What do you say to someone who finds the idea of a dark or an all-black kitchen intimidating? 

Tom: What do I say to them? Buy the white one. There’s a white one over there [Laughs]. That was the ICE one, for Canadian people. Very pale. Actually, the AIR kitchen is the one that’s not here, it’s the one destined for New York, and that one was one where we were actively seeking to do the opposite—make something that’s transparent, which is quite hard with stone.

You have to see all four of them, because the elements are really about dividing the world into four things that everything that exists fits into. And people can be fiery or airy, and you know the stone or the cooking method suited each. We had root vegetables in the EARTH kitchen, and the FIRE kitchen was really about barbecuing. And so, it’s very easy, when you start doing that, to get back to your question, ‘What if they don’t like dark materials?’ They should go for the airy or watery one, which was about trying to use the material in a lighter more airy way.

Kelsey: If someone wants to translate a high-concept kitchen like this to their own house, what are some areas that transition well? 

Tom: I think the idea that [Caesarstone] is attractive from every angle is worth considering.

And the idea that, obviously not everybody has the space to do this, but I do think that the separation between the dining room and the kitchen has almost vanished anyway, right? The idea that people are participating in cooking, the theatre, and participating in the meal themselves… Everybody should go for this. The kitchen is a social space and I think that is really healthy. People being involved in that process had vanished for a while and now it’s coming back as a very popular activity again.  

Tom Dixon’s London Scented Candle. Image: Tom Dixon