Studio Corkinho is a multi-disciplinary design practice based in Antwerp / Belgium, aiming to elevate stillness in contemplative atmospheres. Our purpose is to change people's perceptions and awareness of objects and spaces that we think deserve attention because of their unique values.

We design limited editions within the fields of objects, furniture, and create contemplative atmospheres for interiors and micro-architecture.

Studio Corkinho stems from an amalgamation of pre-existing values : nature, craftsmanship, heritage, patina and atmosphere.

Our drive is to contrast the origin of raw beauty with our own code of simplicity. Purist morphologies define our warm monolithic aesthetics.

Unhiding layers of meaning, Studio Corkinho imagines tangible metaphors for life’s renewal through rebirth. A starting point for a design philosophy that will branch out into other materials, shapes and spatial experiences.

Cédric Etienne (1980) & Klas Dalquist (1973), a belgo-swedish design duo that started with a simple idea about how to ennoble reclaimed cork bark, while having a creative chat in a bar at Vrijdagmarkt (Antwerpen).

Two friends who share a warm love for visual compositions and material values within architectural atmospheres, interior and objects.

Our studio function as an "umbrella" for all assignments and challenges we select to fill our dedicated time with.

We work from the harbour of Antwerpen, in the wild nature in Sweden, under the cork oaks in Portugal, wherever an opportunity takes us - our showroom is global and within all our clients.

Cédric is the founder and interior designer, with a long experience in how to curate one of kind moments by using space and total mind freedom.

Klas is raised in the textile world, with a wide expertise in art and creative direction, how to go from an idea to a finished product, to link all parts so every story is told as it was meant to be told.

In the Portuguese hills of Alentejo, the idea for Studio Corkinho was born. Witnessing the stillness of a cork harvest, the age-old tradition impressed on Cédric Etienne the aspiration to interpret this cultural artefact as a starting point of Studio Corkinho's design philosophy.

Studio Corkinho reflects on the architecture of silence:
what is it that brings architecture, and hereby us, in a serene state?

Out of the need to unplug from an overstimulated society, Studio Corkinho proposes a new language to stand still with silence and bring us again closer to our true nature.

Fascinated by the hidden power of isolation, Studio Corkinho engages how to curate stillness and bring a deeper meaning back into spaces.

By a continual redefining and remodelling, Studio Corkinho elevates the hidden dimensions of noble materials through curiosity and innovation.

Like craftsmanship results in timeless objects, Studio Corkinho creates spaces where time erodes into a calming void, a silent atmosphere to ritualize in the now-here dimension. The “object space" becomes a sanctuary of stillness.

We devote ourselves to the understanding of the dynamics of silence and how to reconnect with inner balance.

As such, we seek to design spaces where one can contemplate in a distraction-free atmosphere.

Focused on emotion and timelessness, Studio Corkinho unearths the beauty of the forgotten. We strive to contemporize introspection and inspire how to slow down to root in the present moment.

Our studio is built on a passion bound foundation, with a very diverse spread of business and action plans, all interacting to support and inspire each other with our singular aesthetics and touch that is Studio Corkinho.

We produce object collections, from our concept stories that stand on its own platform or to be linked with a specific request.

Customised collaborations, which means limited production for a made-to-measure designs or client requests.

We curate stillness to design spaces.

Consulting as a creative studio in architectural projects, build new brand poetry, analysing details that will empower your collection.

We are integrating our design philosophy in different shapes and contexts, this is our creative drive.

Born from curiosity.

2013

MARKED award, a design contest organised by Z33, a contemporary art centre in Belgium. This award marked the birth of Corkinho.

2014

Exhibition at Salone del Mobile in Milan & the Interieur Biennale in Kortrijk.

2015

The beginning of Corkinho’s collaboration with Swedish creative director Klas Dalquist. Studio Corkinho is founded.

2017

Launch of two collections : BIRTH & MOTHER.

2018

Studio Corkinho joins five other emerging Belgian designers to form a collective, BRUT. They show new work in an immersive experience at the Salon del Mobile. At the Henry Van de Velde awards, an annual Belgian design prize, they win the Young Talent accolade.

2019

Lined up for this year and beyond are the following projects: collaborations with various Portuguese manufacturers to design new collections, and an architectural pilot project to redefine remote places. Studio Corkinho also opens a new studio comprising a workshop, showroom and art space in the harbour of Antwerp.

Antwerp gains a sanctuary of silence inside a 19th century cove.
Design practice Studio Corkinho launches Still Room, a multi-purpose space inside Noorderpershuis, a 19th century piece of colossal brick architecture. 

How do we make inner silence and stillness attractive, vital and human? How do we redefine our perception of silence and its benefits? These questions were on our mind while we were designing Still Room, a multi-purpose space in Antwerp’s Harbour.

In 2018, the designer and co-founder of Studio Corkinho was looking for a new office, a place that could represent the studio’s ‘creative engagement’. By chance, he bumped into the Noorderpershuis, a 19th century piece of colossal brick architecture that had served as a hydraulic power station, and had been abandoned since the mid 1970s. ‘I immediately felt the energetic potential of this space,’ says Etienne. ‘It felt like an industrial monastery with its majestic entrance, its 3-floors-high metal shelves, the accumulator tower and its attic with a wooden ceiling.’

Feel free to contact us and make an appointment to visit our STILL room.

Words by Rosa Bertoli for Wallpaper*
Photography by Piet-Albert Goethals