Slovakian designer Tomas Kral presented a new collection of glass objects at 100% Design in London last month.

Called Upgrade, the collection involves taking normally processes used to engrave and gild crystal glass and applying them to industrial jars and bottles.

Kral also showed Upgrade pieces at Beau Sauvage, a “pop up” exhibition at Liberty curated by Gallery Libby Sellers, which continues until 19 October.

The following is from Tomas Kral:

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UPGRADE

The idea is to use traditional decorative techniques for crystal glass like cutting, engraving, gilding to “upgrade” existing industrial glass packaging like milk bottles or jars for tomato sauce. I join together the industrial and the craft. I started simply with application of traditionals decorations and finally I develop my personal “upgrades”. Below: Measuring Cups

Material: industrial glass
Size: various
Date: 2008

Tomas Kral (06.11.1979, Bojnice, Slovak republic) 28 years old Slovak designer. Actually I work and live in Lausanne,  in Switzerland. My father is an Architect but personally I was more interested to work with a smaller scale. Above: Diagonal cut. Below: Personal Gold Label

Thanks to the one year of studies in textile design in Slovakia, I quickly undestood that I need the third dimension to express my ideas. That’s why I definitely adhere to the 3D design. Below: Frosted

Actually, my research is linked to Ecal (the University of Art and Design in Lausanne) where I received graduate (2006) and post-graduate degrees (2008) and where I work actually as an assistent. During this short period I had the possibility to work with such a big ikons in design like Ronan Bouroullec, Martino Gamper, Sebastian Bergne, Florence Doléac… or companies like Swarovski, Bernardaud, Ligne Roset, Coca-Cola, Etain et Prestige… I regularly participate to design contests and exhibitions with multiple interesting results and success.

As a designer, I adopt a simple technique – technique of a curious child, who observe, experiment and imagine night and day. Tireless, I transforme existing thinks and in every stage of my work I try to justify my choices and decisions using trivial questions like: why, for what, how…

I observe people needs and every day situations with humour and distance. I try to capture specific thinks, twist them and infuse them with poetry, to design accessible and comprehensible objects.

I consider important that all these transformations become easily understandable for the user without any long and boring explications. On the other side, my work is an experimentation with materials, technologies and forms. I explore and match especially traditional materials with new technologies and at the same time I try to define particular and personal typologies for the objects I’m searching for.

Credits for photos: François Pirenne, Florian Joye, Tomas Kral