Leading Light

From her sprawling new studio in Rotterdam, design star Sabine Marcelis hones her vision— and looks to the future

- TEXT BY HANNAH MARTIN PHOTOGRAPHY BY SENNE VAN DER VEN & EEFJE DE CONINCK

“WE HAVE A LITTLE oasis in the middle of all this industry,” says designer Sabine Marcelis, from her new Rotterdam studio in the Netherlands.

The nearly 20,000-square-foot space, built in 1960, is situated in Spaanse Polder, a port zone northwest of the city center. Outside, seagulls squawk; a crane lifts sand and plops it on a boat. But inside, slabs of colored glass, hunks of polished resin, and sundry material experiments gleam like mirages in the sunlight that streams in from the ceiling and windows. Marcelis calls that luminosity a “core ingredient” for her work; whether she’s cutting marble or experimenting with Japanese urushi lacquer, she explains, “I use light as a tool to make static objects into dynamic experiences.”

Marcelis has made her name by turning industrial matter into objects of uncanny beauty through adept use of light and color. The works are often deceptively simple—a reflective gradient that challenges your perspective; a slice of resin that looks like a supersized gummy, its edges ever-so-slightly translucent. “I identify Marcelis as a colorist,” explains curator and design historian Glenn Adamson, placing her alongside masters like Hella Jongerius. “It seems to me that this is her true subject; color serves as a means of elevating and specifying an object, giving it a strong and memorable sense of character.”