George Yabu and Glenn Pushelberg are used to woodpeckers waking them up. Their Toronto bedroom is nestled in the treetops, overlooking a deep ravine. The partners, in both life and work, have lavished attention on a space they use primarily for sleeping, but also reading and hanging out.
"Like many people, we've spent a lot of our lives in our bedroom," Yabu says. The pair are the founders of eponymously named, internationally recognized design practice Yabu Pushelberg, which specializes in hotel interiors, retail environments and products for the home. In their global experience, "bedroom spaces are huge," Pushelberg says. "It's like a home within a home."
The duo, keynote speakers at the Interior Design Show, are currently at work in more than 15 countries and expanding their scope to include everything from lighting fixtures to fabrics and faucets. "We're shifting to a more holistic practice," Pushelberg says, "almost like a one-stop shop." Sometimes, they are the first users of their own products. "To us, it's kind of fascinating to make our own house with our stuff in it," Yabu says.
Case in point: They designed the glass side table; early 20th-century task lighting by Édouard-Wilfred Buquet is perched atop. The bedding is from Au Lit and the array of mirrors are by Italian architect, industrial designer and founder of Domus magazine Gio Ponti, purchased from Pampaloni. The mirrors reflect back a tangled mass of branches, as well as modernist icon Alvar Aalto's zebra-print "Tank" chair.
If the above reads like a study in early 20th-century design history, the couple's art collection reveals their personal, shared history of more than three decades. "We are collectors of things and objects," Pushelberg says. "Some of them have meaning because we find them in travels … a piece that we fell in love with or something we find unusual or humorous," he says of the art objects on view. "We don't like to store things," Yabu goes on to say, "it's an awful waste."
They discovered two paintings, hung side-by-side, by artist Yoshitomo Nara at Tomio Koyama Gallery when in Japan for a project. Cape Dorset artist Adamie Alariaq created the pair of stone figures and the Campbell's soup-can stool is by Simon Gavina. "It's an homage to Warhol," Yabu says. "They got the go-ahead to design this Campbell's soup can based on his famous painting. But it's Italian, so it's 'Omaggio to Andy Warhol.' " The classic tomato flavour translates as "Zuppa di Pomodoro."
Their eclectic collection is spread among their homes in Toronto, New York, Miami and Long Island, N.Y. "Yeah, we got a few spots we like to hang out in," Pushelberg says. "They're all a little different. [The Toronto home] feels like it belongs here," he says, "and the apartment in New York, it feels like New York." Likewise, their habits and routines shift slightly depending on location. In Toronto, they tend to hunker down; in New York, they take in the energy of the streets; in Miami, they like to play host.
But what's common among the homes is an affinity to the natural environment, whether it's the Hudson River, sandy dunes or the leafless (for now) treetops in chilly Toronto. "They all have this connection to nature somehow, despite [their] context in the urban environment," Yabu says.
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