At the launch of Bolia’s flagship Australian store in Melbourne on Thursday 6 June, Australian Design Review (ADR) found out more about what the international furniture brand can offer local interior design.

It has been 24 years since Bolia first emerged from the Danish city of Aarhus, affectionately known as ‘the world’s smallest big city’. Now with 88 stores across 12 countries, the furniture giant finally reached Australia this month, opening a bright and meandering Melbourne store that is at home among the luxury furniture showrooms of Church Street, Richmond.

“There is a real synergy between Scandinavian design and Australian design,” Bolia Australia’s head of retail Jo Foley told ADR on the opening night.

“When you look at the Australian aesthetics and how we live – indoor/outdoor, very relaxed, we’re not stuffy, we’re not precious, we just want to enjoy our surroundings and be nurtured by them – it just makes real sense.”

Bolia’s New Scandinavian Design

Bolia champions what it calls “New Scandinavian Design”: a “timeless” minimalist style that draws inspiration from nature, and has tentacles in the international design community. The Zen rug series exemplifies this ethos. Designed by Australian designer Emily Broom, Zen rugs mimic the raked sand patterns of Japanese zen gardens.

Melbourne-born and now residing in Copenhagen, Broom was the first Australian winner of  Bolia’s design awards, which platform fresh talent designing anything from textiles to vases. While not every winner is invited into Bolia’s collections, Broom was, and her designs have played a pivotal role in Bolia’s expansion into the Asia-Pacific market, bringing a unique blend of Scandinavian minimalism and Australian warmth.

An ‘easy collaboration’

While it can be difficult for designers to manufacture their work on a commercial scale, Broom attested to Bolia’s knack for developing ideas alongside designers.

“It’s an easy one for me because I’m very much on the same page in my fundamental design principles with Bolia, which is: relationship to nature, craftsmanship, good quality materials, really trying to keep sustainability at the forefront and coming up with fresh, sophisticated designs that are still grounded in the Scandinavian heritage,” Broom said on opening night. 

“For me, it’s a very easy collaboration.”

“There’s no ego with Bolia,” added Foley. “There’s no ‘we’re Bolia, we’re it’. It’s about collaboration.”

The entire Bolia collection comes with a 10-year warranty and interior designers can access a trade discount. There are future plans for Bolia to expand across Australia, according to Foley. For now, the flagship store can be found at 620 Church St, Richmond.

All photography supplied by Bolia. Lead image by Ksenia Belova.

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