The bold colours and vibrant patterns of Missoni have been an energetic force in design for sixty years. Missoni Home, lead by creative director Wanda Jelmini, is a strong part of that vision, providing our homes with pieces that are dramatic, stylish, and yet highly adaptable into any home.
Rescu. Editor and Founder Bahar Etminan caught up with Wanda Jelmini on her recent trip to Australia to get her tips on how to bring colour into your home, and to uncover just what it is that makes Missoni so special.
RESCU: Missoni is a proud family business, can you tell us a little about how it came to be?
Wanda Jelmini: Textile businesses, or any type of businesses in Italy, have always been something that is family oriented. In fact, Rosita and Otavio started their own business 60 years ago, and they actually started with a business that came from my family. From our family business which was T&J Vestor, which would be 100 years old now.
The family business used to be textiles, but it started with embroidery – shawls, then it went into gowns, nightgowns, and from embroidered night gowns to dresses for women. And from dresses into any textile that you might use.
RESCU: What was your role when you first started Missoni Home 35 years ago?
Wanda Jelmini: When I started it was the first year that we were starting the Missoni home collection, and at that time it was called ‘Missoni by T&J Vestor’… I remember we started with a very small collection. It was mainly furnishing fabrics, and objects and a few cushions.
RESCU: Were the first Missoni Home customers people who had already fallen in love with the fashion line?
Wanda Jelmini: No, I don’t think so. Because at that time, to be thinking about bringing something from fashion to furniture was not so popular. We thought of it because Rosita and Otavio were actually putting their knits onto sofas, which was getting them into trouble, because everything would be stretched and pulled.
So we merged the two areas of expertise. One in the textile business, and the other one being pattern, colour and movement – the creative side. So let’s merge the two things together and bring out something that is suitable for the purpose.
RESCU: How has Missoni Home changed over the years?
Wanda Jelmini: We’re maturing as you said, it’s like when you grow up you start feeling confident to do new things. We want to try and experiment with the realisation of things that might express us in a better way.
RESCU: Have there been any emerging markets in recent years that you’ve noticed really falling in love with Missoni Home?
Wanda Jelmini: Australia’s been one, England, the West Coast of America, Brazil and all of the northern part of Europe.
RESCU: What do you think it is that makes people really fall in love with Missoni Home?
Wanda Jelmini: I always hear back from them that Missoni is making their life better. And that people might be scared to start using it – colour, it’s a challenge. It’s daring. With Missoni you need to be daring.
RESCU: I want to tell you a very personal story about my love for your brand. When my daughter was born, my mother in law made her a teddy bear and a blanket out of Missoni fabric. And she calls the teddy bear Mr Missoni. So Mr Missoni is a character, in our home, in our lives.
Wanda Jelmini: That’s fantastic… When we talk about kids, you need colourful things. Because they’re only interested in clear, interesting things that are colourful and bold. Because they need that for their brain to grow. They need to get this kind of really strong, injection of messages.
What we don’t dare to admit is that we also go on needing that. People might be scared by that, and might need to keep control, and therefore we get minimalism, absence of colour… Absence of texture. It’s just safer.
RESCU: There’s an incredible breadth to Missoni Home collections What would you say defines the Missoni Home aesthetic?
Wanda Jelmini: Missoni is never only about colour. Missoni is about play. And that is why Missoni should be affordable for every one. Because it’s a question of giving interest to anything.
Any surface that is solid, it’s never boring because it contains a message. And the message is through threads, it’s through weaving details, it’s through usage of different patterns and lines that achieve a result of three dimensions, of more interest. And it gives even a boring object something different.
RESCU: What advice would you give someone who is new to Missoni Home, but wants to add a little something extra to a room in their home?
Wanda Jelmini: You might start with a couple of cushions, or with a small rug for your bathroom, with some towels… maybe in the bathroom people might dare a little bit more. Also with a nice cushion because cushions are something that hugs you, something that you see when you let yourself go.
For Missoni Home at Spence & Lyda, visit: spenceandlyda.com.au