Design Daily: First Coalesse Retail Location Opens at San Francisco’s DZINE
Author:Sarah Virginia WhiteInnovative San Francisco design firm Coalesse creates furniture that lives along the ever-blurring line between work and life, making it the go-to brand for crossover corporate cultures. I was thrilled to get a sneak peek at its new retail outpost— where hard-working lounges, adaptable computer tables and gorgeous desk chairs hold court—at DZINE in SF’s design district.
The SW_1 chair, image courtesy of Coalesse.
“San Francisco is at the epicenter of the new work-life behavior,” says Coalesse Vice President and Creative Director Bob Arko of opening the brand’s first and only retail space in the Bay Area. The firm’s founding principle of creating furniture for the non-traditional worker has led to collaborations with designers such as Patricia Urquiola (the graceful Hosu chair, in gray, top, is a convertible lounge with built-in storage for gadgets and charging cords). “If you follow people who are working today, you realize that work isn’t a place they go, it’s something they do,” says Arko. The Coalesse crossover items at DZINE meet this proposition: Already a fan of the Hosu, I was digging the SW_1 aluminum desk chair that, with it’s ottoman, would be equally at home in front of a flat screen, and the FreeStand folding laptop table that converts to a near-flat item that can be slid under the couch.
The FreeStand folding laptop table, image courtesy of Coalesse.
The Coalesse installation is the first office that DZINE owner Cardenio Petrucci has created in his retail space on Utah St., which he has occupied since 2004. He added unexpected vintage details, such as old electronics, football helmets and toy trucks. “In today’s loose-working environments, people are also working 12 hours per day,” says Petrucci of the personalized style of the new space. “I thought about who would live in this space and about making it familiar for myself, so I brought in things that I love.”
