A Darkly Cinematic Furniture Collection, Rooted in Retrofuturism

Use Your Illusions is the third collection we’ve featured by the Sydney-based design studio Page Thirty Three, but it’s the most cohesive by far, inspired by nostalgic visions of the future but rooted in the here and now. “I love looking at how the future was forecast 50 years ago, and comparing it to how we live today,” explains co-founder and creative director Ryan Hanrahan. “In most cases I like the alternate space-age visions that I saw on the big screen — or dreamt up as a kid — much more. I think a lot of what we design comes from these childhood obsessions.”

Obsession number 1: Guns N’ Roses, as evidenced by the collection’s title, which Hanrahan laughingly admits is only half an ’80s glam-metal reference. “I also like the words as a saying when applied to design — ‘use your illusions,’ when said from a functional perspective, makes perfect sense. You come up with these ideas/creations/illusions in your mind, then you build them into actual useful objects.” Obsession number 2: Star Wars, as written in the studio’s so-called matte-black Vader chair and chunky black-painted birch daybed (which the lookbook copy claims is ideally suited for Masters of Darkness). “Sometimes in my mind I imagine, ‘What would Darth Vader have at his beach house?’” Hanrahan says. It would all seem quite jokey and kitschy if the pieces themselves weren’t all incredibly beautiful, finely rendered pieces of sculptural design, made in Australia from often local materials — a study in contradictions that somehow resolve themselves into something legible and ultra-covetable. We got the exclusive on the new, retrofuturistic collection, which includes everything from incense burners to pendant lights, and we’re sharing here with you today.

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