Monday, May 14, 2018

Exciting Design News: The Great Luxury Style and Furnishings Company R&Y Augousti Paris Launches a Popup Shop at Gump’s in San Francisco This Week

Their beloved decorative objects and furniture, featuring exotic materials, sumptuous metals, and sinuous designs, are longtime favorites. Ria and Yiouri are dear friends of mine, and I love seeing them in Paris.

In three decades, R&Y Augousti has attracted passionate collectors and a devoted international clientele. Their thirty-year-old company combines craftsmanship, rare materials, and a timeless, classic style. Now, in a brilliant move, Gump’s launches a collection that also includes designs by Ria and Yiouri’s lovely daughter, Kifu, with her KIFU Paris designs, and her fiancé, Patrick Coard's shagreen candles and décor. You could call it ‘All in the Family’.

The artisanal collections, reflecting handmade techniques and materials like shagreen of eras past. are interwoven through the family signature of intricate patterns, yet retain the identity of each family member.

Welcome to San Francisco R&Y Augousti, and Kifu and Patrick. The designs are dramatic, fresh and timeless. The three collections are exclusively available in San Francisco at Gump’s. 





R&Y Augousti is extremely well known for making shagreen fashionable again. It had started disappearing from its heights in the 30s. The craftsmanship and expertise required for this technique had disappeared and the Augoustis brought it back. Other materials the company uses are shell inlay, semi precious stones- like wild agate, malachite , water snake, parchment and lizard. Patterns include mixes of these exotic materials and accented with bronze.

The R&Y Augousti design studio and head office are in Paris and everything is handmade in their factory in the Philippines. The company’s fine artists and artisans have been with them since the very beginning. They are now training the younger generations from their clans to take over. R&Y Augousit is very much a family ethos.







Gump’s is launching three new collections, KIFU Paris, R&Y Augousti Paris and Patrick Coard Paris, beginning mid-May 2018.

On a recent buying trip, Gump’s buyers discovered the three unique collections and worked with Kifu Augousti to select 52 pieces for the store.

This popup presentation features lighting, furniture, and decorative accessories. The artisanal pieces, reflecting handmade techniques of eras past are interwoven with one another through the family signature of intricate patterns, yet retain the identity of each family member.

Kifu Augousti designs home accessories and furniture with elaborate details and exotic materials. Kifu’s parents, Ria and Yiouri Augousti, are known for unique patterned décor with a classical Deco-tinged modern-meets thirties aesthetic. Kifu’s fiancé, Patrick Coard, is behind the sculptural candle collection focused on textures and sensuous shapes.









“The exquisite detail, handmade process, unpredictable and luscious combinations of materials, patterns and shapes are what makes it so special. The collections are chic, modern, rich and truly artisanal – all characteristics of designers and brands that are true to the Gump’s aesthetic.” – Director of Tabletop & Décor, Oakjoo Lee





A Close-Knit Family: The Parents, the Daughter and the Fiancée

The three collections - R&Y AUGOUSTI Paris, KIFU Paris and PATRICK COARD Paris, are named after all the family members.


R&Y AUGOUSTI
Signatures of Ria and Yiouri Augousti collections are clearly visible within the mix of their handcrafted limited edition pieces. Their dramatic new large-scale furniture is destined for collectible status. Star mirrors use elaborate handmade techniques of metal and other textures, and the collections include abstract and geographic tables, handsome desks in luxury shagreen, and smaller occasional tables, lamps, frames. Of course their boxes on shagreen and multi-colored lacquer and shell have been stars of their collections from the first day.






KIFU Paris
Although inspired by her parents, Kifu’s collection of Home Accessories and Furniture has a bold and distinct identity of its own. She has been designing product and experimenting with a range of materials since she graduated from Brown University.

Kifu uses handmade techniques of elaborate inlay patterns of shagreen, shells, semi-precious stones, materials she experienced as a child growing up in her parent’s studio, but interpreted in a younger quirkier way and with bravado. From her jewelry inspired decorative boxes, gold bar boxes, and an extravagant inlay pattern mix of shagreen and shell inspired from the feathers of exotic birds, Kifu attracts with experimentation and daring.













PATRICK COARD Paris
Kifu's young Irish/Scandinavian fiancé, inspired by his design sense and romanticism, threw the gauntlet down with a highly original collection of candles. Whilst the market has been saturated with scented candles, he went back to basics of non-scented candles. He used his love of this aesthetic to bring out a collection of candles in a shagreen texture in beautifully hand carved patterns and sculptural shapes. His inspiration from sculptors from the 30s and 40s has created a modern collection that’s dramatic and original.











Where to Find AUGOUSTI Around the World

Under one family umbrella, the three Paris brands market a unique luxury vision for the home. Their top accounts include Barneys NY, Gump’s San Francisco, Flair Florence, Forty Five Ten Dallas and the full collection is available at the R&Y Augousti flagship store at 103 rue du Bac in the 7th arrondissement of Paris, near the Bon Marché department store.




About Gump’s

From its colorful and ambitious beginning over 150 years ago as a moldings and mirror shop, Gump’s has become a San Francisco legend, recognized as The City’s premier purveyor of luxury design, including décor, fine jewelry, tabletop, silver, decorative objects, fine crafts such as glass and wood, as well as a wedding registry, lighting, and luxury gifts.

www.gumps.com
Follow Gump's on Instagram:  @gumpssf


CREDITS:
Images courtesy R&Y Augousti

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1 comment:

carrps said...

I absolutely adore shagreen, and these objects and pieces are such a lovely updating of the traditional designs.