A traditional item in an improved form, or how I designed my treasure chests

Sometimes it may seem that some things cannot be modernized, and the solutions that someone else came up with before us are the best, but I have a different opinion and my treasure chests are a good example of this.

In fact, I first started carving reliefs and thought to myself: why is classical art not applied? And why does applied art not have full artistic values? Does it really have to be like this? And I answered myself the last question: No! It doesn't have to be that way. This was the moment when I came up with my method of designing applied art.

Observing what the applied arts market looks like, I noticed that first a given object is designed, it is given appropriate functions and the style of performance is determined, and only then decorative elements are matched to it. In this case, the embellishments are almost always simplified to match the previously chosen style of the item. This approach has some advantages as it does not require the designer to be an artist and the design can be done by factory workers. On the other hand, typically artistic things almost always do not have utility functions, which is of course not their disadvantage. However, I decided to approach the design in a completely different way and it gave very good results.

Namely, first I design a purely decorative thing, e.g. a relief pattern, an interesting arrangement of stones, a pattern to be engraved or burned, a stained glass window made of epoxy resin in wood, etc. Thanks to this, I obtain an object of high artistic quality. Only then do I wonder what utility can be added to this ornament so as not to disturb its appearance. This is how I got the way I make my chests, which are very different from others available on the market. I also think a lot about the best design of the usable part of the item, e.g. watching other chests, I noticed a few things in them that in my opinion were not well thought out. One of them was that ornaments most often engraved or painted were on the top of the chest. Then I thought that I often put other things on the boxes and then these decorations would not be visible. So I came up with the idea that the main decoration should be at the front of the chest, because that's where it can be seen best, and you can also put something on it without covering the decorations. You can even put several chests on top of each other and then you can see all the reliefs and other decorations, and to make it easier, I don't make legs for them, I just glue felt pads. I also care about the durability of my trunks, so I use wood, not plywood, to make them, I line their bottom with a sponge and a pleasant to the touch material, so that the items stored in them are safe.

I use this design method for almost all the items I make and it makes them even more unique.

Below are some examples of chests that I have already made.