‘The Frankfurt Kitchen, designed by Margarete Schütte-Lihotzky in 1926 for the New Frankfurt social housing project, is considered the first streamlined,standardised, built-in kitchen. It marked a departure from the series of individual, scattered, furniture-like items that previously formed the vernacular European kitchen.Like most modernist innovations, it has now been taken to extremes: a great homogenisation and standardisation has occurred.White melamine chipboard is king; 60 cm units suit standardised appliances, a consistent depth both metaphorically and practically. Countertops conform toa series of letter-based pseudonyms, and many deserted islands.Ghost Kitchen is a reactionary installation, an attempt to inject energy, de-serialise and fantasise about the standard chipboard material. It exists with a foot in both worlds: embracing the 60 cm module gospel while decorating it with carved reliefs. A series of new pieces by Soft Baroque populate this space around the kitchen table, built-in modules, and fire pit, a return to a versionof primitive cooking and living, realised through high-tech and advanced materials.The space is a strangely proportioned room; one enters a pit, descending a set of stairs. There is a feeling of a subterranean working environment, something not supposed to be public-facing, but perpetually back-of-house. Like the ghost kitchens set up to appear as normal walk-in restaurants, yet catering only to food delivery customers, considering the disparity between outward appearance and real everyday life.Our practice sometimes feels like a ghost kitchen: making things and sending them off from our studio, accompanied by a curated online presence.’ Opening 20 Apr at 17:00Open 21–26 Apr, 12:00–18:00 Via Leone Pancaldo 1220129 Milano
Designers
Soft Baroque
