Bernardaud and we+ explore colour’s organic drift on porcelain
The Limoges porcelain house collaborates with Tokyo design studio we+ on Les Éditions Nomades, a limited collection inspired by the fluid logic of chromatography and natural systems.
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Water moves through ink and divides it. Colours separate, diffuse and layer. The principle of chromatography, a technique used to isolate pigments, becomes on porcelain something closer to witnessing paint think. Bernardaud and the Tokyo design studio we+ have built their first collaboration, Les Éditions Nomades, around this precise phenomenon, translating scientific process into visual poetry on glazed ceramic surfaces.
Founded in 2013 by Toshiya Hayashi and Hokuto Ando, we+ works at the convergence of art, science and engineering, their research driven practice attuned to the intelligence embedded in natural systems. For this partnership, the studio drew from Nature Study, an extended investigation into how organisms and materials behave, how they respond to environment and chance. The chromatographic principle offered a bridge: allow water to move through pigment on unglazed porcelain, and the result is neither controlled nor entirely arbitrary but something in between, where the material and the moment collaborate.
The gradient patterns that emerge are organic, layered with unexpected colour interactions. Soft greens shift into ochre. One tone bleeds into another. The porcelain surface becomes a record of this gentle motion, each piece marked by its own waterborne journey. The Limoges manufacture, the house known for technical refinement across centuries, holds the craft that allows such delicate effects to endure in glaze and form.
Les Éditions Nomades arrive in limited quantities. They are available in Japan and through Bernardaud’s website, each one distinct, marked by the conversation between intention and the drift of water through pigment.
Imagery courtesy of Bernardaud (@bernardaud).