Back to nature

WORDS Lisa Johnston 

Lees in Afrikaans.

A move from the city has inspired designer Claire Regnard to find a more organic approach to her work. Lisa Johnston caught up with her just as she launched a new range of goods for 2013. 

When Claire Regnard was offered the opportunity to set up shop at the existing Ilovani furniture showroom at The Heath – a roadside centre off the N2 just west of Plettenberg Bay – she packed up her business in the city and headed for the sea. 

Claire was previously based in Johannesburg, where she built a name for herself through her business Amoeba, which specialised in laser-cut metal interior and exterior decor. She also made customised pieces and sculpture, most prominently her nine tree sculptures dotted around Juta Street in Braamfontein. 

On her arrival in Plett she set up shop with Lisa Murray and started recreating the Ilovani furniture showroom, forming what is now known as amoeba@ilovani. Subsequently Claire’s creative repertoire has expanded to include furniture and her medium has grown to incorporate organic and recycled materials. 

“Over the past year my focus has been on setting up amoeba@ilovani and settling into my new community and creative space. The showroom has grown in character and is looking fantastic, filled to the brim with a year’s creative overflow,” she says. “We have relaxed and happy visitors appreciate what we create and can feel that our lifestyle, and hence our products, embrace beauty – outside the rat race and complexity of city living.”

This search for beauty in a natural environment has changed Claire’s stance towards design. Although she’s still making laser-cut items including decorative wall art, screens, votive candle wall pieces, hooks and lighting, and commissioned pieces such as the decorative wall art and details, like what she did for Knysna Municipality, her creativity has branched out.

Instead of focusing on trees made out of laser-cut steel, amoeba@ilovani uses trees to make other products. These include a range of smalls made from reclaimed wine barrel oak and indigenous hardwood off-cuts, which include boards and kitchenware, outdoor furniture, candle holders and wine racks. 

They also design and make larger household items such as tables, servers and shelving units out of Western Cape hardwoods and invader woods. 

Another area of the business is devoted to designing and running a project making chandeliers out of recycled wine and beer bottles. The tumbled shards of recycled glass are wired up into strands of glass droplets, which form cascading pendant lights.

To keep up with demand as well as the company’s involvement with Source-SA at the New York international gift show, Claire has taken over running and managing the Ilovani/Limited Editions workshop.

“Which means I now have four skilled woodworkers who I manage and oversee. So… I’m now a worker and manager and designer of wooden furniture and stuff,” she smiles. 

amoeba@ilovani is located at The Heath, off the N2, Plettenberg Bay, Tel 082 301 5685, 044 532 7899, amoebaconcepts.co.za