Before there was even a whisper of MODENUS BlogTour London, I dedicated a feature on this site to Lee Broom, a London-based furniture designer creating waves in the design world since 2007.  With one foot rooted in tradition and the other well placed in the modern world, Lee has, through a lot of hard work and creativity, risen from the world of “designer” to that of “superstar designer”.

 

This past September during the London Design Festival, he opened his first dedicated retail space in the heart of Shoreditch … mind you his lighting, furniture and accessories are already retailed in over 30 countries!  Lucky for me, the MODENUS gang was invited to tour his store and workspace during BlogTour London where we were privy to all the designs on this post.

 

You would think that a guy like Lee, with his meteoric success, walks around with a head the size of a brontosaurus.  Well I’m happy to report that if he does, I didn’t see that side of him, rather, I saw a well-grounded person.  In a short private interview with him, I asked him to answer the following questions as bullets in single words so as to not think too much about the question.  During this, I discovered a side of the designer few people probably know. Here is an excerpt:

1- What is your most marked characteristic?
Humor, politeness

2- What is the quality you most like in a man and a woman?
Man: kindness, humor, compassion / Woman: humor, glamour, companionship

3- What do you most value in your friends?
Loyalty and humor

 

4- What traits do you most dislike in others?
Rudeness

5- Which talent would you most like to have?
Running numbers in my head

6- What is your idea of perfect happiness?
Hanging out with my partner

7- What is your idea of misery?
Living in suburbia

8- If not yourself, who would you like to be?
Only for a day – Madonna because she is interesting and enigmatic

9- What do you dance to when you’re alone?
Anything from Electric, the new album from the Pet Shop Boys

 

10- What do you sing to?
“Let the Sun Shine In” from the musical Hair

11- What moves you to tears?
A good film with sadness and theatricality like Moulin Rouge

12- What’s the song playing over and over in your head?
I envision Mom saying “eyes and teeth Lee, eyes and teeth”! (that’s smile to you and I!)

I always enjoy meeting the brains and brawn behind today’s contemporary design.  It’s nice to put the human face to an otherwise static object, and something you can only do with designers working today.  It really was a privilege and a rare treat to have access to Lee Broom and see the world from his point of view.

 

richard rabel
principal
richard rabel: interiors + art
interior design and art advising
new york city

image credits: all Lee Broom, London, with the exception of the designer’s portraits sitting at his desk and pinning on the bulletin board which are by Richard Rabel.