British artist and avant-garde designer Samuel Ross is actively pushing the boundaries of art and design, unveiling new art installations at the recent Design Shanghai exhibition.

As the founder of the industrial design studio SR_A, Ross partnered with bathroom & kitchen product producer Kohler for a site-specific installation at the Bund Financial Center in celebration of radical designs.

Continuing the legacy of Kohler x SR_A's previous architectural structures, Terminal 03 guides visitors through an enclosure that creates a counterweight between object and space.

The striking angles and industrial bold Haptic Orange color of the faucet and toilet defy its traditional design and performance. The industrial Haptic Orange hue pays homage to Kohler's 1967 debut of "Tiger Lily" in its bathroom line, blending Ross's signature color with Kohler's legacy of color innovation.

"Terminal 01 and 02 are always about having this slightly limitless and borderless expression of water moving, how water moves through engineering, pipes underneath our feet, and it was more a celebration of, you could say, a millennial work or engineering," says Ross, who launched avant-garde fashion brand A-Cold-Wall.

"When it comes to Terminal 03, it's much more about the placement of the products themselves and the feeling that you want when you're engaging in hygiene activities, so almost having this balance between a cleanly breeze and an open space and the movement of air through the space was one factor and this idea of privacy coming about," he adds.

The collaboration between Ross and Kohler dates back to 2023 when Kohler debuted the Kohler x SR_A Formation 01 through the interactive installation Terminal 01 at the Design Miami 2023.

The form of water flow was redefined by the new design language with abstract and reductive use of form and color, achieving a perfect balance between future-forward design and industrialism.

To further celebrate the partnership at Milan Design Week 2024, the collaborative product Formation 02 smart toilet was unveiled at FuoriSalone through a large-scale and site-specific installation titled Terminal 02.

Visitors were invited to navigate through a maze-like network of industrial pipes. The industrial, brutalist products and installation sit within the grand pillars of the historic Palazzo del Senato, bringing a kind of formless aesthetic that utilizes elements of natural landscape juxtaposed with industrial and scale engineering.

Both the Formation 01 bathroom faucet and Formation 02 smart toilet were showcased in the Shanghai installation.

Ross reflects on his attraction to Kohler, noting, "What called me about Kohler was on site the amount of artisans and craftspeople...It's always so difficult to find really skilled artisans and Kohler had this vision you could say of being able to protect local artisans."

The shared commitment to craftsmanship enabled a seamless collaboration in art and design, fostering a dynamic partnership where both parties worked together as a cohesive team to solve design challenges.

"Once we had established the partnership, it would not just be a designer and a company, but it would be a co-studio where it was our architectural team and our design team integrating the Kohler's industrial design team," Ross says.

Founded in 2019 by Ross, SR_A is a progressive design studio that has produced collaborative, commercial projects with the LVMH Group, Apple Group and Nike Group, as well as independent technology and design-driven companies.

Ross's work with A-Cold- Wall on iconic footwear such as the Nike Air Force 1 & Converse Chuck Taylor All-Star exemplifies his ability to merge high-fashion aesthetics with athletic functionality.

But on the path of artistic exploration, Ross has never been limited to one single field, always searching for new directions.

"I think that there's this desire to seek newness and to bring risk back into commercial practices," Ross explains, "We can't keep sticking to mid-century European principles on design in China anymore because we're not from that canon. I think this is really important to push into the unknown for our generation to at least try to determine what we can add to the lexicon of design and the arts as a whole."

Interpreting that A-Cold-Wall being sold recently, Ross says, "A-Cold-Wall was my journey through boyhood. SR_A will be the journey through manhood, and I hope to take our community on that journey."

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