The Sruli Recht studio is a cross-discipline practice caught somewhere between product design, tailoring and shoe making. For Sruli Recht, design is not just about making a beautiful object: his concepts are based on the resonance of process – ‘It’s about making things that people didn’t know they needed, but now cant live without’ – perhaps because they are functional, perhaps because they look nice, but mostly because they provide them with a new way of experiencing things in life. It is about making the aesthetic and functional qualities integral parts of our lives.
His influences derive from Futurism, Cyberpunk, Russian Constructivism, Industrial design and Science-Fiction writing – particularly the work of Philip K. Dick and Bruce Sterling, whilst his scope of work blurs the borders between the various forms of design. His work has attracted awards and partnerships with names such as Alexander McQueen for whom he contributed as pattern-cutter and show piece maker for the brand’s fashion collections, whilst his “Show Piece One - “Icarus, post-crash” was collected by Karl Lagerfeld himself.
His approach to design is poetic and strongly conceptual, serving as veiled social commentary and primarily focused on design and concept rather than mass production and broad commercial appeal. Examples of this include the production of a full-sized Polar Bear skin fashioned out of 15 Icelandic sheepskins, a buckle-less belt eliminating the need to remove it at airport security and a one-off ring made of his own abdominal skin removed in a video-documented surgery and mounted on a 42 kt gold ring.
