Tell us more about the brand CHIC Tableware…
Defining your personal interior style often starts with your choice of dinnerware. It reflects your lifestyle, your way of dining. The importance of presentation is without doubt the key feature to a successful dinner. The power of tableware lies within its capacity to enhance the dining experience, without taking the spotlight away from the dishes. It definitely enriches the total food experience.
Keeping that in mind, the Belgian brand CHIC brings you timeless, uniquely designed tableware in combination with unique material features. Currently, the tableware industry is strongly focused on design, whilst the user-friendliness of the products is regarded as less important. To counter this, CHIC aims to produce user-friendly products with an added value.
The different product lines of the brand CHIC are developed with the vision to combine an elegant design with innovative materials (e.g. lightweight material; magnesium porcelain; mass coloured) that on their turn meet the user requirements. With its innovative tableware products, you’ll be able to create a food presentation that satisfies your own wants and needs.
CHIC was founded at the end of 2014 in Belgium and became a real success after the launch of its famous Claro Gold Range (08/2015). The young brand has already been nominated a few times for awards, mainly in the hospitality sector. The designs of CHIC are the result of a close cooperation between a Dutch-Belgian design team supported by an international team of product specialists.
How would you describe the designs and products for those who don’t know about them?
Our visual identity focuses on a distinctive personality. We search for an uncommon/interesting combination of materials and textures and bring this together in a balanced whole.
Can you give us a brief overview of some of your collections and what makes them so special?
Dark and gloomy mixed with a refreshing organic shape. Cala provides carefully shaped porcelain tableware with a black base colour. Its design is based on the perfect balance between material, shape and proportion. The lightweight nature stimulates the manageability of the items. The most surprising part of the collection lies within its innovative reactive glaze. This glaze is manually applied on each item and is made out of a mix of matte and shiny elements. Coupled with a mysteriously smoked mirrored backside, the collection ensures a high-class luxury appearance.
For the creation of its Facet collection, CHIC focused mainly on the importance of function and aesthetic values. Tactile characteristics fulfill the timelessly designed items, giving them an extra dimension. The geometric-shaped relief catches the light and creates an interesting play with shadows, causing beautiful effects that will highlight each dish served. The innovating and playful hints determine the atmosphere at the table, without taking over.
Just like the Perla, Classico and Verso collections, this highly versatile collection is also made out of the SiloxiHT formula, which allows the product to be thinner, more durable, lighter in weight and more translucent than any other porcelain product. The beautiful, shiny, off-white glaze enhances the finesse of the collection.
Oro resembles a handmade collection of elegant cutlery and accessories made of brass. CHIC found its inspiration in the royal culture of the 19th century. The Oro collection stands out because of its surprisingly classic but timeless design, a one-of-a-kind design by the brand CHIC.
All cutlery items are designed with great attention to the functional aspect. They are well shaped and fit just right in your hand, making them comfortable to use. All items are handmade, which contributes to its unique character. The soft champagne-gold finishing colour adds personality to your table, while providing it with the finishing touch you’ve always been looking for. All cutlery items are available in sets of 4pcs, which allows its users to compile their very own cutlery set.
The Oro collection is made from pure brass with a small percentage of zinc. Because of the food safety of the items, lead was not included in their composition. The items were polished to obtain the beautiful matte gold color. This process is possible thanks to the presence of zinc. Furthermore, no coating was used for the finish.
Perla (referencing the beautiful white round pearls from pearl oysters) is a symbol of innovation in several ways. It’s the iconic collection of CHIC, where elemental natural beauty is combined with updated styling. The white Perla items are made of the unique formula SiloxiHT. This formula consists of a blend of quality materials, which allows the product to be thinner, more durable, lighter in weight and more translucent than any porcelain product. SiloxiHT guarantees fine bone china looks with robust characteristics. Above this, the durable and lightweight material is a good feature for the catering and restaurant staff, but it is also perfectly suited for the airline industry. Both the chef and the person serving the plates enjoys working with it.
Perla boasts magnificent gloss and organic round shapes, which are unique. “The lightweight nature and durability really appeals to hospitality. The organic shapes look like they add a point of interest but keep quite clean lines, which is ideal. This range is very marketable and the price points make it great value for money” (Birch, 2018).
Thanks to its unique characteristics, the Perla collection was – in its year of introduction – nominated for the Horecava Innovation Awards 2018 (Amsterdam) award for the Best Innovation in the Dutch Foodservice Industry. In addition, the collection was exhibited at the “Innovation & TrendLAB” at Horecava and the “What’s New” exhibition’s area at Maison&Objet in Paris. Last but not least, the collection ended up second in the “Tableware International Awards of Excellence 2018” in the category “Hospitality”, which was awarded at Ambiente (Frankfurt). Horecava being the largest hospitality fair in the Netherlands; Maison&Objet the international authority for home decor, interior design, architecture and lifestyle culture; and Ambiente the world’s most important consumer goods trade fair. These nominations are thus an achievement on their own.
With Perla Gold, the Perla collection got a new promising sub-range. The stunning gold colour ensures a high quality dining experience. The material used differs from the special SiloxiHT material which was used for producing the white Perla items. This is because the surprising gold colour variations with metallic characteristics could only be combined with porcelain. As such, the European-made Perla Gold collection is manufactured out of highly durable porcelain, to ensure the strength and durability for which the Perla collection is known.
If you’re looking to add an extra glam to your dining experience, this range can make your table setting look simple yet sophisticated. The subtle metallic detailing adds an eye-catching element to your tableware, and it creates a great canvas for your dishes to take full focus at any special gathering.
Pairing the white items with the golden ones ensures a promising table setting, maximizing the potential of each dish served.
Are there any specific characteristics that make your products superior to others on the market?
We always look for something timeless and unique. We exclusively work with high quality and unique materials and we translate trends into a high-end refined look. Many of our collections feature a relatively simple base that gets enriched with additional color or texture accents. Its own personality makes the whole CHIC collection timeless.
What is the process of selection or design of the products? Where do you get inspiration from and what is the vision for each collection?
As said before, we always look for something timeless and unique. The designs from CHIC are the result of a close cooperation between a Dutch-Belgian design team supported by an international team of product specialists. The young brand has already nominated a few times for awards, mainly in the hospitality sector. Unique textures are applied in a refined and sophisticated way. Innovative materials are being discovered and translated into high-end tableware products.
Your products are truly beautiful, how do you hope they impact the home and dining experience?
We strive to create products that instantly lighten up and decorate the interiors of its users. We want to create a refined material experience. Our passion for beautiful and qualitative materials makes CHIC a specialist in its business.
We want our users to experience unique experiences, where a lot of attention is paid to the aesthetic and luxury. Qualitative products are used to surprise and pamper users in a wide range of tastes and styles.
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To find out more visit CHIC’s website or follow them on Instagram and Facebook.