aggebo&henriksen

What happens when you ask two talented designers to take a look at a standard product like Troldtekt panels? They naturally go straight to the core, refine the product, and help the rest of us to see cement-bonded wood wool in a new light. Mathilde Aggebo and Julie Henriksen have given Troldtekt new vitality and visual appeal.

Mathilde Aggebo and Julie Henriksen both trained at Danmarks Designskole and later founded aggebo&henriksen. They work with the interplay between craftsmanship, architecture, industrial production and design. They have been highly acclaimed for their decoration of Tietgen Residence Hall in the Ørestad district, and have recently worked with architects such as Henning Larsen Architects, Lundgaard og Tranberg and 3 x Nielsen. 

Working with a 100% natural product while being offered the chance to use mass production creatively immediately appealed to designer duo aggebo&henriksen. After having experimented with format, colour and form, the two designers ended up with four exciting Troldtekt decoration series. „The structure and lines of a Troldtekt panel resemble coarse felting and are therefore very much like textile.” Designer Julie Henriksen was quick to draw parallels with her weaver’s education when she held a Troldtekt panel for the first time. Since the Spring of 2007, she and her colleague Mathilde Aggebo have put their mark on four different Troldtekt decoration series, making it possible to combine good acoustics with attractive decoration of large wall or ceiling areas.

Japanese inspiration in Ørestad
The two designers form the dynamic designer duo aggebo&henriksen, a highly recognised name in textile design, graphic printing and Unika Vaev weaving. The two have worked with large architectural firms such as Henning Larsen Architects, Lundgaard & Tranberg and 3 x Nielsen. In 2006, the duo achieved a considerable breakthrough in architecture with the much appraised artistic decoration and colour-setting at the Tietgens College in the Ørestad district of Copenhagen, including Japanese-inspired processing of the plywood panels on the walls.

Thrilled about Troldtekt
The two designers immediately recognised the potential of working with Troldtekt when, following an article in the Danish construction trade journal Byggeriet on their artistic decoration of the Tietgens College, they were contacted by Niels Kappel from Troldtekt A/S. He envisioned a potential for further development of their concept for Troldtekt decoration, the cement-bonded wood wool being printed with different styles, says Mathilde Aggebo. „We were immediately thrilled about the idea of collaboration – with the clear reservation that we did not want to work with weaving. Instead, we wanted to establish creative use of the mass production. Troldtekt is a really good story about a 100% natural product that involves wood being loaded into one end of the plant and finished panels coming out at the other end”, she continues.

Experiments in colour and form
The designers received numerous samples of Troldtekt of varying levels of coarseness and they started experimenting in colours and forms. „Many questions needed answering. How do we create something that can be used in many different settings? How do we paint the panels without losing the textured surface character? What type of paint can we use? And how do we ensure a durable surface? We liked the panel as it was and didn’t want to turn it into something else”, explains Mathilde Aggebo.

Material confidence
In the ‘Turboladen’ workshop at the Danish Art Workshops in Copenhagen, Julie Henriksen and Mathilde Aggebo laid the Troldtekt panels on the floor in small and large formations, allowing them to test different colour combinations and patterns. „We quickly became familiar with the material. We could sense the possibilities of infusing the cementbonded wood wool with an extra layer of meaning and it was important to maintain a certain level of transparency. Our idiom was also important and over the whole series we chose to work with clear geometric forms”, says Julie Henriksen. The outcome of the work process was thataggebo&henriksen delivered four Troldtekt decoration series – ‘Stripes’, ‘Clouds’, ‘Labyrinth’ and ‘Lotus’. The duo has used the specially designed solutions to prove that aesthetics and acoustics can easily come together in synergy.

THE WALL LABYRINTH
36 randomly installed Troldtekt panels form an intricate labyrinth on the conference room wall at Junckers Industrier A/S in Køge, south of Copenhagen, Denmark. Junckers, Europe’s leading manufacturer of solid hardwood floors, chose Troldtekt decoration with aggebo& henriksen’s design when they needed to improve their conference room acoustics. „Our conference room had very poor acoustics. When we were all gathered around the table, it was next to impossible to have a conversation. This was tiresome and untenable in the long run. Something had to be done. We also wanted to take the opportunity to make the room more inspiring to be in”, says Jakob Mallan, Department Manager of Production Service at Junckers Industrier. Each of the 36 square Troldtekt panels has the same pattern applied but the variation arises through alternation between positive and negative. Furthermore, the panels can be oriented at random and therefore appear in many different combinations.