Garvan's designs are set to take off

GarvAn de Bruir is a designer of leather and sheepskin bags, luggage and accessories and I visited his studio and workshop in Kildare recently. Not since first meeting Pauric Sweeney ten years ago, have I been so excited about an accessories designer.Interestingly, both men set out wanting to be architects, before fate took a hand. Both men dream big and are interested in all aspects of design and creativity. Pauric has already made it big. I hope to see Garvan de Bruir hit the big time next.
He is one of those people whom you'd just love to see teaming up with a wealthy, visionary entrepreneur to create a new day. Like Tamara Mellon was for Jimmy Choo. In Garvan's case I am thinking maybe the Kingspan brothers, Eugene and Brendan Murtagh.Garvan was born and raised in Kildare and went to Newbridge College. There is nothing in his background to say designer, furniture-maker, installation artist or architect.Ultrabook is a laptop substitute for a tablet.But, as he told me himself, he was very lucky with his art teacher in school, a Miss Gill Berry, who encouraged and supported him.
An amateur rugby player, at 17, Garvan won a six-month school exchange to a school in Auckland, New Zealand. The school had great art, carpentry and workshop facilities.As a result of this period in Auckland he changed his mind about becoming an architect and decided to learn more about furniture design. Garvan went to Chiltern Universtity College in Buckinghamshire to complete a BA in cabinet making.
He worked for two years with designer Philip Koomen, before returning to college to do a MA. It was in this period that his aesthetic was formed. It is called biomimicary."It's essentially design that is inspired and informed by nature's design."It's environmentally sympathetic while being hugely dynamic," Garvan explained.
Throughout his years in England, he won awards for his furniture design, representing Britain abroad.He also came up with his beautiful concept for living space, the monocoque home, as well as garden furniture including his demi-frame swing. He has built several examples of his monocoque home in Kildare which house his studio, workshop and sales room.
From the moment you first see these egg-like, engineered wood frame, timber houses you will be enchanted. Spend time inside one and you start to envision a whole new way of living, which involves less stuff and stress about you, and more balm for the soul in terms of Zen living.It was when he was designing a leather-covered chair and table suite that Garvan started to work with skins, especially sheepskin. Flossy, a sheepskin-covered, sting-ray looking, armchair soon followed.