The Wait by Six N. Five for Atelier Aveus

Ever been through a phase where you feel like you’re waiting for something to change, or something to happen? Most of us humans have. Lisbon-based brand Atelier Aveus has tapped into our collective existential angst with The Wait, a furniture collection based on the philosophical themes of waiting.

Atelier Aveus collaborated with Barcelona-based creative agency Six N. Five to create conceptual renderings displaying the collection. The team put their signature Wes Anderson-esque symmetry and pink-heavy palette to work, resulting in a series of dreamlike, intentionally strange configurations. Melancholy ladders hook over open windows, steps lead into solid walls, and other walls interrupt open spaces, serving no structural purpose.

For the collection, feelings triggered by waiting such as contemplation, passivity, and the distortion of time were translated into three pieces of furniture – a room divider, a ‘waiting sofa’, and a wall lamp. Each is presented within narrative, poetic scenarios that appear deliberately dusky and moonlit.

The wall lamp most literally evokes the ‘wait’ concept, with a single spherical bulb mimicking the infinite reflections of the moon. The blue velvet waiting sofa looks both comfy and lonely, the two seats staggered slightly apart so that occupants are not sitting directly next to one another. The room divider is abstract in design, consisting of two detached dusky red steps, and a mirrored panel connected to a curtained frame.

Each scene is a little haunting, but at the same time heavenly and serene. Simulated surrealist outlooks such as open ocean and ambiguously blue fields create an otherworldly impression, that looks beautiful but feels a little isolating. Perhaps tapping into our modern day fear of detachment and being alone with our thoughts? And perhaps encouraging us to face this fear, and wait it out rather than rushing from distraction to distraction?

Six N. Five have delved into this before; their satirical project Social Workout questions the influence of digital and social media on our psyche. Really, we could analyse this stuff all day. Have they been talking to our therapist!?