Uniqwa Collections

UNIQUE DESIGNER FURNITURE WITH A STRONG FOCUS ON RAW AND NATURAL MATERIALS.

With a strong African flavour, Uniqwa Collections is, as the name describes, uniqueness with a difference.

Established in Queensland in 2009 by South African born Charl van Heerden, Uniqwa is all about simplicity and art combined with function; the pieces are organic, earthy and naturally modern.

Much of Charl’s inspiration originates from Africa, the stunning natural luxurious resorts and the tribal influences.

“I am, and always have been, inspired by the culture that I grew up in. It is such a creative place where people use materials often overlooked to create the most amazing pieces of art. I have learned that there is the potential for beauty in everything around us, but it is the way we use it, the way we see it and the way we apply it that makes it beautiful.”

Central to the business philosophy is the aim to provide unique contemporary designs that are influenced by nature and ethnic cultures. Sustainability, the unique quality of handmade furniture and accessories and the combination of textures to create a tactile, earthy environment are ideas that often feature as van Heerden talks about his business.

Charl took a slightly circuitous route to get to this point with his business, and it hasn’t always been smooth sailing. Trial and error, good timing and bad timing, surviving the Brisbane 2011 Floods mixed with sheer determination, belief, serendipity and a love of furniture have seen Uniqwa thrive over the past years.

As a young man growing up in Cape Town, South Africa, Charl had intended to divide his time between work and his passion for furniture. It hadn’t occurred to him how he could develop a career around something he considered to be a hobby. So, he embarked on a business degree in commerce and marketing only to change tack after discovering that he could merge work and play with furniture design and manufacturing.

Charl left South Africa for Australia and enrolled in a Diploma of Furniture Design and Technology at RMIT in Melbourne. As he learnt more about modern furniture production, he became reminded about the beauty of handmade pieces, natural materials, a sustainability ethos and ethnic cultures. The idea

IMAGE COURTESY UNIQWA COLLECTIONS

The name ‘Uniqwa’ – an Africanised twist on the word ‘unique and a simple way to capture the principle idea behind the brand – evolved during his studies at RMIT. “We were encouraged to start developing our own brand back then, and I was quite fresh out of South Africa at that time. It still had a predominant influence in my life,” he explains.

“We are all inspired by different natural elements around the world, so I wanted to develop a company that helped to bring those experiences and memories that people gather as they travel,” he says of his aim to reproduce those feelings through the way people decorate their homes.

A lot of the inspiration for a new product is born in the resorts of South Africa and other African resort destinations, with manufacturing done in Southeast Asia. New designs begin with sourcing the right product that fits within the business philosophy and enhances the brand. As the range continues to expand, it naturally begins to reach a wider market which leads to more opportunities and connections with designers and other established brands.

“We are heavily focused on quality control, improving continuously everything that we do and not just finding a product and selling into the market. We are continuously focused on development.”

“We don’t really scout out trends and try and follow trends. We see where there is interest in the market, but we always try and add our own element to make it unique,” he says. “If other people are doing a product we do, we will probably stop doing that. We don’t want to compete in the market with the same product. We want to compete in the market in uniqueness.”

Their product hits the spot for contemporary casual living and outdoor furniture. Charl believes in moving towards more raw and natural products and away from 100 per cent synthetic products that are typical of the outdoor market. He notes that clients are leaning towards more natural materials. “There’s definitely a focus on outdoor fabrics and increasing the variety and options and almost bringing an inside look to the outdoors,” he says.

“We don’t feel there needs to be a different look just because furniture is used in a different application. Obviously, the materials need to be able to handle the extreme conditions that Australia throws at us, but if we can incorporate an indoor look or relaxed look, it doesn’t matter whether it’s used indoors or outdoors as long as it fits the theme you want to achieve.”

What began as a love of furniture and hobby for the young man from Cape Town has become a constant at every stage of his life. It’s a business and lifestyle that he is passionate about sharing with his family, the design community and the wider market.

“It’s the one thing that ticks all the boxes,” he says.

My Yellow Room

Kim Williams’ Inspiring Story

Kim reveals the inspiration behind her book My Yellow Room and how it shaped her perspective of the design process.

Kim Williams is a creative behaviour strategist and runs a full-service Cape Town-based interior design studio. She is known for her unique approach to interiors which blends creative, behavioural and design strategies.

Presenting at Decorex, Kim will be expanding on how the world of interior design has shifted and its evolution has become about “interior intelligence”. She is on a constant search for what is coming next, how the world is changing and what this means for design and her work.

Her deepest passion centres around designing to positively impact the physical and emotional lives of her client’s so that they can live their best possible life – at home and work. This passion is also evident in her property development and commercial design projects where understanding what people are needing from their spaces and how interiors can serve them better to improve the way they live and work is key.

Her journey with design started in her bedroom where she spent many years indoors as a young child born with a club foot. “I was always drawn to the colour yellow. It made me feel happy, like I was basking in golden light,” says Kim in her book. “I dreamed of my bedroom being yellow and filled with this light. A place where everything felt in harmony. Where every item contributed to the glow and flow of the space. It was there that my journey as an interior designer began. I just didn’t know it yet.”

Kim explains that she is so grateful for this early time in her Yellow Room as a child, because it led her to renovating her own properties during her early twenties, then took her to corporate workspaces as a change management consultant and behaviour specialist for over twenty years, and finally culminating in her life’s passion, interior design.

“All these experiences led up to this one moment: the creation of Kim Williams Design where I get to live my passion and purpose every day.” Today Kim has the portfolio to go with her passion; she has worked across building and construction projects, alongside developers and architects for over 111 new apartments, 18 residential homes, 8 renovations and 4 commercial projects in the design phase, with many more in the pipeline. These projects include a variation of interior architecture, interior strategy, design and finishing, as well as soft furnishing and installation.

So, why write a book? My Yellow Room

Kim’s idea for the book germinated as she started writing a blog in 2020 during the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic and lockdown. She began using this time to understand what she wanted out of the next chapter of her life. Kim soon realised that her experiences could help many people navigate the unknown of being in a confined space - how to understand what they needed in order to function better - and how to use this knowledge to improve their quality of life and manage their mindset in an incredibly challenging time. “If they could understand the basic principles of how a space affects their wellbeing, mindset and energy - that small things make a big difference - then somehow this could free them from the limitations of this time,” she says.

As she wrote the blog and received positive feedback, this idea grew to combine all these lessons into a book that would inspire others through the lens of her life as a creative behavioural strategist.

Follow me on social media @kimwilliamsdesign or sign-up for my regular blog and InSights newsletter by visiting www.kimwilliams.co.za - where you can also redeem your free copy of my new e-Book MyYellowRoom. Simply add the code, DECOREX2021, to your cart at checkout to get your exclusive copy!