Studio WAK is a Korean design studio founded by industrial designers Se Hyeon Won and Namju Kim, based in Germany. The studio creates furniture, products, and interior objects shaped by everyday use, material properties, and hands-on experimentation. Their work often begins with simple physical gestures—bending, cutting, joining, or peeling—and develops them into functional, precise objects.

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Curved Coat Stand started from a very simple observation: a straight line suddenly becoming a curve.

We were interested in that moment when a flat, straight sheet begins to bend, and the character of the material changes completely. A flat metal sheet can feel cold, rigid, and industrial. But once it’s bent, it begins to hold tension, direction, and even a kind of softness.

The first question was not “how do we design a coat stand?” It was more basic: can a single bent sheet become a function? Can the curve itself hold something, support something, or create a structure?

We started by bending thin, flat sheets of metal and making many small prototypes by hand. We were looking for shapes where the bend was not decoration but the reason the object could work. Through that process, three metal sheets of different lengths came together. The lower curves became the legs, and the upper curves became the places to hang clothes.

That was the moment Curved Coat Stand began to make sense to us: the object didn’t need an added hook or an added structure. The same gesture—bending a flat sheet—could create both the form and the function.

One of the hardest moments was realizing that the most important part of the
product would also be the hardest to produce.

Curved Coat Stand depends on a very specific curve. The radius is not just a
visual detail. It decides the balance of the object, the way the metal touches the floor, the height of the hanging points, and the overall presence of the piece.

Because we are a small studio producing in small quantities, it was difficult to find a metal workshop that could bend the sheets exactly the way we needed. Many standard bending processes were not suited to that curve, or they made the result too difficult to control.

For a while, we were not sure if we could make the product in the way we had designed it. But changing the curve felt like changing the entire object.

So instead of compromising the form, we built our own solution. We designed and made a bending jig and tool that allow us to bend the metal at the exact position and radius we need. It takes more time and effort, but it lets us keep the curve that gives the coat stand its structure, stability, and character.

That was a turning point for us. We realized that as a small studio, sometimes the answer is not to simplify the idea to fit an existing process, but to create a process that protects the idea.

Some people asked whether the hanging points could all be placed at the same height or whether we could add more places to hang clothes. From a purely functional point of view, those were natural questions.

But we didn’t want Curved Coat Stand to become a tool for holding as many clothes as possible. We wanted it to stand quietly in a space as an object, even when nothing is hanging on it.

So, we kept only three hanging points and allowed them to remain at different heights. This made the object more minimal, but it also created a subtle rhythm and variation within the form. The different heights also became useful in practice. Children and adults or people of different heights can naturally use different parts of the coat stand.

For us, the important thing was not to add more function but to keep only the amount of function the object needed—enough for it to feel convincing both when it is in use and when it is empty.

We removed anything that explained the function too loudly.

In the beginning, it would have been easy to add more hooks, more parts, or more obvious details that made the object immediately read as a coat stand. But each addition made the object less clear to us. The more we added, the further it moved away from the original idea: a flat sheet becoming functional through a single bend.

So, we tried to remove the elements that were only there to make the object more familiar. We didn’t want to hide the structure behind extra parts, and we didn’t want the object to become a collection of useful features. We wanted the bend itself to do the work.

That process of removal was not about making the product look minimal. It was about keeping the relationship between form and function direct. In the final object, the lower curves become the legs, the upper curves become the hanging points, and the wooden column quietly holds the three sheets together. Everything justifies its place.

After SaloneSatellite, Studio WAK feels like it is standing in front of wider
possibilities. We are in conversation with different brands, and some of our
works may move forward through collaboration or licensing.

At the same time, we are continuing our own experiments with materials, structures, and new object typologies. But for us, the next step is not simply about making more products or moving toward larger production. What we want to keep doing is translating small gestures found in everyday structures and materials into objects. We are interested in moments when a line begins to bend, when a sheet peels away, or when a cut becomes a point of support. These small physical changes can create both form and function.

We would recommend Noknok Studio, whom we met during SaloneSatellite. Their work has a clear formal character without feeling exaggerated, and we appreciate how they interpret material qualities in their own way. Their Loop Lamp especially stayed with us because it balances a simple gesture, material expression, and function beautifully.

Tubular by Ingo Maurer, which sits on our desk.

Oki Sato’s Problem Solving Lab. We read it when we first started designing together, and we still return to it when we feel stuck.

We walk out together to buy croissants, make coffee, and talk through the day’s schedule.

A pair of Adidas sneakers with a 3D-printed sole.

Don’t keep it in your head for too long. Make it at full scale as soon as possible and don’t be afraid of failing.

Cappuccino with oat milk, for both of us.

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