Architecture as a setting: the VitraHaus
The VitraHaus Loft is shaped by the architecture around it. Designed by Jacques Herzog and Pierre de Meuron and completed in 2010, the VitraHaus is Vitra’s flagship store on its campus in Weil am Rhein. Its design takes the familiar form of a house as its starting point.
The building is composed of twelve elongated gabled houses, nested within one another and fitted with large windows at their fronts. Their projections overlap and extend up to 15 metres above one another, creating a composition that can resemble a loosely stacked collection of houses. The building measures 57 metres long, 54 metres wide and 21.3 metres tall, rising above the other campus buildings.
This architecture is more than a container for the interior. By day, it frames views of the surrounding landscape; at night, its glass fronts glow like display windows, while the building’s form appears to dissolve into the dark. The monumental scale and shifting light establish a striking backdrop for the Loft, where the design turns attention towards the human scale and intimacy of home.
Designing as if someone lived there
Artist and designer Sabine Marcelis was invited to reimagine the VitraHaus Loft as part of Vitra’s annual campus design celebration, coinciding with Art Basel. Rather than treating the space as a conventional furniture display, she approached it as a home she might inhabit. The guiding question was: how would she design the space if she lived there?
That approach reflects the organisation of Marcelis’s own family home: a large, open interior divided into functional zones. In the Loft, her designs are combined with furniture and work by friends, artists and collaborators to create a connected whole. The result draws on Vitra’s catalogue but is not limited to presenting products in their standard configurations.
One example is the Kado Office shelving system, adapted to serve as both a wardrobe and a bed. The change illustrates how a furniture system can be reconsidered in response to the needs of a domestic setting, rather than treated as having only one prescribed function.
Colour as a way to organise space
Colour is the central organising device in the Loft. Marcelis selected the palette intuitively, drawing in part on colours her studio often uses in resin projects and mirror elements. Rather than following a seasonal trend, the scheme uses a different base colour in each area to help distinguish the zones within the open interior.
| Area | Base colour | Intended effect in the space |
|---|---|---|
| Lounge | Caramel | A warm, enveloping atmosphere |
| Kitchen | Rusty red | A warm definition of the food-preparation area |
| Living room | Green | A natural-feeling contrast |
| Workspace | Very light yellow | A sense of clarity and focus |
The palette combines familiar studio colours with other hues to connect the rooms visually. Its overall warmth is offset by cooler accents, including green and pink. The colours therefore perform two roles: they mark out different areas and help keep a varied collection of objects visually coherent.
The choice is also personal. Marcelis’s stated approach is to select colours she likes and does not tire of, rather than relying on a trend such as a designated “colour of the year.” That is a preference, not a guarantee that any particular palette will remain appealing to everyone. Its practical implication is more modest: colours chosen for lasting personal appeal may feel more durable to the person living with them than choices made chiefly to follow a trend.
Reconfiguring classic furniture
The Soft Modular Sofa, designed by Jasper Morrison, was rearranged into a lounge pit. Instead of the L-shaped configurations for which the modular system is generally used, its sections were joined into an enclosing seating area. The aim was to make the room feel less like a showroom and more like a place where visitors might settle in. The walls could also be used for film projections, encouraging people to spend time in the space.
This arrangement makes the sofa’s modularity visible as a practical design feature: its components can be combined into a configuration that changes how a room is used. In the Loft, the lounge pit is intended to act as a central gathering place. The interpretation is domestic rather than purely presentational—the furniture is arranged around lingering and informal use, not just viewing.
The project also introduced limited editions of two designs by Verner Panton: the Panton Chair Classic and Visiona Stool. The chair was offered in a high-gloss finish in the same seven hues used in the Loft. The cylindrical, low Visiona Stool was offered in seven limited-edition hues with different coverings, ranging from furry textures to leather. These variations foreground how colour and surface can change the character of an established form.
Both products were offered during Art Basel week at the VitraHaus and through vitra.com, with a limit of 50 pieces per colour. This describes the offer at the time; it does not establish present availability.
Art, collaboration and the memory of objects
The Loft extends beyond furniture through artworks and pieces created by other artists and designers. Maria Pratts, Johnny Mae Hauser and Carlijn Jacobs contributed works to the project. Berlin-based artist Ehsan Morshed, whose pattern-design work includes projects for fashion houses such as Martine Rose and Diesel, designed the bed sheets. His collage-based approach to pattern-making brings a further visual layer into the bedroom area.
Some of these customised pieces and accompanying artworks were made available as limited editions in the VitraHaus shop. Their role in the interior is not only decorative. The project places value on objects that carry personal histories and associations, giving the setting a narrative dimension alongside its functional and visual design. In this sense, a domestic atmosphere is created not solely through furniture arrangement, but also through the meanings attached to particular objects and collaborations.
Bringing a large catalogue into visual focus
A collection spanning many periods and styles can make an interior feel crowded if its pieces compete for attention. Marcelis’s response was to use colour as a unifying thread: related hues recur across separate areas, helping the mix feel calmer and more connected. The selection process considered the full Vitra catalogue as well as pieces by Artek, with the intention of combining old, new, unexpected and iconic designs.
This approach does not erase the differences among the objects. Instead, the repeated colour relationships provide a shared visual framework within which those differences can remain visible. It offers a useful distinction for interiors that bring together varied furniture: cohesion need not mean choosing objects from one period or style, provided another element—such as colour—helps connect them.
What the project suggests for domestic interiors
The Loft offers several ideas that can be adapted to everyday spaces, while remaining specific to a designed display environment:
- Use colour to clarify zones. In an open-plan room, a distinct base colour or repeated colour relationship can help indicate where one activity area ends and another begins without adding physical partitions.
- Consider furniture in more than one configuration. Modular pieces and storage systems may serve different needs when rearranged or adapted. Any conversion must still suit the room and the intended use; the Loft’s examples do not establish that every product can be modified in the same way.
- Build cohesion without requiring uniformity. A palette can connect objects from different periods and styles while allowing their individual forms to stand out.
- Choose personal references as well as practical ones. Objects with histories or associations can make an interior feel more particular to its occupants, rather than like a generic display.
- Treat trends as optional, not compulsory. The palette’s personal basis suggests a way to think about longevity: prioritise colours and objects that continue to appeal to you, while recognising that taste changes.
The VitraHaus Loft brings commercial display and domestic imagination together. Its design makes the difference between a showroom and a home less a matter of the objects on view than of how they are organised, adapted and given meaning. Colour defines the zones; furniture is arranged around use; and collaborations add individual associations. Together, these choices invite visitors to consider how a room can feel inhabited even when it is also presenting design.
Further resources
The VitraHaus architecture page provides information about the building and campus architecture tours. Details about the limited-edition Panton Chair Classic and Visiona Stool in this article concern their offer during Art Basel week and do not confirm whether they are currently available.
At a glance
Scope
Editorial reading; this does not constitute a visit or a technical assessment.
Sources and references
VitraHaus Loft | Official Vitra® Online Shop CH ↗23/10/2026 VitraHaus Loft | Official Vitra® Online Shop CH — Interview with Sabine Marcelis, published 27 May 2024; includes information on the Loft, its colour scheme, furniture adaptations, collaborators and limited editions.
VitraHaus | Official Vitra® Website LP ↗23/10/2026 VitraHaus | Official Vitra® Website LP — Building description, dimensions, architects and architecture-tour information.
VitraHaus | Official Vitra® Online Shop SE ↗23/10/2026 VitraHaus | Official Vitra® Online Shop SE — Building description, dimensions, architects and architecture-tour information.