Twist table
Easy chair
Bowl
Desk
Bamboo table
1. What event in your life influenced you to become a designer?
My father, who made beautiful stylized wooden animal figures.
My stay in Kenia with the Akamba. They inspired me with their craftsmanship, such as ironwork and wood cutting. Apart from very practical utensils, such as stools, kitchen utensils, bowls and agricultural appliances, they also make all kinds of sculptures. I also started in that period with one of their favourite kinds of wood: muhuhu wood. It smells lovely when you are working it; it’s also called surrogate sandalwood. I lived far away in the bush, not distracted by the TV or other urban agitation, with a beautiful nature, a view of the Kilimanjaro. Making wooden and stone sculptures is a delightful waste of time then.
The request for a beautiful desk for an office in 1995. I designed and made my first furniture sculpture then. Very inspiring to be working from idea to object.
2. When did you know that you wanted to become a designer?
From my primary schooldays onwards I already made steps in the direction of sculpting. I made my first wooden little sculpture then: a piglet. By the end of the Nineties I decided to focus more on the making of functional sculptures. I started my own company Meubelbeelden (Furnisculptures).
3. Is it difficult for young designers to find proper jobs when they have graduated?
That’s a question I can hardly answer. I did not receive an education in design, and I have a technical background. I just started sculpting more and more, and I developed myself by doing. That was, and remains a fascinating expedition. I keep finding people who are interested in my work, and who buy it as well.
4. Are people becoming more and more interested in modern design? How do you notice?
I think that people have always been interested in beautiful shapes. Just look at the beautiful examples from history. But now you see that design is applied in almost all products around us in a conscious way. Because of the current production methods, design has become accessible to many people. I do experience that people are very interested in my furnisculptures as a counterpart to industrial mass products. As a sculptor I make unique objects according to traditional methods. I use natural materials, such as stone and wood, and recently bamboo as well.
5. What is a good design in your opinion?
A good design is logical, simple, in balance, and made of natural materials.
6. How do your ideas come into being?
My ideas arise everywhere and often in a flash. Sometimes I have a piece of stone or wood lying around in the garden or my studio for months, and then I suddenly see an object or sculpture in it. Sometimes a few lines on paper (old envelopes work very well) lead to a design. Consequently I work out these ideas in small-scale models. While I’m working, often new ideas arise, derived from the basic principle that was worked out in the first design. When I’m working in commission, the combined action with the client will lead to the final design.
7. What inspires you?
Shapes from nature: flowers, plants, rocks, and people as well. I listen to my customers. Their story and the place for which they are looking for a design often provides clues for the final design. Apart from that I look for a logical interplay of forces in my designs. My training as a civil technical engineer comes in handy. When you take a good look at my designs, you can see how that background is inspiring me.
8. What is the most fascinating in your work?
The combination of thinking and doing, working with my head and with my hands, is what fascinates me the most. I consider myself to be a sculptor, and I am still making sculptures. I think up the concept, and I make them. It is beautiful to see how a sculpture that you thought up in your head, will finally emerge from a piece of material. At first it is crude, but eventually the texture and the marking in the material will help to strengthen the form. And only in that final phase everything falls in place. And I see all of that happening.
9. What are you currently working on?
At the moment I am working on a table object for a company in the surroundings of Deventer. It consists of three elements: a desk, a conference table and a sort of cabinet with a drawer. The three objects are connected to each other in a hinge point. The object is made from bamboo It’s a beautiful material to work with. It gives the design a beautiful look. Bamboo is also a sustainable material. Apart from that I am currently working on a series of bowls/sculptures in bamboo.
10. Who is your favourite designer? Why?
I am a great admirer of the sculptors Brancusi, Barbara Hepworth and Henry Moore, in particular their heavily stylized shapes and abstract sculptures appeal to my imagination. They are looking for the essence.
The same goes for Isamu Noguchi, who does not perceive a line between sculpture and design, which is eminently made clear by the book “Isamu Noguchi Sculptural Design”.
11. What design would you liked to have designed yourself? Why?
A beautiful design by Isamu Noguchi is the table he made in 1948 for William A. Burden. I would have loved to design that one myself.
Head marble
Bookcase
Dining table Balance 
Paul with sculpture 
Under construction