If you visited one of the astonishing Bape stores in Japan you visited a work of Wonderwall. Masamichi Katayama, the head behind the interior design studio is making marvelous store designs. He once got his name out there designing the first Busy-work-shop for Nigo and is still to this day doing everything for the collector and fashion designer. From designing new store projects to his personal Atelier or home.
There are already two Japanese books out there covering most of Katayama’s work called Wonderwall Archives (released in 2010 and 2014) so I was a bit hesitant to pick this one up at first because I was under the impression that the content would be more or less the same. There are a few overlapping projects but all the short interviews and articles about Katayama inside make this book worth the purchase alone.
It’s beautifully made by German Gestalten publishing with different types of paper inside and a lot of background information. I take it that all pictures were provided by Wonderwall directly so you can find a lot on their company website. As a huge fan of Katayama’s work and a fan of Japanese interior design, in general, I just had to get that book and can only wholeheartedly recommend it to everyone with a just a loose interest.
Like Nigo, the man behind Wonderwall auctioned off a lot of his collection last year (Nigo’s Sotheby auction) and the catalog is still on sale in Japan. Might pick that one up and share a couple of pictures with you.
Browsing the web I just found a great video which was directed back in late 2017 where Katayama shows of his office in Tokyo. He just loves decorating his workplace with art and is sharing his thoughts about collecting. This video could easily have been two hours longer. It’s just so much fun to hear this inspirational man talk.
Btw. I was always a little skeptical about the concept of using the USM Haller modular furniture for storing books. Katayama is doing exactly this with glass doors protecting his collection. I have to admit, it looks stunning.
But now let’s have a look at the book itself. If you watched carefully: In the conference room on a seat behind Katayama is the Wonderwall Case Studies book lying on top of the two Archives ones.
