How Kelly Wearstler designed her new H&M collection

The star designer talks to Fast Company about how she brought her luxe aesthetic to a mass-market audience.

BY María José Gutierrez Chavez

Swedish retailer H&M is breaking into Milan Design Week with a new collection in collaboration with the award-winning interior designer Kelly Wearstler.

Wearstler’s high-profile work, including the interiors of the Proper Hotels, and for celebrity clients like Cameron Diaz and Gwen Stefani, has earned her A-list status in the industry. Now, with a first-of-its-kind collection, H&M is bringing Wearstler’s high-end designs to Main Street.

“The constraints were very real. Everything had to work within specific production and shipping parameters. But that actually became a creative driver,” Wearstler tells Fast Company over email. “Working at this scale pushed me to distill my ideas—how to create something artisanal and expressive, but also accessible and adaptable to different ways of living.”

The 29-item collection of furniture, decorative objects, and textiles that includes a modular sofa, marble serving tray, and carved-wood vase, marks H&M’s first large-scale furniture and small-objects collaboration with a designer.

Wearstler, who wanted the pieces to feel collectible, focused on flexibility and modularity to make each object adapt to daily life. “A chair can become a sofa, smaller tables can expand into larger ones. It’s about creating a system that evolves with the user,” she says.

Wearstler and H&M’s Milan debut will take over the 17th-century baroque palace the Palazzo Acerbi—a historic venue usually closed to the public—from April 21 to 26. The palazzo’s opulent interior of frescoes and colonnades is set to contrast with Wearstler’s contemporary designs in an installation produced by Studio Boum.

“With this milestone we want to make an impact on customers and the design industry alike in a new way. When we discovered the venue—the Palazzo Acerbi—everything fell into place,” Evelina Kravaev-Söderberg, H&M Home head of design and creative, said in a press release.

How American independent bookstores made a massive comeback

© Fast Company