So I knew an industrial designer now. Great! So I sent Marcel an email with on old idea I had of a modular shelf system. And he was not even that negative about it. Nice. So I thought: let’s give it a go. To help me out, Waacs made some great product renderings of my idea that I named A+B. Then it would be nice to have it made and what would be even better, that it would be presented at the annual Via Milano exhibition. So I contacted the organization on how to get in. Their answer was simple, you have to go via milano. Show your work at the Salone Internazionale del Mobile, and maybe you will be selected for the exhibition. Okay, so I need to present in Milan. I knew that Waacs was also presenting a project there. So I contacted Marcel and asked if it would be an option to get some of their space. Stupid question obviously.

At 11 I ran into Geert van de Wetering, at that time working for VPRO. He was setting up a new tv-show about design, high and low culture, called Picabia. If I was interested into doing some work for that. I told him about me Milan plans and that it might be a great idea to have that as an item in Picabia. He thought so too. It was three weeks before the Salone started, but I still didn’t know if I could use some exhibition space of Waacs. So I called Marcel, that if I would arrange a camera crew following him from conception of his project to Milan, if that would be a fair trade. It was. Hurray! Now I had a place in Milan. And little time to find out if that idea that I had would actually work, to create a model to show in Milan and make it look good. The rest is history:

Marcel managed to ‘hack’ himself into the presentation in Milan, in a presentation of 20 Dutch and Belgian designers who present themselves collectively as ‘Tutto BeNe’. The designers of WAACS (best known for its award-winning design of the Senseo, the best-selling coffee machine of all time) have been so kind to host and support him. His presentation is a kind of a ‘flashmob’ presentation since only three weeks ago he decided had to show his design in Milan. Dutch television picked up his ‘guerilla’ action and is following him in his unconventional ‘road to Milan’.

For the cultural VPRO television program, ‘Picabia’, Marcel is filmed during the development of his very first prototype leading up to the launch of the ‘A+B’ at the Furniture Show in Milan, 5-10 April 2006. This VPRO broadcast will be aired 16 April 2006 at 22:20, Net 3.

We kept in contact ever since. And I joined in on occasion to work on some projects as well. When I called Marcel end of 2007 to ask for advise on a pile of job options I had, he simply said: ‘Why not here?’ It was the most unexpected thing to do, so for me it made all the sense in the world. So I did. I left 9 months later, but we still do projects on occasion and that are always great, high energy projects with unexpected but great outcomes. Not the ordinary, for ordinary people. How it should be.

Oh, A+B was selected by the Via Milano organization for an exhibition. Mission completed.