For a long time design was in my life. I knew as a previous hotel owner and owner of a cooking studio in the Netherlands that the design of a space matters. It attracts customers. So I made beautiful objects to match a space. The height, the color, the texture, a corner needed filling.
But my craft got more meaning along the way. If I make something for a space, I don’t know the story of the ones who are living in it. It felt like I wasn’t really part of it. I was just the maker. The producer. Not by mass, But it felt unconnected. 

It didn’t make me happy. I needed to fall from a roque and while I was recovering I discovered that my work is about connection. About building and reshaping lives with pieces that give a touch of softness, courage and connection. My pieces are not another beautiful object in a room.

When I had cancer and I had my last chemo and left the hospital there was this painting of a woman in a Spanish dress. I bought it. To mark the end of a time. To mark the hope of living without cancer. To mark the end of the treatments. That’s what I want that my pieces have; a meaning. A connection to stories and life. So I want to know your story as well. Why do you want what I make?

 

WHO AM I

My name is Ingrid Vermulst. I’m Dutch and live at the moment in Spain.  I spend my days with hands in clay. I am a former hotel owner, trained as an interior designer and love to work in my cooking studio in the Netherlands. Because that’s about connecting. But the cooking studio is closed because of the gasexploitation in the Netherlands and reconstruction of the building. Instead of a half year it’s going to take moren than 2 years and I need something else to connect with. 

My objects are designed to make a turning point. To remember courage. Softness. An answer to today’s mass production and AI. To relate to nature and earth again. 

My objects are more than clay, water and fire. It’s a dialogue with you. In forms, shapes and materials. A language about earth, rhythm and ancient processes. A communication about home, the time we live in and how I think about it. I try to communicatie in shapes and symbols and make objects that create a feeling of belonging. 

HOW IT COMES TO LIFE

 

Every piece starts as a shape, round and soft. To feel kindness. I built them up by and layer by layer, sometimes pierced. See it as a heart. And then at the end all pieces fall together in wall sculpture. Puzzled, finding there place. Like things in life. 
It takes time.