Curated is a online shop, specialising in British eco-friendly design. Founder Greer Peachey insists on complete transparency about where products have come from and what they’re made of. Greer is a fellow klc-er (and People Will Always Need Plates fan!). I always enjoy talking to people who make a living from their own design ideas, so I was keen to grill her about how she got Curated off the ground…
Greer, welcome to confessions of a design geek. Perhaps you could start by telling me a little bit about you, your background and how you came up with the idea for Curated?
When I was little, I’d always be building houses out of Lego, right down to little sofas and tables. This developed into a full blown furniture obsession which led me to study interior design at Central Saint Martins and klc.
Before I graduated, I spent a lot of time visiting exhibitions to find products for my projects and thought it would be a lot easier if all my favorites were available on one site. And the idea for Curated was born.
I found a lot of high street stores gave minimal information about their materials and country of origin, so I decided to concentrate on British designed and made pieces. As a lot of our designers are independent, they know what their materials are and are happy to share that information. Also, as independent designers, they are happy to customise a product to suit the customer, which is great – I often found that I wanted to buy things in different sizes to those available.
Cwch table by MijMoj
What did you learn along the way?
I learnt to ask friends for an honest opinion. When you work on something for a period of time, you begin to think that nothing could go wrong. I went out to lunch with some friends one day and told them about the project – and they absolutely hated the name! I’m not telling you what the original name was, but if we’d kept it, it would have totally pigeonholed us!
George chair by &Then Design
What’s been the hardest and the most fun part of making this all happen?
Lack of sleep has been a struggle. I used to be a solid eight hours a night girl. Now I wake up in the middle of the night with a burning idea and have to go and sort it out straight away. My husband often finds me at my desk at 3am, takes one look at me and just says ‘Okay, carry on.’ as he knows I won’t be able to sleep until I’ve got the idea out of my head.
I absolutely love tracking down new designers, so visiting them at exhibitions is usually the most fun part. They really appreciate the honesty and transparency of what we’re trying to do.
What’s different about Curated from any other online design shop?
We’re very contemporary for an exclusively British furniture site. A lot of sites tend to be full of Scandinavian and Italian pieces (which I still love), but British pieces are just as fabulous!
Curated has a very strict environmental policy that designers must adhere to before they can sell through the site. There are many parts to it, but I would say that the most important bits are:
Keep it local – if a piece is made in the UK, this cuts down on transport pollution and helps the UK manufacturing industry in employment. If the materials are sourced locally too, so much the better.
Durability – if a piece is built well from great materials, it should last longer than the customer! Think of it as a future heirloom.
Recyclable – can the materials be recycled at their end of their life? This cuts down on future waste, and may even lead to upcycled pieces.
Aurum 20K light by Endesigns
Why is it important to you to promote graduate talent?
Graduates have a lot of enthusiasm, but also still have control over how pieces are made and what they’re made of. Once their designs have been sold on to the big manufacturers, that control can be lost in which case it’s hard to know exactly what you’re getting.
Why is transparency so important to you?
Transparency should be important to everyone. I think you end up saving yourself, your customers and your designers a lot of headaches if you spell out your policies very clearly in the beginning. Why shouldn’t we know how something is made and where it comes from?
Elementi cabinet by AF Designs
What’s your favourite product on the site right now?
I think the Tilly sofa is gorgeous. It’s so simple and yet has bundles of character too (not unlike my house I guess!). I’m also in love with the Magus table. The legs are incredibly sexy, I just wish I had room for it in my house…
What can we expect to see from Curated in the future?
We’ve just met a bunch of exciting graduates, so we’re hoping to to get them on to the site soon. Also, we’ve had a suggestion to set up a different version of Curated for other countries, which could be very interesting indeed.
Lean Man side table by &Then Designs
What advice would you give to an aspiring design entrepreneur?
Accept that nothing is going to happen overnight. You have to work hard, you will have sleepless nights, people may laugh at you and not understand what you’re trying to do. But at the end of the day it will be worth it.
And finally, what’s your favourite colour?!
Every kind of blue. I dream of living by the sea one day, so I keep on buying seaside illustrations by Gillian Bates and gorgeous modernist seaside plates from People Will Always Need Plates. I may run out of space soon…
Further reading for the especially geeky:
- http://www.klc.co.uk/News/article.asp?n=163&t=
- http://hearthomemag.co.uk/an-interview-with-design-entrepreneur-hatty-fawcett/
- interview :: heart home magazine
- interviews :: buy the book
