Pure material expression found it genesis at the recent nau x artedomus exhibition, held as part of Melbourne Design Week. Here, a series of pieces by designer Tom Fereday for nau were juxtaposed against slabs on Artedomus natural stone.

The gallery, a hidden warehouse sitting unobtrusively along Flemington Road in Flemington, endowed the exhibition with lashings of natural light and a spacious blank palette upon which both designs and materials could shine.

Tom, whose background is in industrial design, is a great believer of honest design and celebrating materials through manufacturing process, form, finish and detailing. Through natural materials he looks to marry craftsmanship with industrial design intelligence. “I’m obsessed with quiet innovation … To hero the material first, with subtle industrial design detailing that goes into it,” he says. So ultimately, a piece is not just elegant or perfectly functional: “I try to make products that I would want to own… that add to your quality of life.”

Juxtaposed against slabs of Artedomus natural stone, Tom’s pieces appeared almost like artwork within an artwork. The space, stripped bare of distractions, left ample room for contemplating even the finest details of Tom’s pieces, from material to colour, texture, finish, angle, form and more. These were framed by a glorious backdrop of natural stone elements, clashed, melted and furiously mixed together – a millennia’s worth of raw, subterranean chemistry frozen in time. To gaze upon each stone slab was like looking into a geological dreamscape.

With slabs securely dropped into place, nau thoughtfully paired furnishing with stone. Two Ayva tables, set against a spectacular Baccaro slab, offered a quiet study in balance and proportion. “Ayva started off as an idea for a compact table which is quite utilitarian and small, but without losing the sense of luxury,” Tom reflects.

This original idea holds true in the final manifestation of Ayva which, with its soft, rounded form and central arced leg, speaks to the intimacy of small spaces. The tabletop’s edge profile features a dual radius – a detail of intrigue that allows the piece the reveal itself through familiarity. “These kinds of quiet details endow pieces with character but also longevity,” says Tom.

Tom is also very proud of the Nola Lamp, his first lighting piece for nau, which conjures a sense of stillness with its quiet glow and calming presence. This piece – a mono-material expression of hand-cast crystal glass – elicits both warmth and a compellingly poetic presence from what can be a rather cold and impervious material. Set again a backdrop of Elizia, the Nola Lamps highlighted the stone’s greenish-grey hues that appeared almost like rippled fabric snapping in the wind.

The Cove chair, with its bright yellow and soft, mauvey upholstery popped against a Maderano backdrop. This piece portrays timber in its purest form with an exposed frame and sled-style base. “This piece I originally exhibited in 2022, and with Richard Munao [founder and CEO of Nau], we slowly developed this into a whole collection.”

Tom reflects on the time-consuming process of developing a piece from prototype to production; with nau he worked extensively on the manufacturing details, designing the Cove to be an entirely flat packed piece, perfect for global distribution.

The nau x Artedomus showcase was a beautiful moment of cohesion, drawing together Tom’s and Artedomus’ shared passion for natural materiality and designs that endure beyond first impressions of beauty or functionality.

“For something to last a really long time, it’s got to have both aesthetic and functional longevity. It can’t just be elegant, and it also can’t just be perfectly functional,” reflects Tom.