BehaghelFoiny
BehaghelFoiny is a Paris-based design studio founded by Antoine Behaghel and Alexis Foiny. Working across collectible furniture, objects, and exhibition design, the duo develops a playful and distinctive visual language that combines industrial elements, bold forms, and a strong sense of experimentation.
Rooted in an intuitive approach to making, BehaghelFoiny creates pieces that balance functionality with sculptural expression, often exploring the dialogue between raw materials, color, and geometry. Through their work, the studio seeks to bring a sense of joy, spontaneity, and curiosity to contemporary design.
Interview
We are both French and currently based in Paris. Alexis was born in Bourg-la-Reine on the outskirts of Paris, but spent his childhood in the countryside before returning to the capital to study. Antoine was born in Nantes, grew up in Brittany, and then moved to the Paris area.
Our families are the heart of our first experiences in the world of art and creation. With a great-grandfather who was a carpenter and a grandmother who was a seamstress, manual creation has always held a great place in Alexis’s childhood. The discovery of the notebook of drawings that his father had presented to integrate the Beaux-Arts of Paris was his first discovery of the world of Art. These cubist collages marked his sensitivity as a future designer.
Antoine was surrounded by the numerous paintings of his grandmother and mother displayed in the living room, representing the shimmering colors of the South of France.
We both studied in Ecole des Arts Décoratifs in Paris. While Alexis studied object design and has always practiced this discipline, Antoine trained as a textile and material designer before moving into furniture design.
Our mutual meeting played a big part in our common approach to the practice of design. If we had each sensitivity of a visual artist, it would be our common questioning on the direction that must guide our practices, which opened us to the practice of design. The discovery of design was for us the inauguration of a new way of being in the world. We believe that the contexts of creation must be addressed by asking questions and proposing answers.
Our creative methodology is always based on materials. During an encounter with materials, we want to be surprised by their characteristics and possibilities. We let the material speak, and listen to its manifestations. During an experimental phase, including the physical and intuitive manipulation of it, we are in search of its decorative and dreamlike potential. It is by rambling with the material that we create shapes and colors.
We divide our day between the continuation of our current projects and the reflection on projects to come. We alternate technical phases of finishing and moments of creation. By keeping time for our future desires, we try to keep the spark alive that animates our work.
We have chosen to work with industrial semi-materials. These materials can be manipulated while presenting a real technical potential. By the choice of matters, we interfere in the circuit of the heavy industry, to bring there a merry disturbance.
All our pieces are unique. They are handmade with love in our Parisian studio.
Be honest with your sensitivity, and sincere with your desires.
Move slowly and allow yourself to dream.
Our design is part of the Functional Art and Collectible Design movements. We produce unique pieces, engaging in an offbeat and contemporary aesthetic research. Our sculptural approach to furniture allows us to produce a new and lively universe.
Our master of thought would be William Morris. By associating decorative design with happiness, he confirms us in our approach as designers. Charles & Ray Eames, as an emblematic couple in the history of design, also touched us a lot. The strong and playful imagination they created together around their practice is a real inspiration for us. We are also very influenced by the design of Ettore Sottsass and his way of infusing spirituality and color into objects.
We appreciate contemporary designers who have a fun and expressive approach to the object, such as Bertjan Pot, Serban Ionescu, and James Shaw.
We appreciate the jewelry artist James Merry, the artist Théo Mercier, and the photographer Paul Rousteau.
Our design could be resumed as « Neo-prehistorical ». We mix intuitive ways of manufacturing shapes with diverse industrial matters in order to create new craftsmanship.
“We let the material speak, and listen to its manifestations.”
The Questions
(The Proust Questionnaire is a set of questions answered by the French writer Marcel Proust.
Other historical figures who have answered confession albums are Oscar Wilde,
Karl Marx, Arthur Conan Doyle, Stéphane Mallarmé, Paul Cézanne…)
Building our own house.
Emptiness.
Overthinking.
The lack of sincerity.
Our mothers.
Our haircuts.
Head in the clouds.
Authority and perfectionism.
Sensibility.
Empowerment.
« Bon appétit ! »
Being a pastry cook.
Being more available.
Our design studio.
A rainbow.
In the forest.
Each other.
The denial of the ecological disaster.
Hiking and camping.
Colorful.
Humor and creativity.
Donna Haraway and Pasolini.
L’Arlequin.
Marie-Antoinette and Andy Warhol.
Artists and designers.
Pimprenelle and Clémentine.
Pollution.
To have lost our childish carelessness.
Peacefully.
« Prenez votre plaisir au sérieux » – Ray & Charles Eames.
“Be honest with your sensitivity, and sincere with your desires.”
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