Jean Nouvel has partnered with Bolon for the Swedish flooring brand's first collection designed by an architect, which launches at Stockholm Furniture Fair today.
The woven vinyl flooring collection is patterned with lines of varying thicknesses. Nouvel describes the flooring as architectural.
"The freedom is yours to use the flooring to play with colour and light, and engage the windows of the space," said Nouvel. "It is not a decorative carpet, but an architectural floor."
The Bolon by Jean Nouvel Design flooring has a textured surface that looks different depending on the angle it is viewed from and how it catches the light.
Bolon – whose previous collaborations have been with designers and design brands like Missoni – are positioning the flooring as a means to experiment with layout and natural circulation in interior spaces.
The flooring can be laid vertically, horizontally or at a diagonal to windows. The latter appeals to Nouvel, who associates it with the image of sunlight coming through glass.
"I'm a bit of a minimalist, so I enjoy it when the figurative theme disappears and one goes towards the most essential thing: the basis of the texture," he said.
The range comes in a colour palette of blues, reds, greys and black. It is available in rolls or as 50-by-50-centimetre tiles.
Nouvel is a Pritzker Prize winner who came in at number 40 on the inaugural Dezeen Hot List – a guide to the most read-about architects, designers and institutions of the last year.
His famous buildings include Paris's Fondation Cartier centre for contemporary art and Barcelona's Torre Agbar skyscraper.
His Paris-based firm Ateliers Jean Nouvel recently unveiled plans for its first residential project in Florida, which is is raised over 11 feet above sea level to address the growing risk of flooding in Miami Beach.
Bolon by Jean Nouvel Design was first introduced at Nouvel's retrospective exhibition at the Louvre's Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris in October 2016. Bolon is launching the full collection at the Stockholm Furniture and Light Fair, which begins today and runs until 11 February 2017.
Other products launching at the fair include a new office configuration of Benjamin Hubert's Pair chair and a giant version of Timo Niskanen's Loop light.