Rainlight founder Yorgo Lykouria explains how a modular furniture system called BoxLife allows users to organise their living spaces, in a video produced by Dezeen for Scavolini as part of Virtual Design Festival.

BoxLife is a furniture collection designed to allow its users to adapt the interior of their home for different uses at different times.

The furniture collection was designed for Italian kitchen brand Scavolini by Rainlight, a design agency founded by its creative director Lykouria, who spoke to Dezeen in a video interview recorded using Zoom as part of Virtual Design Festival.

"BoxLife is a fully adaptable concept for micro living," said Lykouria.

The collection is based around hiding or revealing elements with differing functions according to when they are needed. These elements are stored in box-like structures in order to transform and maximise available space.

The project won the Storage award at this year's NYCxDesign awards, which were announced in a virtual ceremony earlier this month. While the festival has been postponed until October due to the spread of coronavirus, the awards programme was held digitally.

Initially, Scavolini approached Rainlight to design a space-efficient kitchen, but the scope of the project expanded during the research and development process.

"When Scavolini approached us to design a micro-kitchen, what we discovered was that the kitchen wasn't the only problem in a small apartment."

"We looked at designing the entire apartment, and that's how BoxLife came to be."

The modular system features fittings for kitchen, bedroom, office, laundry, dining, storage and entertainment spaces.

"The idea is effectively taking a certain amount of space and transforming it to become the kitchen, to becoming an office, a bedroom, a dining room, a place where you can have a party," explained Lykouria.

Lykouria described BoxLife as the equivalent of a smartphone, in the sense that it is an organising tool that allows users to dip in and out of a diverse range of functions when needed.

"You're able to use your apartment in the same way that you use smartphone," he stated. "The idea of the smartphone that organises your life in time, your communications – BoxLife is organising your living space in much the same way."

This video was produced for Italian kitchens brand Scavolini by Dezeen as part of Virtual Design Festival.

Virtual Design Festival runs from 15 April to 30 June 2020. It brings the architecture and design world together to celebrate the culture and commerce of our industry, and explore how it can adapt and respond to extraordinary circumstances.

To find out what's coming up at VDF, check out the schedule. For more information or to join the mailing list, email [email protected].