ofuro japanese hot tubs by bartok design japan

Whenever we create, develop, distribute italian made products in Japan or japanese products all over the world, we are often asked this question.
Why Bartok? Isn`t this a Hungarian name? Does your business have some relation with Bela Bartok (the famous music composer and director)?

Well, yes, I like Bela Bartok.
Of course I have known him from before, but I started to listen and understand his music when I was living in NY. The encounter with Bartok was actually a fateful one: once, in the east village I bought a CD in a second hand shop and when I got home, inside the box there was also Bartok`s Dance Suite...

I like Bartok because he masterfully combines modernity and sperimentation with traditional and ethnic roots. Given I am attracted both by modernity and tradition I thought Bartok showed a viable "third way".
Have you ever thought about it?
Technology always pushes us forward, even if we end up forgetting the reason we rush so much!
On the other end if we worship the past, we end up stuffed, living in a museum...
With some common sense, we can pursue the best of both sides. Don`t you think so?

Sometimes the most difficult problems have an extremely simple solution. This is a beautiful paradox of nature.
As a designer, in my work I try to seek inspiration from nature. Think of a flower, a drop of water, a galaxy: perfect designs like we can find in nature are at the same time simple and complex. My quest as a designer is to express this "simple complexity", let`s call it synthesis. Designing a nice shape can be a superficial exercise: I wanted to design sensations, feelings, perfumes, sounds.

So, back to Bartok design: when I first started my own company and had to think of a name, to better express my design mission I decided to make use of a Synesthesia .
Can you hear a color? I am sure you can... if not... try to listen with more attention! Designing what you cannot see is already quite of a challenge: anyway to give a broader scope to my enterprise, I built in "Bartok", a word at the same time soft and hard, difficult to remember and difficult to forget.

Bartok design Co. is meant to be a point of synthesis and connection between different realities. While a "compromise" might imply a greish simplification, "synthesis" enriches both parties and creates a even more harmonious plurality.

Synthesis shold not be intended as a static "point of arrival", but rather a dynamic interaction, a challenging bridge between different worlds, cultures, materials.
I am sure that Bela Bartok was operating with a similar set of mind and hope he is looking with a benevolent eye at my effort...