Where and how does Serhii Makhno live?

Author: SERHII MAKHNO

Serhii Makhno blog

20.05.07

Home isolation has pushed Serhii Makhno to an important conversation about his major design projects: Serhii Makhno’s apartment and house. The world knows them as Wabi Sabi Apartment and Shkrub House — winners of international competitions, and heroes of world magazine covers. Serhii calls them simply — home.

Now, in the time of a pandemic and a global re-evaluation of the “home” concept, Ukrainian architect, ceramist, and collector Serhii Makhno has decided to share his feelings.

PHOTO BY VALENTINE BO, SPECIAL FOR BIRD IN FLIGHT

HOME. THE APARTMENT OF SERHII MAKHNO

Wabi Sabi Apartment has become a bold experiment for both the MAKHNO Studio team and the family itself.

This apartment is a tribute to Serhii’s fascination with Japanese wabi-sabi philosophy: the search for beauty in the imperfect. There is a lot of nature and meditative, rough simplicity here.

Although the company had been following the unbeaten road for many years and had been constantly experimenting with style, no one was ready for the walls plastered with clay and rough wooden beams in the living room. Even Serhii’s wife, Vlada Makhno, a designer, did not immediately agree to her husband’s unusual design tricks. And the walls, by the way, are made in the technique that our great-grandparents used in huts. That is where the style begins to trace Ukrainian authenticity.

Comfort, aesthetics, eco-friendliness — that is what modern design is about. At Wabi Sabi Apartment, Makhno blended his ancestor’s longstanding traditions, Japanese traditions, and contemporary art. In every corner of the apartment, there is an author product design by MAKHNO Studio, that passes the test drive here before getting into the homes of the clients.

Design awards: SBID Awards 2017 (finalist in “Residential Apartment Under £1M” category), Architecture MasterPrize 2018 (win in “Residential” category), IDA Awards 2018 (bronze honors). Media publications: Yatzer, Dezeen, Design Milk, Architonic, Journal du Design, Casa Naturale Italia, Interiors the Best, and more.

APARTMENT PHOTOS BY ANDREY AVDEENKO

HOME. SERHII MAKHNO`S HOUSE

Serhii loves his apartment like a firstborn, who helped him gain experience and find his style. Japanese culture has become a prism, a sieve, through which Makhno sifted the Ukrainian heritage — we have a lot to learn from the Japanese art of appreciating their culture. This was the starting point of rethinking and the beginning of the concept of the Ukrainian House.

The Shkrub House, where the entire Makhno family has been living for about a year, has become a project of a new generation and a new scale.

Work on this object began in the yard — the team worked on the landscape design of the Ukrainian-Japanese garden, filling it with sculptures and ceramic art toys by Serhii Makhno. Also, a geothermal well was made for an independent water supply. Solar panels and a boiler protect from any unplanned shutdown of heating or light. And the immutable partner company D8 took care of providing a home with a ‘smart house’ system.

PHOTO BY VALENTINE BO, SPECIAL FOR BIRD IN FLIGHT

A private house means more space for author design by MAKHNO Studio: lamps, vases, and ceramic DIDOs. They have already become world-famous by participating in Salone del Mobile. Milano 2019 — the largest design exhibition in the world. Clay on the walls flowed to a hefty fireplace in the living area, where most of the collection of ceramics from the Trypillian civilization is located. The house breathes with history: both from the textbooks and the one created by the Makhno family.

Quarantine has brought us the value of our home — with its stories, meanings, and feelings. We have started being drawn to where everything and everyone is dear — to the home. And for that, quarantine, thank you very much.