Bonds that hold, a traverse through time that comes full circle, and a dialogue between roots and movement are the foundations upon which Hermès’ latest creations for the home have been elegantly constructed. Debuting at Milan Design Week 2024, the new 10-piece collection is presented in tandem with items from the Italian House’s vaults – crops, a jockey’s jersey, a leather bracelet – highlighting the deep well of self-referential inspiration from which Hermès continues to draw.

The enduring luxury of leather and cashmere, coupled with artisanal know-how, has created a collection that is the antithesis of anachronistic design. Timelessness pervades, lending the House’s signature classic quality to designs that would just as easily fit into a home from centuries past as the villas, lofts and apartments of today. The pieces blend in, but also luxuriate in their surroundings to become art, discussion points that serve a purpose.

The simplicity of the Voltige d’Hermès lamp with its slim stem inspired by the tools of the seasoned equestrian – lunge reins and riding crop – plays with texture and material evidenced in the braided leather, waxed brass and linen; while the Diapason d’Hermès lounge chair is the modernist standout of the collection, with its deceptively simple two-material construct of hammered aluminium and unlined bridle leather.

The Derby range, comprising basket, bucket and centrepiece, showcases perhaps the most striking marriage of leather-working, hand-stitching and saddlery in the collection. Geometry and marquetry lie at the heart of this eye-catching trio, which is presented in tandem with pieces from the design house from 1970, 1949 and the 1980s, respectively.

Versatility is key, with each item inhabiting a quintessential pan-seasonality, so one can just as easily picture the cream-and-yellow calfskin Derby bucket overflowing with wildflowers in the spring months as filled to the brim with fallen pine cones foraged from the forest floor come winter.

The Amalthée Myriade watch and jewellery box are presented in tandem with a pair of embroidered gloves in baby goatskin from the 1950s Hermès Conservatoire of Creations. A House classic, the mix of elm wood and bridle leather opens to reveal a suede lambskin interior; while ink, applied to the leather freehand, traces the myriad of lines and dots with light, meticulous gestures evoking, perhaps more than with any other piece, a distinctly generational ‘otherness’.

Linear, abstract lines splashed across the 27-piece Tressages Équestres dinner service symbolise the bond between horse and rider, with its depictions of the passementerie and braiding on harnesses. Mint greens, lemon yellows and petrol blues stand out against the backdrop of artist Virginie Jamin’s kaolin white porcelain creations, serving up slices of modernity along with supper.

For those for whom the geometry of the jockey’s jersey, which inspires two-thirds of the blankets and bedspreads collection, remains an aesthetic high point, the silk and cotton-twill applique Hippique bedspread on offer conveys the diversity of equestrian silks and motifs. Meanwhile, the cashmere Tartan Dye bed blanket with its shades of bronze and sunny yellow – not to mention the signature resist-dyed H logo – is luxury (and cosiness) personified, an earlier version of which decorates the Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s Montecito home.

These are functionally beautiful pieces that take you not only through the seasons, but through the day, year and decade, clearly influenced the creation of Hermès’ cashmere Altitude throw. Hand-spun, hand-woven and hand-dyed in Nepal, the precision dyeing with its whip-straight lines brings a tailored, bespoke freshness to a classic home favourite. 

The throw, as with the rest of the collection, retains a beguiling ambiguity when it comes to trying to pinpoint exactly where in time and aspect these pieces originated, and to which era they ultimately belong. The answer is, as with anything Hermès creates: everywhere and always.

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