Luis Ho: Illusion and the Tactile Reality of GROUND

Moving beyond mere material substitution toward a slower, sensory dialogue between user and object with Luis Ho

In an era dominated by screens, we often reduce design to flat images, forgetting that sight alone cannot convey weight, warmth, or resistance. Designer Luis Ho disrupts this visual bias with his GROUND collection. Cast from a bio-composite of cork, natural latex, and charcoal, the pieces evoke the imposing mass of volcanic rock from afar, only to reveal an unexpected lightness, warmth, and subtle give beneath the touch.

Rooted in both conceptual inquiry and hands-on material testing, Ho’s practice embraces objects that record time rather than resist it. For him, the small marks and compressions of daily use are not damage, but signs of a living, emotional durability. Ahead of the London Design Festival, we sat down with Luis Ho to discuss tactile illusions, bio-based materials, and the power of bringing touch back into our spaces.

IRK: In a screen-dominated culture, how do your pieces bring focus back to touch and physical presence?

Luis Ho: I’m interested in making objects that cannot be fully understood through appearance alone.

We increasingly encounter design first as an image. Materials become colour, form and texture on a screen, but a screen cannot really communicate temperature, resistance, scent, weight or how something responds when you touch it.

With GROUND, I wanted the body to become part of how you read the object. From a distance, the dark colour and irregular surface can look almost like volcanic stone. But when you come closer, the cork feels warm and gives slightly under pressure.

For me, physical interaction creates a different kind of attention. You stop deciding what an object is simply by looking at it and begin understanding it through several senses.

IRK: What raw ingredients make up the bio-composite in the GROUND series, and how did you develop the distinct tactile surface?

Luis Ho: The material itself is relatively simple and built around tree-based materials: natural cork granules, expanded cork, natural latex, and a small amount of charcoal powder.

I started by experimenting with factory-processed cork in different forms,from blocks and sheets to different grades of granules. Initially, I thought I would carve larger cork blocks, but producing those forms would have created waste. That limitation actually changed the project.

I started treating cork more like an aggregate and researching what could bind the particles together. Natural latex worked because it held the cork while retaining some resilience and flexibility. Other binders I tested made the material much stiffer, drier and visually flatter.

From there, I tested different granule sizes, ratios, densities and levels of compression. Casting and hand-pressing the material into moulds, I refined the seams and surfaces by hand. The intention was never a sterile, industrial finish; instead, the value lies in seeing where granules meet, compress, and take shape.

The surface carries evidence of how the object was made. Rather than hiding the material’s structure, I want you to be able to read it through your hand.

IRK: How did transitioning from Goldsmiths’ conceptual design to Central Saint Martins’ material focus shape your identity as a maker?

Luis Ho: Goldsmiths taught me to begin with a question. Central Saint Martins taught me that sometimes
the material can answer that question better than I can.

At Goldsmiths, I became very conscious of context: why an object should exist, what behaviour it produces and what it communicates in the real world. At CSM, those questions became much more physical. I had to produce an entire collection within a limited period, so practical problems constantly needed to be solved through making.

A mould fails. A material behaves differently from what you expected. A joint doesn’t work. You either force the original idea or allow the design to change.

I started finding much more beauty in the second approach. It also taught me not to put too many ideas into one object. I want the function and the sensory experience to be understood quite quickly when somebody encounters the piece, while the deeper ideas can reveal themselves over time.

I think that is where I began to understand my identity as a material-led furniture designer: somewhere between asking conceptual questions and answering them through making and experimenting.

IRK: How do you envision these bio-based materials evolving or wearing as people live with them over time?

Luis Ho: I don’t want the furniture to remain frozen in the exact condition it leaves the studio. I’m interested in materials that can record time rather than constantly trying to resist it.

With GROUND, repeated contact can gradually affect the surface. The areas people touch or sit on most may become slightly smoother, more compressed or subtly different in appearance. These are very small changes. They might only become noticeable after living with the object for a long period, but that is what interests me.

The object slowly becomes specific to the person using it.

Many contemporary products are designed to remain visually perfect, so any scratch, compression, or change immediately feels like damage.

I’m interested in questioning where damage actually begins. Has an object broken because its surface has changed slightly, or only when it can no longer perform its function?

That changes my understanding of durability. Durability can be emotional as well as physical. You keep something not only because it still functions, but because it has become part of your daily life.

IRK: What was the idea behind the wooden ergonomic rigs in your workshop, are they research tools or sculptural works in themselves?

Luis Ho: If you mean the wooden structure that appeared on my Instagram, that was actually my BA
graduation project at Goldsmiths.

At the time, I was researching how stimulation across different senses could influence attention, relaxation and our awareness of the body. I created an experimental structure combining repetitive foot massage, a rocking movement and a 40 Hz binaural audio experiment. Rather than designing a conventional piece of furniture, I tried to translate that conceptual research into a physical experience someone could enter and interact
with.

Looking back, that project led quite directly to GROUND. The difference is that with GROUND I’ve simplified the question. Instead of building a whole multisensory system around someone, I’m asking how much of that
experience can already come from the material itself.

That led me towards tree-derived materials: cork bark, natural latex from rubber trees and willow charcoal. I became interested in whether tactility, temperature, scent and resistance could bring some of the sensory qualities we associate with natural environments into everyday furniture.

IRK: The GROUND pieces look like carved stone or volcanic rock. How do you play with the illusion of heavy versus light?

Luis Ho: I like that short moment of confusion between what the eye predicts and what the body actually
feels.

From a distance, the dark colour, mass and irregular surface suggest something geological, almost like volcanic rock. So naturally you expect the furniture to be cold and extremely heavy.

The forms reinforce that impression, but I also use arched bases underneath many of the pieces.
They are partly inspired by architectural arches and domes: removing material underneath while
still making the upper volume feel structurally substantial.

The openings also create a shadow underneath the furniture, so these quite heavy-looking forms
appear slightly lifted from the floor. Then you touch or lift the object and discover the expanded cork-and-latex composite. It is much lighter than expected, warmer against the body and slightly responsive when pressure is applied. That contradiction matters to me because it shows how quickly we make assumptions about
materials based on appearance.

I’m interested in that delay between seeing an object and actually understanding it.

IRK: Your work transitions from minimalist galleries to outdoor playgrounds. How does the setting change how people interact with it?

Luis Ho: Setting dictates how people interact with an object. In a gallery, visitors keep a respectful distance, quietly studying form and surface before daring to touch. Outdoors or in informal spaces, those unspoken rules vanish: people lean, sit, or use the piece in ways I never anticipated.

These spontaneous interactions are invaluable. Observing how people instinctively touch a piece and how materials hold up in uncontrolled settings turns context into a living test ground, directly shaping my next design.

IRK: Do you see these creations purely as furniture, or as spatial installations that dictate the atmosphere of a room?

Luis Ho: They are furniture, but I think furniture has much more spatial power than we sometimes acknowledge.

A chair determines posture. A table establishes distance between people. A lamp changes where your attention goes. Even a relatively small object can influence how people occupy a room. So rather than creating an installation that dictates an atmosphere, I’m interested in how a collection can gently tune one.

With GROUND, the low proportions bring the body closer to the floor. The surfaces invite touch, and the forms are quite visually quiet despite their strong texture. Together, they create a slower kind of interaction.

IRK: What core message are you bringing to the London Design Festival regarding
the future of bio-based design?

Luis Ho: Bio-based design must move beyond simply replacing conventional materials with natural alternatives; substitution is only the starting point. We should instead ask what new relationships these materials can foster: Can an object age meaningfully and gain value through use, rather than staying artificially pristine?

With GROUND, failed casts aren’t waste, they are shredded and fed back into production, redefining failure entirely. We must also remember that “natural” doesn’t automatically mean responsible.

My message for the London Design Festival is clear: bio-based design shouldn’t just look sustainable, but foster a conscious, evolving connection with the objects we live with every day.