Cool Collab: Cara Saven Wall Design x Kooooooos

WORDS Michaela Stehr PHOTOS Supplied

Cara Saven Wall Design’s latest collection for her CS&Co range – a cool collaborative project that highlights her favourite local artists, features South African artist Kooooooos, in a collection that’s both playful and whimsical.

Cara prefers the collaborations to happen by chance. “I don’t actively seek out new artists to join our range,” wall design specialist Cara Saven says, “I wait for them to cross my path.” She stumbled on a lobster painting by multidisciplinary artist and designer Kooooooos while scrolling on Instagram, which was the spark that set off the new quirky range. 

Kooooooos’ art differed from the previous collabs for CS&Co (featured here) and Cara thought that something a bit more cheeky with a playful and darker edge would work well, all messily packaged in a youthful and sketchy style. love messy,” Saven says, “I relate to a haphazard style. There’s a whimsy to Koooooos’s work, there’s a youthfulness to it, it’s not taking itself too seriously. It’s also very strong graphically so it ticks all the boxes.”

After a few brainstorming sessions, the pair finalised where they wanted to go with the idea and what images would fit on large-scale or smaller walls in homes, offices, guest houses, restaurants or any other space that called for a statement wall. “I’m very curious to see it being applied,” Kooooooos says. “It excites me a lot to imagine where they’re going to go.”

This resulted in five options, Bathers 1 &2, Wine Sloths, Tired Nudes and Beach Plz, all celebrating the naked form of women in a loose-lined style. pattern. I felt unsure if the work would lose impact if it was a very small, repeated pattern that’s almost like a texture rather than illustrations. But when Cara and I met, she said, “No, big. It must be big and the scale must be bold.” This is to allow the artwork to stretch across an entire wall as an impactful mural or be tweaked for the client’s desired effect in a space. “We worked some of them out into repeats, which is necessary,” Kooooooos says. 

“It’s important that if our clients want to change a colour, or change the scale, we can bend to their needs,” Saven says. “We even love people asking us for fully customised designs. If someone loves the style of The Bathers but would like mountain climbers, it’s so great to be able to go back to the artists and commission a piece like that.“

The result? A fun, flirty tongue-in-cheek collection that reminds you to not take life too seriously and revel in the finer things, wallpaper included.

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