Body of work

WORDS Nechama Brodie

With new, larger premises at 44 Stanley and a Danish manufacturing deal under her belt, Anatomy’s Andrea Kleinloog is winning over local and international design fans.

Andrea Kleinloog has just returned from “the wildest trip of my life – it was like The Hangover, but in Paris,” she says, starting with Andrea and her design/business partner Megan Hesse spending their very first morning in Paris in jail. 

“We got into what turned out to be an illegal taxi [at the airport]. The police arrested him and whisked us off to the station as soon as we arrived at our hotel. We didn’t think it was serious, but they separated us and made us give independent statements,” she says. 

When the French police finally let the pair go it was with a warning: “This is a dangerous city.”

“We’re from Jo’burg,” they both said. 

The trip was, in part, for Andrea and Megan to see “what is going on in Europe, find niche brands that suit us – and use that to work out what we can make here”. 

Andrea was also meeting with a Danish lighting company, which will be taking over manufacturing her signature sleek metal Lab Light. 

“When I got the email from Denmark I thought it was more spam,” Andrea says. Instead, it turned out to be a major global manufacturing deal with a number of benefits for Andrea and her interiors/design business Anatomy Design. 

“We don’t have the capacity [in South Africa] to do many of the [safety] ratings tests,” she says. Now, Andrea will be able to import her own light – ready-boxed – that conforms to American and European lighting standards. 

“It was never my starting point, to manufacture – I started off with interiors,” says Andrea. 

After studying at UCT, Andrea did a postgraduate course at the Greenside Design Centre and worked at Tonic for four years before launching Anatomy. 

In 2011, Anatomy opened its first store at 44 Stanley in Johannesburg and expanded to a bigger store in the centre in 2012. 

The Anatomy store stocks a mix of “smalls” designed by Mia Widlake, and “all the bigger stuff” (designed by Andrea and Megan), which includes furniture and lighting. 

Andrea says her primary design principle is to “solve some sort of problem” rather than reinvent already good designs or products.

“In cities,” she says, by way of illustration, “we’ve found that it’s a nightmare trying to fit everything through doors – so all our products are modular, they can be broken down.” 

Although interiors work still makes up more than 70% of Andrea’s business, the store at 44 Stanley functions as a mini-showroom as well as a place where big and small ideas get to rub shoulders. 

“Even if you can’t afford a R5 000 light, you could get a R300 vase,” she says, before adding: “I hate it when people say something is ‘so expensive’ – you have no idea how expensive it is to make!” 

Anatomy Design, 44 Stanley Avenue, Braamfontein Werf, 011 024 3727, www.anatomydesign.co.za