F/List, a specialist in luxury interiors for business and private jets, has opened the F/Lab future laboratory at its headquarters in Austria. The business describes the F/Lab as its centre of innovation; a dynamic hub for creative thinking, cross-discipline collaboration, and imaginative experimentation.
F/List already had in-house design facilities, in which staff were encouraged to challenge traditional manufacturing and the product status-quo. The commercial launch of the dedicated F/Lab centre means that design now forms the core of a new customer interaction strategy, with a focus on innovation, technology and sustainability. The formal addition of F/Lab to the F/List brand portfolio represents a shift in the company’s market approach, which it says is now “an essential pillar in the F/List innovation strategy”.
“With the F/Lab expansion, we are demonstrating that we are much more than just a manufacturer fulfilling design briefs,” said Katharina List-Nagl, CEO of F/List. “We are introducing the concept of 361° insight, which will see our colleagues not just visualising our customers’ world, but working in tandem with them to realise their design dreams. Many of our customers own multiple high-value assets, and with our latest approach, we’ll seamlessly support the interior design and development of their jets, yachts, interior spaces and residences across their portfolio, in partnership, from inception to installation.”
The F/Lab will be used by an in-house staff of around 35 engineers, designers and technologists working between project. The F/Lab includes modern equipment, workshops and testing areas, along with a showroom for demonstrating concepts.
The multidisciplinary F/Lab team will continue collaborating with experts from academia, transportation, design and industry to identify, define and explore concepts and solutions that reimagine the world of interiors. The F/Lab is also a think tank for sustainability, exploring eco-friendly alternatives and strategies.
“Our team’s ideas converge to ensure form, function and ingenious thinking, which result in unprecedented features that enhance comfort, functionality and aesthetic appeal for every interior,” said List-Nagl.
Initial F/Lab concepts have included the Shapeshifter F/Lab Morphing Sideledge table concept, with a real wood veneer table that deploys seamlessly from the side ledge. Other developments include Whisper Leather, produced from plant-based raw materials; and Linfinium, a linseed-based compound with applications ranging from countertops to flooring. The Red Dot-winning F/Lab Aenigma product range fuses jewellery techniques with aerospace technology to combine elements as varied as ground mother-of-pearl and apricot pits, to create materials that can be customised in terms of colour, texture and thickness for use on any interior surface.
