December 19, 2024 |
Following the pandemic, our appetite to discover what makes a home has blossomed. The endless months we all spent trapped indoors ignited a new lease of life for the interiors publishing industry, with a host of sparkly new mags cropping up in both Europe and the US. Set on creating something like nothing else on the market is London-based bi-annuel Ton.
George Rouy, artist and furniture maker, lives in a former church, the pointed home of Jan Roth and Scarlet Berner, photography by Oskar proctor and Kingsley Iffil, courtesy of Ton
Now on its third issue, the magazine’s name is derived from editor-in-chief, Jermaine Gallacher, “wanting something that sounded weighty”, which reflects Ton’s approach to crafting its content. While traditional, glossy interiors mags may only have room for two spreads to illustrate a glamorous home somewhere in the South of France, Ton works more intimately, dedicating sprawling stories to the humble abodes of a litany of intriguing, global creatives.
“I was just pretty bored with everything that was out there,” says Gallacher on starting the mag. “I was seeing a lot of good stuff that wasn’t getting published. I thought it was the right time [for the magazine] because, as much as it’s about interiors, it’s also about makers and people doing great things.”
Raised in Brighton, Gallacher – who is also both a furniture and interior designer, plus a design dealer by trade – was set on the mag having a sense of humour, too. “I didn’t want to tell people what to buy nor have shopping pages because I think there’s enough of that,” he says. “Magazines cost a lot to print and if you’re going to do that, you might as well make it good. I sometimes wanted it to take the piss. It’d be funny and not take itself too seriously, but also take itself really seriously. To have a beautiful point of view is important.”
Enlisting an impressive masthead that has included Dazed’s Ted Stansfield, art director Rory Gleeson and editor Billie Muraben, the troupe has ventured far and wide to capture the homes of future-facing culture-shifters.
There was the artist George Rouy, who has transformed a former church in Faversham, in Kent, into a marble-clad space that looks more like a gallery space than a house of worship. Then there’s musician Celeste, whose London Fields home, featuring giant Barnaby Lewis-designed steel wardrobes, was the cover story for the mag’s inaugural issue. Elsewhere, the team have featured the colourful South London home of artist Adam Christensen, ventured inside the cluttered enclave of experimental design studio The House of Beauty and Culture member Dave Baby and taken readers to the pretty pink Stoke Newington flat of fashion designer Edward Meadham.
Away from the British Isles, Ton has also spotlighted the angular atelier home in Munich of the lighting designer Jan Roth and the artist Scarlet Berner, and has headed as far as upstate New York to capture interior designer Ben Bloomstein’s cosy home.
A bathroom stripped to its bare bones, photography by Esther Theaker, courtesy of Ton
Ton’s ethos is reflective of Gallacher’s own interior design journey. “My mum had painted furniture from the ’80s in our flat when I was growing up and stuff like that. It kind of looked like a hairdresser’s [salon]. [There was] all that metal stuff, which is everywhere now.” Highly in demand, he has spent his career designing interiors for everything from buzzy restaurants through to the offices and homes of high-flung clients. “I’m always inspired by people who make things.”
I’m keen to find out from Gallacher what makes a Ton-worthy interior. “Authenticity every time, really. Just be authentic. We can’t have it all, without going too deep. The only remaining good in the world is authenticity. Nothing will be able to destroy that authenticity.”
Some of his favourite interiors that Ton has featured so far include a grotto in Brighton, where fisherman Rory McCormack has spent the last decade or so crafting Bronze Age-style statues from flint, and the studio of artist Ben Burgis on a farm in Anglesey, Wales.
What sets Ton apart is its idiosyncratic approach to documenting homes of enigmatic creatives from a variety of fields. While there are notable names featured across all issues, Gallacher and his team are keen to spotlight artisans who have never appeared in a magazine before now (its first issue featured a portfolio of radical disruptors of design, including “rulebreakers, piss-takers and candlestick-makers”).
The homes that are featured feel at once strange yet familiar. They’re not the four-storey mansions that might be on top of your shopping list if you won the lottery, yet even the most compact homes that grace its pages swell with palpable excitement and creativity thanks to the brilliant people who occupy them.
“I’m always looking for beautiful things or really ugly things, but nothing in between. I think that’s the thing, It can’t be mediocre,” says Gallacher. “I want to see the makers. I want to see people doing it their own way. I don’t want to see a polished house. That’s not what we do.”
Moving forward, Ton will continue to publish twice a year, with plenty of weird and wonderful interiors yet to be discovered. Gallacher would like to take the magazine further afield, documenting homes across each corner of the globe, and would eventually like to bring the magazine into the physical space. “I would love to create a place where all these great kids making all this great stuff can sell their work,” he says. Who knows, maybe in the not-too-distant future you’ll be able to bring a taste of Ton to your own pad?
Out in the open, the magazine captures English country gardens, photography by Maxwell Granger, courtesy of Ton
Photography by Maxwell Granger, Oskar Proctor, Esther Theaker, Kingsley Iffil, courtesy of Ton. Taken from 10+ Issue 7 – DECADENCE, MORE, PLEASURE – out NOW. Order your copy here.
