Julia Sagias

AN ARTISTIC RESPONSE TO THE CURRENT SCENARIO OF PANDEMIC-INDUCED,  ISOLATION & INTROSPECTION.

A new design methodology based on pure elements which re-imagines the domestic interior as a santuary which is sensually and spiritually uplifting. 

Julia Sagias is a Scottish interior designer and artist from Glasgow. In 2020 she completed the Masters of Design in interior design. She has a first class degree in history of art from the University of Glasgow and is a practising artist based in the Southside of the city. Julia is a determined individual, having left a career in the cultural sector to study at the GSA and set up her creative business, Julia Clare Interiors. With a background in art and design theory, she has a strong conceptual approach combined with the artistic skills to apply her research, implementing a variety of artistic techniques including drawing, sketching and painting. She takes a concientous approach to the environment through the use of upcycling and natural materials.

Through her time at GSA Julia addressed issues such as emotional wellbeing experienced through the phenomenology of ambience, materials, spatial composition and colour of the interior space. This project, entitled  CONCEPTUAL AMBIENCE is a direct reponse to the current experience of perpetual, pandemic-induced isolation and introspection.  She was inspired to imagine the poetic ambience, form and materiality of the domestic interior which culminated in the redesign of the site of her own lock-down, her home.

Detailed through an in-depth exploration of form, colour, texture and space, and with a theoretical background based on the Classical and Modernist concept of Purism, this project demonstrates a way to create order and wellbeing through the layering of elemental form and colour and the careful arrangement of mass and surface. CONCEPTUAL AMBIENCE is a manifesto and methodology; an applied design language consisting of pure, geometric elements and a colour book of 30 earth-based colours and pure metals. The outcome is the creation of an interior programme inspired by Greek architecture and Le Corbusier’s Modernist interpretation of this typology.

Julia’s creative experiments include 3D digital modelling as well as sketching, and sculpting textural surface and form with gypsum and clay,  painting and gilding. This warm, serene aesthetic is a space which prioritises the private realm and interprets it as a sanctuary, with free-flowing movement between bedroom, bathroom and changing room and a continuous visual sequence throughout the house in an open-plan layout and atrium. As per the concept of the Total Work of Art, the layering of a unifying colour design, texture and form throughout creates a sense of balance, order and harmony. The result is a poetically ambient and emotionally therapeutic space which makes domestic isolation a calming and enriching experience.