The Wonderful World of Monsieur Flamant

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H
ome... The word alone exudes softness and gentleness,”
says Alex Flamant. And that is why the
furniture, accessories and materials designed,
produced and sold throughout the world by
this Belgian businessman and his two younger
brothers Georges and Jacques have nothing aggressive
or cool about them but are soft and
gentle. There are some 10,000 different items
in the Flamant Home Interiors collections,
each of which has the charm of a long-forgotten
treasure discovered in the attic or a souvenir from a journey to distant
parts. Tables that look as though they have been varnished, sanded
off and lovingly restored time and again.
Leather sofas like those in the best London
clubs and accessories that you would
only expect to find at a junk shop or a flea
market. The basic concept is patina or,
alternatively, new editions – new furniture
copying an antique design. This is
the idea behind one of Belgium’s largest
and best-known companys with 260 employees
and sales of around 36 million
euros, of which 75 percent are exports.
The brain behind all this is CEO Alex
Flamant, a man who is driven by
curiosity. He is constantly on the
road searching for knicknacks and still
discovering them after 30 years in the
business. He was so taken by an ancient
telescope that he had a limited edition
produced by specialists. Some small
wooden doors that he acquired in China
are now being displayed as coffee tables
in his stores. Many of his discoveries are
used for a purpose not originally intended.
For example, an old theodolite, re-
novated and polished up, is now on sale
as a lamp stand. One of his most recent
finds, at a flea market in Beijing, is an old
Chinese fisherman’s vest made of bamboo.
He took it home and mounted it
in a plexiglass case. He doesn’t talk about
“decoration.” It’s a word he doesn’t
particularly like. He prefers “inspiration”
and he can find that just about anywhere.
He is not a great collector. The only thing he collects is stones.
“We expand, we improve our service. But we never produce items in the
hundreds. Only 20, maybe as many as 50 units and that’s it. That is why
we shall always be a niche operation,” explains Alex Flamant. He started
studying business administration in Brussels but broke it off in 1978
when his father got sick and needed help in his antique business. His first
big order was to find twelve antique iron garden chairs. After drawing a
blank everywhere, he dug up an old illustration, from which he drew his
own design and had the chairs made new in Spain. That was the start of a
company that now has agents across the globe, some 500 “corners” in
department stores and other retail outlets and 15 stores of its own in cities
30 years ago Alex Flamant joined his father’s antique busi-
ness. Now he manages a family business with his brothers.
“Flamant is hot – but we plan to stay in our niche,” he says.
“Interiors are just like fashion.
Everything is possible.”
as far removed from each other as Dubai and Hamburg. It will be opening
new stores this year in Düsseldorf, Marseilles and Maastricht.
The company’s head office is located 30 kilometers west of Brussels
at Geraardsbergen. It is a gray box very similar to all the other
featureless gray boxes in the town’s industrial zone. For any-
one making a first pilgrimage to this “mecca of style” it seems a bit
of a letdown. But behind the glass doorway comes the reception hall
with its own sandy beach, a romantic fishing boat, deckchair and
canopied sun bed. Entering the Flamant headquarters is like walking
into a giant 3-D catalog.
Alex Flamant comes hurrying down the staircase dressed in gray flannels
and a light-blue shirt, cell phone at his ear. He closes the phone
conversation with a goodbye in French,
welcomes us in English and says something
in Flemish to the lady at the reception
desk. It is lunchtime and Flamant
takes us to a large room with long tables
covered with white tablecloths and an
open country house-style kitchen. A buyer
from Harrods of London is sitting
nearby and there are also some customers
from Moscow, not to mention a large
part of the workforce, which eats its
lunch most days in the “canteen” where
Sarah is serving a noodle and vegetable
casserole. Alex Flamant first says hello to
everyone personally before sitting down
and filling our glasses with mineral water
and white wine and starting to tell us
about his company.
Flamant produces his furniture in
Shanghai, his glassware comes from Romania
and the ceramics from Portugal.
The main logistics center is located in
Poland. The company has its own restaurant
in Antwerp and some of its stores
have their own cafés, bookshops and
flower shops in addition to the main furniture
and accessories business. A customer
can order a coffee to drink while
making a sketch of how one of the items
on display would look in his own home.
And there is such a wide choice that just
about everyone will find something they
like. Anyone doubting this only has to
take a walk through the 50,000-square-foot showroom to be persuaded
otherwise. It contains a variety of scenarios, for example, hotel rooms,
banqueting tables, work rooms, living rooms, idyllic gardens. Alex Flamant
sets a fast pace as we follow him through a fascinating mosaic of
epochs and cultures – here a bit of Old England, there a bit of French
country house style, a touch of Baroque next to an example of Swedish
simplicity. It is an eclectic mix where a Californian beach house rubs
shoulders with a scene from the Orient and everything is seasoned by a
host of articles displayed haphazardly between the main scenarios.
“Harmony!” he explains. “We look for natural harmony in every culture
in every part of the world. No matter how sophisticated you are, you can
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An African mask stands between a child’s drawing and an antique Louis-Vuitton traveling box. There are statues of horses almost everywhere.
Alle Namen und Adressen finden Sie auf Seite xxx.
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