Working and playing with Carlo Tanseco

They say that if you love what you do, it won’t feel like work at all, and everyday will be like playing and having fun. If everyone adhered to this philosophy, they would probably be enjoying life as much as Carlo Tanseco.

Businessman, restaurateur and product designer, Carlo’s daily to-do list has him moving from one city to another, attending successive meetings with clients, visiting retail outlets, and overseeing several businesses. But you will not hear him complain or find him cranky. In fact, he is almost always in a good mood, ready to share an amusing story or joke, albeit corny.

Notwithstanding the crazy schedule, Carlo still finds time to unwind. A foodie at heart and a health enthusiast, he spends his down time in a favorite restaurant in the company of friends, in the gym, or at the beach enjoying a favorite water sport. But the fun and play really start when he shifts to work mode, often in high gear and moving at frenzied speed.

Of the many things he does, product design is what Carlo feels most passionate about, something he has been doing since he was 10, without realizing it. "I had really bad asthma when I was a kid, which required me to stay home a lot. I had to find something to do to keep myself entertained," he shares.

But Carlo wasn’t your typical kid who played with toy guns and Matchbox cars (he found them quite ordinary), so he made his own toys. "I’ve always loved those do-it-yourself model sets, they never ceased to amaze and challenge me." While he has long given up his model sets, he is still like a kid at play, set free in a world where everything is possible. Today, his masterpieces have gone beyond elaborate toys to exceptional works of art.

An architecture graduate of the University of the Philippines, Carlo’s creative juices however flowed someplace else. Fresh out of college, he put up an export company in 1994 called Kaizenhaus (Kaizen is German for "constant improvement", and coincidentally, their first major buyer was a German company). The appellation couldn’t have been more appropriate as a house is never finished, it constantly evolves through time, literally and figuratively.

With innate entrepreneurial skills and exposure to his family’s retail business, Carlo set up his own retail shop cum café in 1996, called The Store Company. Known for its clean and understated home furnishings and accessories set against a striking contrast of old world charm and modernist industrial interior, The Store soon became the place to go for unique home items, good food, and great coffee.

The success of this venture may be credited to Carlo’s knack for coming up with simple yet extraordinary designs, something that can be difficult to achieve because, when you think of it, what really differentiates simple from boring? The difference, according to Carlo, lies in the details. "An object, even with the absence of embellishments, should be interesting," he says.

In business, "interesting" translates to the melodic ring of the cash register. It was reason enough for the late Eli Pinto-Mansor, then head of the Center for International Trade Expositions and Missions (CITEM), to contract his services for the April 1999 edition of Manila F.A.M.E. International–its bi-annual tradeshow on furnishings, holiday décor, and fashion accessories–to help local SMEs perk up their product offerings for the international buyers.

"It was my baptism by fire," relates Carlo of the experience. He worked with a wide cross-section of the country’s natural indigenous materials, something he had never done before. He studied, analyzed and familiarized himself with their different nuances and developed new applications for each.

The results were outstanding: abaca fiber twine woven in a haphazard manner for shapely vessels and bowls; cracked eggshells that found their place in an exquisite vase; other hybrids of materials made into equally gorgeous home objects.

The success of this initial undertaking convinced CITEM to use his talents again for the show’s October edition. Knowing that a designer is only as good as his last collection, it was a job more challenging than the first, given the higher expectations. And Carlo did not disappoint.

Grateful for both opportunities, he reveals: "Both projects opened a lot of doors for me." One of those doors led him to Paris in January 2000 as guest designer of the illustrious group Movement 8 when it participated in Scenes D’Interieur (and later in several major shows and cities around the world). The other brought him to New York the following month, where he mounted a three-month long exhibit dubbed "Fuzz, Feathers, and Beyond: Natural, Renewable Materials in Philippine Design" at the Materials ConexXion headquarters.

Even more pleased was the CITEM executive director, and the two worked closely to make sure that the exhibit not only highlighted the country’s wealth and range of materials, but also underscored the Filipinos’ skill in producing high-quality, world-class products.

George Beylerian, president and founder of Materials ConnexXion, wrote: "The exhibit marked a new beginning in Philippine decorative arts; exciting designs that used abaca twine, translucent capiz shells, bamboo, and even tender feathers. It was the Philippines’ great contribution to the world’s design industry: a wealth of eco-smart materials to inspire the creation of a new generation of designs."

Carlo Tanseco was no longer the new kid on the design block. With a number of awards under his belt, international recognition and numerous consultancy projects, he has established himself as one of the country’s most respected designers.

Today, the 37-year-old bachelor deals with new business ventures (he is part-owner of Global Café, Figaro and Atmosfera), and a growing list of companies ferreting him out for his services. Among them is Ayala Museum, who signed him up in 2004 to do product design and development for its gift shop. He has also branched out into furniture design, providing conventional home objects a refreshingly fun and exciting makeover.

His first objective: to design a bulaga piece, but Carlo knows that it takes more than putting his eccentric ideas on paper and sending them to the production line. "There has to be a balance between form, function, plus the wow and salability factors. Being able to master this balancing act, while knowing which designs would sell, is the mark of a good designer," he explains.

His Full Bloom and Cala chair for Contempomaze were the most noticed and photographed pieces in last April’s Manila F.A.M.E., along with his Urchin Lamp and Nova Chandelier for D.A. International. But did he succeed at marrying form with function? Well, buyers were surprised that the chairs were very comfortable, and yes, they sold…a lot.

With his strong background in retail, Carlo has developed an uncanny ability to identify which products would sell. It was thus only logical for CITEM to engage his services again as curator for Market Special.

Introduced in April 2004, Market Special is a new program of Manila F.A.M.E. which aims to address the concern of buyers that prices of Philippine products are higher compared to Thailand, Hong Kong, Indonesia, India, and Vietnam. Carlo’s task: to gather an assortment of merchandise following a set of criteria–quality, affordability, and salability–and come up with a concept and a catchy brand name. His idea: a supermarket called Smart$hop.

The supermarket concept– complete with shelves, pushcarts, baskets, checkout counter, even baggers, and a refreshment area– was undeniably innovative. Now on its second year, Smart $hop has more than served its purpose as buyers have not only discovered that the Philippines could still be a major source of competitively priced, high-quality products, but is also a very convenient way of finding most of what they need.

Despite its success, Carlo feels that it’s time for a change, and take Market Special to another level with Evolution: The New Smart Shop. This time, his setting will have a sleek, all-black look, where products are sectioned in themes–Wellness, Love, and Holiday–and packaged like gift packs, which he believes is an efficient way to market, promote, and move inventory. Aside from having new products, the "evolved" shop will feature enhanced versions of the ones presented before as Carlo offered to update their look.

But will his concept be as effective? Carlo believes so, and is optimistic that it will produce equally outstanding, if not better, results. And, judging from his past work, we have no doubt that it would.

Doesn’t he run out of new ideas? "Not yet," replies the intrepid designer. "Besides, we are surrounded with an incredible library of forms in nature, it would be a shame if we don’t draw any inspiration from it."