Brutalist Bathhouse by Kohler x Flamingo Estate

Kohler collaborated with Flamingo Estate at Milan Design Week to present The Bathhouse, a meditative environment exploring the creative tension that emerges from the convergence of opposing elements — nature and craft, geometric and organic, permanence and ephemerality. By bringing these elements into a state of balance, design becomes a pathway toward enduring and transformative personal wellness. Anchoring the installation was a monumental brutalist bathhouse, rising from a bed of untamed wildflowers and serving as a protective shell for quiet reflection. At the heart of the bathhouse, the new cast iron KOHER Reverie™ bath paired a timeless, understated form with a warm copper exterior, serving as an invitation to experience a deeper connection with nature.

“The Bathhouse is a meditation on ritual, nature, and the quiet power of materials,” said Richard Christiansen, Founder of Flamingo Estate. “We imagined a place where wildflowers, water, and light come together to create a sensory experience that reconnects us to the rhythms of the earth.” Surrounding the bathhouse, four custom, one-of-a-kind pollinator baths offered respite and hydration to pollinator species drawn into the installation by the blossoming flowers. Handmade by skilled artisans in Kohler’s historic foundry, the pieces are cast in iron and then flame‑sprayed with raw copper before the edges are finished to reveal two unique expressions of copper.

“For the Flamingo Estate Bathhouse, we wanted to explore the relationship between architecture and ecology, how design can create moments of care not just for people, but for the natural world around us,” said Michael Seum, VP of Global Design at Kohler Co. “The pollinator baths translate this idea into sculptural form, drawing from Brutalist principles on the exterior while softening into organic, nature informed surfaces within. It’s a reflection of our belief that design should hold space for both human ritual and environmental stewardship.”