Photography by Kevin A. Roberts
At a museum, you look but don’t touch, then you buy a tchotchke in the gift shop. At Centro Modern Furnishings (4727 McPherson, 314-454-0111, centro-inc.com), you can sink into a Philippe Starck chair so artfully designed, it’s in a museum somewhere else—and take it home with you.
The showroom has the thin-air euphoria of a temple to art: pure white sculpted forms; a branched Moooi chandelier soft-lit with papery white circles; a sleek, techy column of LED candlelight. There’s a Maserati lounge chair, a Cappellini pylon chair, a Josef Hoffmann Armlöffel chair. There’s a lacy chair made by melting wax away from the metal armature, a black Maarten Baas armchair framed with deliberately charred wood. Achille Castiglioni shelves are as gracefully parallel as strokes in a Chinese character.
Most of what’s sold here is sold nowhere else in St. Louis.
“At any given time, we have 20 to 30 pieces that are in museum collections around the world,” says co-owner Todd Lannom. Europeans, he says, “walk in and feel at home, because European culture is much more receptive to modern interiors. After World War II, their architects started to design furniture and objects, and manufacturers quickly tapped them, because their names carried such weight.” He hesitates, not wanting to sound elitist. “Europeans are just exposed to more art and architecture.”
Centro has carved a narrow but deep niche for itself, and its devotees tend to show up knowing an object’s back story. But Lannom and co-owner Ginny Stewart also see themselves as educators, quick to notice a flash of shy interest and supply the customer with information about anything from the 3-D printing of a Finnish lily lamp to the resurgence of applied pattern on wood or the organic influence that’s melting the stereotype of “cold modern.” They aren’t snooty—they don’t even have design degrees. But they know how to curate.
