Film: The A'dammer - The man behind the cupboard

Film: The A'dammer - The man behind the cupboard

The documentary 'The A'dammer - The man behind the cabinet' follows the life of designer Aldo van den Nieuwelaar. In the 1960s, he designs a series of revolutionary fixtures based on the disfavored fluorescent tube lighting. But his real breakthrough came with the A'dammer cabinet design, which grows into an international design icon in the 1980s, with more than seventy variants sold worldwide. Museums purchase his work and he grows into a promising name in the design world.

But Aldo is more artist than entrepreneur, and his perfectionism clashes with commerce. Especially the tense relationship with director Harm Scheltens of furniture manufacturer Pastoe ends in a legal battle for years over money, recognition and control.

The film focuses on his childhood in Catholic Haaren, where he felt like an outsider from an early age. As a gay boy with radically new ideas about design, Aldo clashes with everything his surroundings stand for. His parents run a traditional furniture store where there is no place for his geometric language of form and fluorescent light art.
When Aldo came out of the closet at a young age and began a relationship with a boy, his mother literally kicked him out of the house - afraid that his "otherness" would damage the family's good name. That rejection would carry with Aldo his entire life.

The film then highlights his flamboyant life in the free Amsterdam of the 70s and 80s. In Amsterdam, Aldo finally finds the space to be himself. He is discovered by Benno Premsela and finds a connection with a group of rebellious designers, including Gijs Bakker, Wim Crouwel and Ad Dekkers. He develops his own minimalist style based on his systematic, modular way of thinking, geometric abstraction and through minimal use of imagery. Not too fashionable. He believes in evergreens. His most famous design, the A'dammer cabinet, depicts his vision: no compromise, no superfluous details, but a more hushed, anonymous and timeless product and at the same time a silent ode to the city where he found freedom.