Swedish designer Gustaf Westman has turned Mickey Mouse into furniture and tableware in a new partnership with Disney. The first three pieces, a sofa, a cup and a tumbler, are a preview of a larger collaboration that launches in Paris at the end of October.
Westman is known for rounded, brightly coloured objects, and the Disney pieces follow that style. All three designs treat the character in an abstract way, picking out Mickey’s ears and face rather than showing the full figure. The tumbler is a new version of Westman’s existing Chunky Tumbler, dressed in the character’s colours, with red shorts and white buttons forming its base.
The other two pieces are darker and more sculptural. The partnership is meant to bring a sense of joy and playfulness to objects people use every day. A black ceramic cup and saucer carry Mickey-style ears, while a black leather sofa uses the same rounded outline at a much larger scale. Both keep the cartoon reference subtle, so the character is suggested by shape rather than by colour or a printed face. The sofa is part of a made-to-order furniture collection and costs €9,250, which places it firmly at the collectable end of Westman’s range.
The wider collection is based on the Disney brand Mickey & Friends and will cover apparel, accessories, furniture and homeware. It will be shown first at a pop-up in Paris on 30 October before travelling to further pop-ups in Tokyo and New York. Dates for the Tokyo and New York stops have not been given, and the full product list has not yet been revealed.
Westman said the project “felt like a very natural creative match from the start”. He explained that his work often relies on rounded edges and inflated shapes that look almost like cartoons, which made Disney’s characters an easy fit. Of the three launch pieces, he picked out the tumbler as the one he likes best. Disney began as an animation studio in 1923, and its most famous character has been reinterpreted by designers before, including Kelly Hoppen’s grown-up take in 2019 and Ron Arad’s chairs with oversized Mickey ears in 2021. Westman’s own version of the character now joins that list, with the sofa, cup and tumbler setting the tone for the products still to come.
