Object Density is a Sydney-based design studio established by Nicola Charlesworth and Kim Stanek. Object Density believes that a designed object can be ‘dense’. Dense with the tacit knowledge of those who contributed throughout the design process.
Nikola and Kim both graduated from UTS with a Bachelor of Industrial Design Honours in 2016. Nikola worked as a tutor at UTS for two years, and in the Fabrication Workshop. Kim also tutored Product Design, and currently also works as a Protospace Workshop Technician.
The duo moved from Sydney to Eindhoven in 2019 to immerse themselves in dutch design culture while founding their studio Object Density. After three years they returned to Australia, continuing their studio work and research.
Some of Object Desnity’s projects are:
🌊 Celebration of Sand - Plates made from reused scrap glass. The plates’ form is a direct response to the sandstone erosion patterns that is are so iconic to coastline of Sydney, Australia. Using a combination of slump forming into the glass kiln’s sand bed, and sand-blasting to soften the form, it is as if the plate had spent years tumbling through the ocean floor and was discovered on a beach in that way.
👓 Lens Luminaire - The Lens Luminaire seeks to reinstate the value of imperfect optical lenses, by highlighting their inherent beauty and unique distortive qualities. The Collection began with a chandelier that features 154 repurposed optical lenses suspended upon a solid brass structure, with each lens distorting and reflecting the beam of light in a unique way. This has expanded into a series of table and floor lamps.
🍃 Native Anodising - Native Anodising is an ongoing project that explores the technique of dying aluminium with native Australian species, namely Eucalypts, Acacias, and Callistemons. This unique process has been developed in-house over the past 3 years involving rigorous testing, experimentation, and data collection
🧱Proportions of Space - a collection of ceramic tables that explore the pair’s relationship to different landscapes within the Netherlands. This design won the Object, Furniture and Lighting – Rising category at IDEA
#australiandesign #industrialdesign
Object Density’s entry into this years Rigg design prize, ‘Salt’, caught our eye for many reasons: Its organic sculptural form. The contrast of the slump formed glass exterior panels with the laser straight aluminium frame. The way the glass looks like it might dissolve or float away, were it not for the pebble like chrome fixings.
We can imagine placing this beautiful and functional piece in our YL project as a physical expression of the sense of calm, fluidity and grace that informs the project, as well as a reference to the ever changing atmosphere of the beachside location.
Images via @objectdensity Photographed by @kyleford.co
Celebrating the creative force of a new generation — the designers of the NGV Rigg Design Prize 2025: Next in Design
Selected from across Australia the 2025 finalists are early-career practitioners working across furniture, lighting and object design through the material histories and knowledge systems of glass, ceramics, wood, jewellery, textiles and metal.
It has been a joy to work with this remarkable group of designers and makers, whose resilience, commitment, generosity and vision fill the galleries on Level 3 at The Ian Potter Centre: NGV Australia with energy and possibility.
Open now until 1 February 2026
In this post:
Image 1. @objectdensity
Image 2. @_daltonstewart
Image 3. Lavinia Ketchell @erubarts
Image 4. @studio.adeney
Image 5. Delissa Brown @hermannsburgpotters
Image 6. Douglas Powell @duzi_objects
Image 7. Jack Fearon @_fearon_
Image 8. @clairmar
Image 9. @nathansnhan
Image 10. @claudialaustudio
With thanks to Major Partner
@deakinuniversity and Major Supporter Cicely & Colin Rigg Bequest managed by Equity Trustees.
@ngvmelbourne #riggdesignprize @contemporaryaustraliandesign
Beautiful portraits by @timcarrafa
The Rigg Design Prize 2025 @ngvmelbourne is open. It is such an honour to be part of such an incredible exhibition. A big congratulations to all the participants, it has been so special to connect over this occasion. A big thank you to @simoneleamon and the @ngvmelbourne team for curating and producing such an amazing show.
The Rigg Design Prize is Australia’s most prestigious accolade for contemporary design. For its landmark tenth edition in 2025, the prize will be awarded to an early-career Australian design practice, drawing attention to the new generation of talent. Bringing together thirty-five emerging designers under the age of 35, the exhibition spans ceramics, glass, furniture, woodwork, metalwork, textiles, lighting and contemporary jewellery, presenting ambitious works that reflect bold approaches
to materiality, form and function.
The Ian Potter Centre: NGV Australia
19 Sep 2025 – 1 Feb 2026
Installation view of the Rigg Design Prize 2025, NGV, 2025. Photography: Madeleine Burke
@NGVMelbourne
#RiggDesignPrize
#RiggDesignPrize2025
#NGV
The Rigg Design Prize 2025 has landed and the $40K award has gone to Alfred Lowe, ceramicist and proud Aranda man from Snake Well in Central Australia.
His piece is the first one on this slide and it’s pure magic: clay + fibre woven into textures and sgraffito carvings that echo the desert landscape.
Australia’s design talent is on fire right now — and this prize is proof.
Rigg Design Prize 2025 — Highlights 1. Alfred Lowe — You and me, us never part (raku clay, underglaze, raffia palm) 2. Marlo Lyda — Pat, sculptural lamps from the Kin series (aluminium, acrylic, glass, pearls + LEDs) 3. Emma Shepherd — Shape/shifting (banana fibre, linen, walnut husk dye) 4. Walter Brooks — Wangatunga jirtaka jilamara (10 folded bark baskets with sawfish design) 5. Patrick Adeney — Banana lounge (Tasmanian blackwood, Danish paper cord, brass + leather)
Next slide 6. Marcel Hoogstad — Hay Moon 1–7, from the Moon Phase series (blown + mirrored glass, steel) 7. Claudia Lau — A kind of whiteness: Index (porcelain, stoneware, ash, feldspar, clay, bone) 8. Simone Namunjdja — Wak wak (Crow) (stringybark + ochre pigment) 9. Julian Leigh May — Caged cabinet (aluminium, latex, foam) 10. Nicola Charlesworth & Kim Stanek of Object Density — Salt (glass, aluminium, eucalyptus bark, acacia leaves)
Go check it out at the @ngvmelbourne
A highly regarded accolade in contemporary Australian design, the Rigg Design Prize celebrates its landmark 10th anniversary in 2025 with a grand prize of $40,000.
Among this year’s finalists are three alumni from Australian Design Review’s influential 30UNDER30 collective, a recognition program celebrating the leading lights of Australian design in the early stages of their careers.
Finalists for this year’s Rigg Design Prize are 2024/25 30UNDER30 alumni Dalton Stewart and Annie Paxton, and 2022/23 alumni Nicola Charlesworth and Kim Stanek represented by their practice Object Density.
Read more about their celebrated entries at ADR – link in bio.
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📸 Dalton Stewart portrait and Annie Paxton design submission photo by @piercarthew 📸 Object Density glass design submission photo by @kylefordphoto
REPOST / Thank you @ausdesignreview
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Dean Norton is the latest designer to contribute to our Designer Selects series.
Born and raised in Essex, London, the now Melbourne based multidisciplinary designer is a design polymath whose work has found its way into the NGV collection.
From Maison Martin Margiela’s book to fellow Australian designers Object Density, his selections demonstrate the breadth of his creative and stylistic influences and interests.
Read more at link in bio.
@deannorton
📸 1. Mark Lobo. 2 & 4. Mischa Baka. 3. Supplied.
#designerselects #melbournedesign #productdesign #australiandesign #contemporarydesign
Dean Norton is the latest designer to contribute to our Designer Selects series.
Born and raised in Essex, London, the now Melbourne based multidisciplinary designer is a design polymath whose work has found its way into the NGV collection.
From Maison Martin Margiela's book to fellow Australian designers Object Density, his selections demonstrate the breadth of his creative and stylistic influences and interests.
Read more at link in bio.
@deannorton
📸 1. Mark Lobo. 2 & 4. Mischa Baka. 3. Supplied.
#designerselects #melbournedesign #productdesign #australiandesign #contemporarydesign
