Building character

Sometimes crockery is far more than a utility item, as Markus Tenbusch, manager of the Udo Walz branch on Kurfürstendamm, discovered over the years with KPM porcelain. Writer Sandra Winkler and photographer Christoph Mack visited Tenbusch in his apartment in Berlin's Moabit neighborhood to learn more about his passion for porcelain.

An excerpt from the feature in KPM WEISS Magazine, Issue no. 02:

The plates and cups with which Tenbusch sets the table in his apartment have a special meaning for him: they stand for a new beginning, the beginning of his life in Berlin. "It was a lucky coincidence that I found this porcelain. Or that it found me," says Tenbusch.

Eleven years ago, he had just moved from Munich to Berlin after a long period of wrangling about whether the capital might be the right place for him, when he saw the tableware at a flea market on the Straße des 17 Juni. Six cake plates, cups and saucers from the Königliche Porzellan-Manufaktur Berlin's URBINO series, designed in 1931 by Trude Petri in the spirit of New Objectivity. The appeal was instant - the simple form, the pure white, the noble platinum rim.

Nothing is as boring as the perfect thing. I like to play with contrasts and harmony."

Markus Tenbusch

[...] He later bought a blue espresso cup. Friends gave him two HALLESCHE FORM cups - inspired by the Bauhaus style, but with a romantic flower pattern: a combination of new shape and traditional decoration.

But Tenbusch does not only mix different styles in his kitchen cupboard. As a guest in his apartment, you can choose whether to sit on a loft chair under a modern pendulum lamp or on a baroque chair with gold-coloured ornaments from the requisites of the Komische Oper.

When Tenbusch comes home from work each evening, part of his pay goes into a piggy bank - towards the next wish he wants to fulfil. At the moment he is set on two more URBINO espresso cups, in red and yellow.

Read the full story of Markus Tenbusch's passion in the KPM WEISS Magazine Issue No. 02.