Handles and switches that offer a tactile experience

Today we would like to introduce a brand we have recently added to our showroom and with which we share an interest in design and detail: Buster + Punch, a firm of London origin that designs objects for the home across a very broad range, from electrical switches and door hardware to lighting and furniture.

What unites its entire catalogue is touch. Its pieces are made in solid metal and carry a distinctive knurling that the fingers recognise before the eye does. In this article we look at the origins of the brand, its product families (switches, hardware, lighting and furniture), what sets them apart and what to bear in mind when specifying them in a project.

Buster + Punch: from an East London garage to the details of the home

Behind the brand is Massimo Buster Minale, an architect and industrial designer who worked at Foster + Partners and at Richard Rogers’ practice before launching Buster + Punch in 2013. According to the firm, by day he worked as an architect and by night he turned old motorcycles into one-off pieces in a garage in Shoreditch, in east London, making every component himself. From there he moved on to home accessories: door handles, switches, toilet-roll holders.

The brand sums up its aim in a single sentence: to reinvent the home accessories that usually go unnoticed and turn them into something memorable. Its products stand out as in-house designs, with high-quality materials and finishes and a wide range of solutions for each family.

True to that origin, its collections seek the originality of the unexpected with an elegant essence, for users who value design and detail. The firm draws inspiration from London’s fashion, music and subcultures, and collaborates with street artists, motorcycle builders and fashion designers on special pieces.

Four families with a shared language

The catalogue we presented in 2020 is organised into four families. All share solid metal, knurling and details such as round-headed screws, so that a switch, a door handle and a light fitting can coexist in the same space with a common language.

The switch finishes are those the brand gave for its Electricity collection, which allowed plate and control to be combined in 11 colour combinations; the hardware finishes are those listed in our original presentation. For lighting and furniture, finishes depend on each piece.

Solid-metal electrical switches

Switches, dimmers and sockets conceived as design pieces.

This is how we find complete collections of solid-metal electrical switches, with the distinctive knurled pattern and metal screws, in finishes that can be combined with one another to fit out entire projects: dimmers, switches, sockets, USB outlets and plates. The collection is modular, so switches, dimmers, sockets and USB outlets can be combined on a single plate.

Massimo Buster Minale borrowed details from the world of rock to design it: the dimmer is inspired by guitar knobs and the toggle switch by those on vintage amplifiers. The dimmer knob carries the brand’s diamond-cut knurling and the plate is finished with its coin-style screws, which can match the colour of the knob. The result is clearly different to the touch.

Hardware: door handles, knobs and pulls

Where the difference shows most, not only to the eye but especially to the touch, is in the wide range of hardware: door handles, knobs, door stops, door locks and pulls, in black, steel, brass, smoked bronze and gun metal.

This hardware is a genuine tactile experience: the design goes beyond fulfilling a function, and material, weight and texture take on great importance in each of its collections. The pieces are solid metal and carry the brand’s cross knurling, diamond-cut and hand-finished.

Pulls for furniture and wardrobes

Pull bars, in various lengths, and furniture knobs bring the same knurling to kitchens, wardrobes, chests of drawers and bathroom units. Using the same family on doors and on furniture is a simple way to give continuity to an interior.

Lighting and furniture

Last but not least, we highlight complementary products such as lighting, furniture and accessories. All share a common approach to the product and to the design of each piece.

In lighting, the Heavy Metal pendant is a solid-metal lampholder with the same cross knurling, designed for E27 bulbs; the brand pairs it with its Buster Bulb, an LED bulb it presents as the first designer LED bulb. In furniture, The Rockstar is a solid-wood bar cabinet with a stitched back panel, interior lighting with a knurled lampholder, the brand’s hardware and folding legs.

Key points for specifying Buster + Punch

Beyond aesthetics, these points are worth resolving at design stage:

• Version by country: the switches are made in versions for the United Kingdom, Europe and the United States. For a project in Spain, the European version must be specified.
• Combination of finishes: plate, control and screws are chosen separately. It is advisable to define the combination for the whole project and record it in the electrical fittings schedule.
• Consistency across families: switches, hardware and lighting share the knurling. Choosing the same finish for all of them, or a deliberate contrast, avoids unintended mixes of metallic tones.
• Use of the handles: according to the manufacturer, its door handles are intended for interior doors, are not suitable for exterior doors and have not been tested as fire-rated hardware.
• Dimmers and light fittings: check the dimmer’s compatibility with the planned LED lamps and drivers; the manufacturer gives the permitted wattage ranges in each data sheet.

Because the tactile experience in a project matters, Buster + Punch attends to every last detail of its switches, hardware, lighting and furniture to create a complete experience for the user. At Matter we help you coordinate these finishes with the rest of the project’s materials.