My name is Julian Forsythe. I’m 45, I’m an interior designer from Bristol, and I spent three months renovating my bathroom last year. New tiles, new fixtures, a freestanding bath I’d been thinking about for a decade, lighting I’d sourced from three different suppliers. Every decision was considered. Every detail was deliberate.
Then I put a £4 plastic toilet brush in it from the supermarket and didn’t think about it for six weeks.
I’m a professional interior designer. I am aware of the irony.
The Moment I Noticed
A friend came to see the finished bathroom — she’s an architect, she has opinions, and she was generous about the whole thing. Then she looked at the toilet brush. She didn’t say anything. She didn’t need to. The look was sufficient.
I looked at it properly for the first time. It was beige. It was slightly melted-looking from proximity to the heated towel rail. The bristles were already beginning to splay. In a bathroom I’d spent three months and considerable money on, it looked like an afterthought. Because it was an afterthought.
I started looking for a replacement that evening.
What I Was Actually Looking For
As an interior designer, I have a specific set of requirements for objects in a space. They need to earn their place. They need to be well-made. They need to have a considered relationship with the other objects around them. And ideally, they need to have a story — a reason for existing beyond pure function that gives them a kind of presence in the room.
A toilet brush is not, on the face of it, a promising candidate for any of this. But good design doesn’t discriminate by category. Some of the most interesting design objects in history are mundane things made extraordinary by the quality of thought applied to them.
Finding the Gedy Puppy
I’d been looking for about twenty minutes when I found the Gedy Puppy White Toilet Brush. I stopped immediately when I read the designer’s name: Makio Hasuike. I knew the name. Hasuike is a Japanese-Italian industrial designer whose work spans decades and disciplines — and whose pieces are held in the permanent collections of MoMA New York and the Triennale Milano.
A toilet brush. In MoMA. I ordered it within about ninety seconds.
Why This One Specifically
- Makio Hasuike design — a designer with genuine museum-level credentials. The Puppy isn’t a toilet brush that happens to look nice. It’s a considered design object that happens to be a toilet brush. The distinction matters.
- MoMA and Triennale Milano permanent collections — these are not marketing claims. MoMA’s design collection is one of the most rigorous in the world. If the Puppy is in it, the design has been evaluated and found to be genuinely significant.
- 100% Made in Italy — thermoplastic resin and high-quality nylon tuft, manufactured to Italian standards with a two-year warranty. Not a design object that sacrifices function for form — both are taken seriously.
- Clean minimalist silhouette — the white finish and precise geometry work in almost any bathroom aesthetic. It doesn’t compete with the space around it. It simply belongs.
- Precise dimensions — 33.5 x 15 x 15cm. Compact enough to sit discreetly beside the toilet without dominating the floor space, substantial enough to feel considered rather than token.
When It Arrived
It arrived two days later. I took it out of the packaging and held it for a moment before putting it in the bathroom, which is not something I have ever done with a toilet brush before and am slightly embarrassed to admit. But the object has a quality to it — a weight and a finish and a rightness of proportion — that rewards a moment’s attention.
I put it in the bathroom. I stood back. The room looked complete in a way it hadn’t before, which is a sentence I did not expect to write about a toilet brush.
My architect friend came back two weeks later for dinner. She went to use the bathroom and came back to the table and said, without preamble: “You replaced the brush.” I said yes. She said: “Good.” That was the entire conversation. It was enough.
Eight Months On
The Gedy Puppy has been in daily use for eight months. The thermoplastic resin shows no signs of discolouration or degradation. The nylon tuft is as effective as it was on day one. The white finish remains clean and bright — it wipes down easily and doesn’t harbour the kind of grime that cheaper materials accumulate over time.
It has also been noticed by every person who has used my bathroom in the past eight months. Not always commented on — but noticed. There’s a quality to well-designed objects that registers even when people can’t articulate why. The room feels more considered. The details feel intentional. That’s what good design does, even — especially — in the places you least expect it.
What It Taught Me
I’m an interior designer. I know better than to treat any object in a space as an afterthought. And yet I did exactly that, with the one object in the bathroom that gets used every single day. The Gedy Puppy was a reminder that design doesn’t stop at the objects you choose to think about. It extends to all of them.
The lesson, which I should have known and apparently needed to relearn: there is no such thing as a category of object too mundane to deserve good design. The Puppy proves it.
Who I’d Recommend This To
Anyone who has spent time and thought on their bathroom and then put something cheap and forgettable next to the toilet. Anyone who cares about design and wants objects in their home that have genuine credentials. And anyone who has ever been looked at by an architect friend in a way that required no words — because this is the straightforward solution to that problem.
Where to Get It
The Gedy Puppy White Toilet Brush is available from ALTOE. If you’re upgrading your bathroom accessories more broadly, these collections are worth exploring:
- Toilet Brushes & Holders — functional bathroom accessories that don’t compromise on design
- Toilet Brush & Holder Sets — complete sets for a cohesive bathroom look
- Bathroom Accessories — the finishing details that complete a considered bathroom
- Home & Garden — design-led products for every room in the house
Julian Forsythe is an interior designer from Bristol who spent three months renovating his bathroom and six weeks ignoring the toilet brush. He considers this a lapse in professional judgement that has since been corrected. The room is now complete.
0 commenti