They met at a Bauhaus design exhibition in Berlin — the kind where the arguments are about the intersection of art and utility, and the coffee is served in perfectly proportioned cups. Elke was defending the primacy of form. Markus was the only person in the room who thought function deserved equal billing.

What began as a heated debate across a grid-ruled table became long walks through Mitte, became shared studios, became a life built on the conviction that beauty and purpose are not opposites — they are each other.