Nickey Kehoe’s New Collection With The Lacquer Company Takes Its Cues From Beloved Antiques

In 2024, AD heralded the return of lacquer. In our April 2026 issue, cover star Athena Calderone was pictured leaning over an enormous burgundy-lacquered kitchen island, and in May, cover star Mark Grattan showed off his parrot green lacquer walls. Today’s collaboration between AD100 design firm Nickey Kehoe and The Lacquer Company brings the glossy finish down to a slightly more manageable scale, applying it to coffee tables, desks, trays, and tissue boxes. Nickey Kehoe founders Todd Nickey and Amy Kehoe designed the 30-piece collection with The Lacquer Company founder James Lowther, drawing on antique furniture and objects the three have collected over the years.The Bonne Nuit nightstand in Cassis staged among various Nickey Kehoe textiles and an upholstered headboard. The Florin Tray in Carreaux & Marine Blue is styled with all small pieces from the Nickey Kehoe collection. Many of the pieces, as is often true of Nickey Kehoe’s in-house catalog, draw on the founders’ personal vintage collections. The Pastis side table is based on a bamboo folding table that belongs to Nickey. The Hugo desk is a Louis XVI–style writing desk, with tapered, fluted legs, brass details, and three soft-close drawers in a bright red lacquer. The colorways sound like a very civilized, French late lunch: cassis and lettuce green, carreaux and marine blue, khaki and chocolate brown. The Jules catchall tray comes with a matching tissue box cover for the powder room.Layred trays, tissue boxes, side tables, and the collection's coffee table are staged together her to show the full line. The Pastis side table references a vintage style with the lacquer and bamboo combination reminiscent of Regency Chinoiserie. Lowther bought his first piece of lacquer, a burnt-orange betel box, while traveling in Burma in 1999, and it’s still one of his favorite things. He later found the craftspeople he was looking for in Saigon, and every piece from The Lacquer Company is still made there in Sơn Mài lacquer, a Vietnamese art form that goes back centuries. The process is lengthy: wood is first sealed with a resin called Sinh. It’s then coated repeatedly with natural lacquer mixed with ground mountain rock, alluvial soil, and cashew nut shell oil. Each coat is wet-sanded until it’s smooth before the next coat is applied. “There is no prescribed drying time, no set number of layers,” according to the company. That makes the eight- to 12-week lead time on larger pieces easier to forgive.Nickey Kehoe’s goal is for its furniture to feel “as if it was acquired, not purchased.” With these pieces so rooted in vintage styles and techniques, they make good on their promise.The collection is available to shop on NickeyKehoe.com.Shop the Collection:Jules Square Tissue Box by Nickey Kehoe x The Lacquer CompanyFlorin Tray by Nickey Kehoe x The Lacquer CompanyDauphine Drinks Table by Nickey Kehoe x The Lacquer CompanyDauphine Coffee Table by Nickey Kehoe x The Lacquer CompanyPastis Side Table by Nickey Kehoe x The Lacquer CompanyBonne Nuit Bedside Table by Nickey Kehoe x The Lacquer Company