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Over the past 10 years, Berry Dijkstra has constructed a curious career. “I mostly tell people that I’m a composition artist,” smiles the Dutchman from his home in the Spanish city of Valencia. What this mostly means is that he creates towering “stacks” of furniture – placing cabinets, side tables and chairs on top of one another, interspersing lamps, vases and the odd Greco-Roman bust within each ceiling-high structure.

It’s a creative pursuit that began on a whim. “At my apartment in Rotterdam I would make small arrangements of objects, and then one day I began to use bigger pieces,” Dijkstra recalls. “I just started to play with furniture.” His eye-catching bricolages have since led to collaborations with brands such as Polish furniture maker Tylko and Dutch bedding line Suite702. He has created installations for design boutiques, as well as events like the Design Biennale Rotterdam.

One of Berry Dijkstra’s “stacks” in his Valencia apartment © Beatriz Janer

Dijkstra refers to his creations as “sort of architecture, like a cityscape, but then as a photo it’s also flat – so in a way I’m painting with furniture . . . It’s all about colours, materials and composition,” he adds. What makes a successful stack is “when the balance is right, but there’s also a little bit of friction”.

This might be a colour-popping Oceanic Table Lamp by Michele De Lucchi sitting atop a bubblegum-pink Tylko chest of drawers, or a sea creature-like wall light by young Irish designer Barry Llewellyn, made from ceramic fragments and recycled glass, next to a ladder by Malva Office, the Valencia-based design studio of Jose Cortés.

These building blocks come, for the most part, from Dijkstra’s own collection, a trove he has been compiling for the past 20 years. It started with Dutch design that he would hunt for at vintage markets: a particular passion was Pastoe, the Utrecht-based furniture brand known for its sleek midcentury sideboards and, later, minimalist cabinets by Aldo van den Nieuwelaar. Over time the focus has shifted to young contemporary designers. It’s an eclectic mix, skewing to the “graphic and minimalistic”, he says.

Books and magazines in a basin with an incense holder (left) by Phil Procter, Jurassic Park bath soap holder and Bored flag by Rotganzen © Beatriz Janer

A vintage lamp sits on a Beaver Dreams stool by Kasper Boelenns, beside an Osaka armchair by Martin Visser for Spectrum © Beatriz Janer

Dutch design remains a theme. One of Dijkstra’s newer additions is a vibrant neon-green chair from Eindhoven-based designer Teun Zwets’ Splitted furniture collection, composed of rough-hewn wood coated in glossy lacquer. “Nothing is new in this world, but it feels fresh,” says Dijkstra. Other pieces from the Netherlands include a textured elm-wood stool by Kasper Boelens, a neon light bySabine Marcelis and several wool-felt “house plants” from Rotterdam-based outfit Wandschappen.

Dijkstra grew up in Leeuwarden, a city in the north of the Netherlands. He moved to Rotterdam rather than Amsterdam because, he says, “I love the underdog. There is something interesting in Rotterdam’s architecture: the people, the diversity. I lived there for 20 years.” Studies in communications led to marketing roles in music clubs before Dijkstra pivoted to a more creative path. “I sort of rolled into interiors,” he says, “working in shops and as an interior stylist.”

Dijkstra in his bedroom, with an Auping bed, bedding by Suite702 and wall cabinets from Ikea © Beatriz Janer

Three years ago he found himself at a turning point when he split up from his long-term partner. “I thought, OK, I work freelance. I don’t have an apartment. I don’t have a relationship. I could go wherever I want.”

He settled upon Valencia and found the “perfect apartment” in a late-1920s building in the historic El Carmen neighbourhood. “When I saw the tiled floors it was like, oh yes, this is the Spanish dream,” he says. “The ceilings also have lots of mouldings and ornaments – and they are very high.” Not only does the space make for a good backdrop, it also accommodates his 6ft 7in frame.

All his design pieces are functional. In the apartment’s single bedroom, for example, a blue concrete plinth, cast in concentric fronds by Iwan Pol, becomes a bedside table; above it swings one of Belgian duo Muller Van Severen’s tubular hanging lamps. “I use everything and then I use it to make a composition – so sometimes I don’t have a light,” he laughs. “My boyfriend was just here from Paris and was like, ‘Can I have a reading light in the bedroom?’” The request was refused: “It was still part of a stack.”

A Bubble Gum clock by Teun Zwets sits on a pile of books atop a Palissade Collection bench by Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec for Hay © Beatriz Janer

Dijkstra’s adopted city is also increasingly playing a role in his design language. For the month-long Valencia Design Fest last September, he hosted Songs from the Fifth Floor in his apartment, featuring the work of five Valencian artists, including Canoa Lab and Vicent Orts.

Recently, though, he’s been working on installations further afield: one for Suite702 – a presentation of its new bedding collection at its Amsterdam HQ, which took place earlier this month; another at Wonder Festival, a design fair in the Belgian city of Kortrijk (until 2 November). “It’s the first time that I’m doing multiple stacks in a space – it becomes more like a set design, creating a whole world,” says Dijkstra. It’s a challenge but “fun is very important”. “An interior evolves, you select things that are personal, that have a memory. You don’t have to follow trends.” His advice? “Do it with your heart – and use the pieces. This is what stacking is all about: form follows fun.”