Design Week

Modem was there, visiting and looking around:
a selection of the shows that we saw and liked in Ventura Lambrate.

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Thinking Hands
Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design <sld(bezalel)|right>

The graduate’s show of the Bezalel Academy entitled “Thinking Hands” presented the works of students embracing industrial design, arts and crafts, experimental processes, new technologies. They all graduated during the last two years.
Settled in a corner of a huge warehouse in Lambrate, the exhibition was sub-divided in four themes, which are The Exposing Hand, The Unifying Hand, The Enchanting Hand and The Mischievous Hand. The show explored a new chapter in the design industry that stands between the manufactured product and the one of a kind object.


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Carwan Gallery

<sld(carwan)|left>Nicolas Bellavance Lecompte, director and co-founder of Carwan Gallery launched the first show of the gallery during the Salone in Milan. Established in Beirut, Carwan is a pop-up gallery promoting limited-edition design in the Middle East. At the occasion of the design week, the gallery took over a warehouse in the Vestura Lambrate area. From the very high ceiling of the space, till the floor, large widths of paper shaded from a colour to white creating a beautiful and simple display for the works. The exhibition featured series of young international designers, presenting exclusive and new works: brightly coloured carpets, massive shelves, blown glass vessels…

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Mindcraft11
Danish Crafts
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The exhibition Mindcraft11 is an initiative from Danish Crafts and features a generation of Danish craftspeople that interpreted and challenge traditional Danish values in an intelligent, playful and serious way. Neatly displayed in a raw on a low podium in the middle of the room, the pieces of 13 designers and craftsmen presented a large diversity in material, typologies and functions but with a common quality: a perfect execution.

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Edition of 6

This exhibition featured limited edition of pieces by six international designers, made together with Italian artisans. In a simple display, Edition of 6 presented a variation on cold and warm materials, organic and geometrical shapes, as a demonstration of ability both from the designers and the craftsmen.


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Waiting for…Glasstress
MAD of New York with Venice Projects
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Exhibition featuring pieces from Particia Urquiola. Bright colours, bold associations of textures and dreamlike shapes, Urquiola managed to communicate the richness and playfulness of her inspirations through the collection of big glass sculptures.

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Rien de 9
Babled
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While his massive Paso Doble table seemed to swing around in the Ventura 6 courtyard, Emmanuel Babled was busy presenting to visitors his gallery space. Heavy and organic wood and plexiglass tables on the floor, transparent and colourful glass containers were floating in the air, marble blocks were revealing glass jars; the space was full of contrasts, materials, textures, and colours and was definitively the showroom of an hyper productive and multi-disciplinary designer. The exhibition Rien de 9, featured Babled’s most recent work in limited editions.

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Kasselcollection
Kunsthochschule Kassel
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In an original and cosy display, the Kunsthochschule Kassel presented Kasselcollection, a selection of objects from the Department of Furniture and Exhibition Design. In one of the warehouses of the Lambrate area, the collection was presented to the public for the first time. Kasselcollection showed the works and thoughts developed at the Kunsthochschule and put them up for discussion.

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We Present you
Academy of Fine Arts Maastricht

The Jewellery and Product Design departments of the Academy of Fine Arts Maastricht exhibited a selection of works from their current students and alumni of the last 5 years. Accompanied by a beautifully designed booklet, We present you featured precious jewels, hand-carved wood tools, delicate ceramics, etc. An eclectic and dynamic selection of young and promising designers.

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New times New heroes)
Particles Gallery

<sld(particles)|left>The gallery showcasedAldo Bakker’s new pieces, recognizable by their pure and sleek lines. Next to it, the fascinating yet slightly uncanny blankets of Emilie Pallard with eyeholes were an invitation to hide and observe. Freshly added to the collection, the wood textiles from Lenneke Langenhuijsen and her little stools, halfway between a sheep and a cupcake.
A few meters away, Brecht Duijf showcased her objects. Light colors, body-printed textile, pastel bodies and hollow shapes define her dreamlike inspirations.

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Plusdesign Gallery

In its naked space, at the entrance of Via Ventura, Plusdesign Gallery presented eight pieces entering its collection this year. The cutting-edge selection of young talents and renowned designers grew bigger this year, with limited edition and exclusive pieces.

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Poetry Happens
Made in Berlin
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Held by Made in Berlin, the exhibition Poetry Happens featured 15 Berlin architects and designers. All the participants explained in which way their works are related to poetry, might it be conscious or unexpected. The show was a happy juxtaposition of projects, prototypes, objects and installations, displayed on raw wooden plinths. The very diverse range of projects, and the combinations and confrontation between different inspirations did create a context where poetry happened.

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RCA Campsite and Design Products Collection
Royal college of Arts
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A big exhibition in two folds was set up under big tents in a warehouse of the Ventura . On one hand recent graduates and second year students were presenting their projects, on the other hand the Royal College featured First hand, the first selection of products from their newly formed Design Products Collection. A selection by Gareth Williams and Toord Boontje.

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Textiles Future
Central Saint Martins College of Arts and Design

The exhibition entitled was the presentation of thirteen students from the Central Saint Martins College of Arts and Design. Videos, samples, pictures and final pieces of each student’s projects were ranging from the meeting of science and design, designing emotional resonance, transience, revival of indigenous craft techniques and future manufacturing processes.

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Talking Textiles – Graduate Textile Talents
Edelkoort exhibitions

<sld(ttlambrate)|left>A selection of young graduate designers was showcased in the dynamic Ventura Lambrate area as part of Edelkoort’s ongoing initiative to promote textile design education. Concentrated in a tiny space, textiles works were displayed all over the room, hanging from the walls, on tables and plinth, samples, tryouts, pieces, from the tiniest yarn-made-jewellery to pieces of furniture. Li Edelkoort, curator of the show forecasted “the overwhelming revival of textiles in our interiors, covering floors, walls and furniture in an expansive and personal manner”. Young textile designers featured in that exhibition are therefore people to follow.

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New Times New Heroes
Z33 and Thomas Lommée

<sld(z33)|right>New Times, New Heroes featured and gathered different parties, independent designers, institutions from Holland and Belgium . Amongst them Z33 and REcentre which were presenting Thomas Lommée’s OpenStructures project. Standing in the middle of the space a long table with a grid print presented a new vision of design as a never-ending possibility of combinations and additions to an existing grid or structure. Contributions to the project were endless and it offers a refreshing and new approach of design as a collaborative organic process. Introducing this concept at the occasion of the Salone in Milan, it definitively demonstrated a will to rethink design, and design production.

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Ahrend

Royal Ahrend is a Dutch furniture company established in 1896. The company focuses its goals in producing beautiful, timeless and sustainable designs. This year, Ahrend was presenting two new pieces under the ear-catching title “Space Tricks & Material Treats”. In the small yet light full space of via Ventura, we had the chance to witness Ineke Hans chit-chatting with Yuya Ushida while he was assembling his incredibly complex XXXX_Stool. Although it seemed to be a piece of cake for him, it is difficult not to be puzzles by the structure of his pieces. A kind of giant eco-friendly Légo for grown up. It results in a flexible piece of furniture, that one could even decide to assembly himself! “When you put it together yourself, I am sure, it will become more than furniture to you”. The XXX_Sofa can be stretched from a chair dimensions to a sofa size thanks to all the articulations.
On the other hand, Ineke Hans presented her contribution to Ahrend’s collection, the Ahrend 380 chair and table. The simple and clear lines of the pieces offered an interesting contrast with Ushida's intricate sofa.

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