PLANT FEVER towards a Phyto-centred Design
€35.00Can design help us change our perspective and reveal their potential as allies?
Can design help us change our perspective and reveal their potential as allies?
The exhibition SERIAL EATER at CID Grand-Hornu dissects thirty years of experimentation with, and reflection on, the ‘object’ of food. The analysis of Food Design, from its development in the 1990s to its implications today, makes it possible to understand changes in consumption habits and awareness of the ‘food system’.
What type of consumers are we, how do we assess our impact in today’s system and what do we accept on our plates?
Bilingual edition: French/English
Dirk Wynants (°1964) is the founder and owner of the innovative Belgian furniture brand Extremis. He is also the main designer of the brand and the creator of the brilliant branding concept “Tools for Togetherness”.
For Michael Young, experimentation and research into different materials and techniques is his greatest passion.
Born in Sunderland (UK), he works from his studios in Brussels and Hong Kong. His designs for furniture and utensils are technically sophisticated and advanced, but thanks to a touch of humour, never sterile. He has spent more than ten years in Asia testing the most sophisticated technological processes and exploring the possibilities of different types of materials. His aluminium projects in particular stand out for their uniqueness and daring approach. This first monograph offers a nice cross-section of Michael Young’s oeuvre and compiles not only his work in aluminium, but also his most iconic creations in other materials.
This book appears on the occasion of the exhibition al(l) in Grand-Hornu (31 January – 29 May 2016).
Fibre-Fixed. Composites in Design shows and explains what can be achieved when fibres are combined with another material – usually a plastic or a bioplastic – to form fibre-reinforced composites.
Silversmiths Rob and Jaap Thalen, who enjoy an even greater reputation in the United States if possible than in Europe, are now ready for their second book.
Unconstrained, poetic and timeless. That is how we can characterise the designs of Jean-François D’Or. The Belgian Designer of the Year 2013 does not put himself in the spotlight with large showpieces, but with his special talent he leaves his own mark on the field of smaller home and interior accessories such as bowls, lamps, vases, coat racks, door handles, mirrors,… Small touches that in all subtlety colour an interior and at the same time very ‘democratic’ design that can seduce a large public.
Contemporary jewellery design is undoubtedly the result of thousands of years of craftsmanship, tradition and research. Contemporary jewellers still use the same precious metals and gemstones as their predecessors, but continue to experiment with techniques, innovate with new materials and create their own unique concepts.
Throughout the centuries, silverware has been a source of inspiration for many artists. Religious silverware raised the profession to unprecedented heights, but in the course of the 20th century commissions became scarce. More and more studios had to close their doors and monumental silverwork soon disappeared into the background. Gradually, training also left something to be desired. Father Rob and son Jaap Thalen’s dream is to make the very best again: objects, utensils and works of art in silver such as have been hard to find for a long time. Monumental creations for which both the old craftsmanship and the most advanced techniques are required. Their designs take shape in Francorchamps, Belgium, and are appreciated worldwide.
Vision was designed in 1986 by Pierre Mazairac and Karel Boonzaaijer based on the philosophy that a cabinet, as a composition, should be part of the architecture. Partly due to its maximum flexibility of use and extremely modest design, this design was very successful from the outset with the Dutch manufacturer Pastoe. 25 years later, the compositional possibilities remain unlimited: from a three-dimensional relief to a graphic grid of lines and planes, from a series of sideboards to an architectural landscape of volumes. The book Vision – Room for imagination sketches the story of this young classic.
The work of self-proclaimed ex-designer Martí Guixé (°1964) can aptly be described as ‘beyond design’. Creating new objects he finds rather ‘superfluous’ and ‘boring’; he prefers to concentrate on ideas, systems and living matter such as food and human behaviour. As a ‘global designer’, Guixé constantly travels back and forth between Berlin and his native Barcelona, analyses situations, rituals and movements and proposes radical solutions with a minimum of ergonomics – simple, immaterial, humorous and often iconoclastic.
Danny Venlet (°1958, Victoria, Australia) is one of the world’s best and most promising designers; yet his work is a well-kept secret in the design world. This is partly due to the fact that Venlet has worked and lived in two different worlds (Australia and Belgium), but is also explained by the essence of his personality and work – modest, prone to understatement, and relaxed.
Futurotextiles – published at the end of 2008 on the occasion of the exhibition of the same name – is more than just an exhibition catalogue.
Surrealism may be best known as a movement within literature and the fine arts, but the influence of this 20th-century artistic movement in other fields should not be underestimated. Even the world of design and contemporary design does not escape a healthy dose of surreal humour.
In 2008, Design Flanders is organising the Triennial of Design for the fifth time, a prestigious exhibition in the Royal Museums of Art and History in Brussels, which puts Flemish design in the limelight on the basis of a chosen theme.