Dutch Design Week 2017 | Day 1 Favourites

You may have seen on my Instagram, that I was part of a group of bloggers #BlogTeamDDW organised by Holly and Desiree, covering the Dutch Design Week over the weekend. It was so great to catch up again with friends, some of those I hadn’t even met in person, yet I’ve known for years. I also got to meet some lovely new faces. I love this online blog world for that, it is the perfect tool to bring people together with the same interests. With that in mind, we were bound to have fun together exploring our love! That we did, with two full days exploring the Dutch design scene and a very special evening at the launch of the new NLXL wallpaper, Timber Strips by Piet Hein Eek. Piet’s friend, the one and only, Paola Navone cooked for us (!!) and Rossana Orlandi was also a guest. But more of that, and day two, coming up in a later post.

Looking at the DDW program before leaving, I saw that there was an enormous amount of exhibitions and events to choose from, so I was secretly happy to be handed a schedule of what we were to see, and follow along.

We began our first day meeting up for breakfast at The Student Hotel, a cool concept design accomodation where most of us were staying. We then headed to the Design Academy Eindhoven’s Graduation exhibition, MINED.   The students were to look within and around them to find solutions for today. I really enjoyed walking around here. It was all conceptional design, so there was obviously more freedom of expression.

The standout piece for me was, Piece of Comfort by Iris Muriel van Houten, She designed this with the idea to help combat the stresses of contemporary working lives. The concept is a pull down power nap station for office spaces which includes a pillow and a body wrap. If this stylish design doesn’t make it into workspaces, I could see it on balcony spaces where space is lacking, and yet where we would all appreciate taking a little siesta in the afternoon sun.

The lamps by Nick Beens are super cool! The series of led lamps can create different light settings between spot and ambient. They can also be twisted at the joins to form different shapes.

We then ate lunch at Kazerne , which had an exhibition space Eat, Drink Design. The first image at the top of the page is from one of the exhibitions, Linoleum, a different dimension put together by Forbo who specialise in linoleum flooring. Here they showed the possibilities with flat and flexible linoleum in design from floor to tabletop to lighting. This wasn’t really about new design as they used some pieces from Alvar Aalto, who was a fan of linoleum, to more recent designers. It was interesting to see though and very aesthetic to the eye. I had never thought of linoleum in design before. I do wish that they had the list of the designer of each product though as I love the pendant lamp with beautiful curves!

Further in we discovered young designers. The graphic and interesting form of these small tables below by  Studio Minale Maeda caught my eye.

The circular wall lamp second below by Sandra Lundberg reacts to movement. It intensifies the closer you get to it. If you stand still or move away, it fades out. This light wall art would be a fun talking point in a residential or commercial set up.

More stunning wall lighting on show at Eat, Drink, Design. Current Currents by design duo, Vantot who wondered if electric components could be used as part of the design, instead of hiding them. I say yes! Make sure you check out their website to see how it looks against a coloured wall. It’s really beautiful!

David Derksen‘s lightweight, wood veneer Grid Space Dividers are gorgeous. I really like the use of dividers, we had one in our last home and it made for an interesting way to define a space,  yet keep it light and airy.

My friends from the #BlogTeamDDW  are all writing about Dutch Design Week on their respective blogs, so make sure you pop over to see their favourites:

Decor8 // Vosgesparis // Stilzitat // Happy Interior Blog // Monsters Circus // Joelix // Everyday Marta // Yvestown // The Style Files // Passion Shake // April and May // BeeldSteil // Trendstefan // Sandra Kaplanovich // Urban Jungle Bloggers

Do you see favourites here? Or perhaps you’ve been visiting yourself?

Mel xx