The etymology of June is most commonly traced back to the Latin Iūnō, a word implying vigorous, youthful energy, which is exactly what you should, will, leave any good architecture and/or design exhibition pumped with on account of the impulses, stimulations and questionings that exhibition has given you in return for your entrance fee. And a vigorous, youthful energy that is very much in demand in these days of ours. Our five recommended locations for reviving your personal Iūnō, and by
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For all that architecture at both the Hochschule für Gestaltung Ulm and at its more or less direct predecessor Bauhaus, is most popularly associated with a school building — that in Ulm by Max Bill, that in Dessau by Walter Gropius — in contrast to the Bauhauses, architecture at the Hochschule für Gestaltung Ulm was from the very beginning an active, integral, practised discipline. If a discipline that today is all too often overshadowed by the Hockers, record players, graphics, et al of the
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Architecture is often understood as being about geometry, as being about interplays and relationships between geometries of different forms at different scales to create a unified whole, a state of affairs that, arguably, can be traced back to the practice of the earliest architects. But is it? With the aid of the practice of Frei Otto and Kengo Kuma the Kunstsammlungen Chemnitz invite us all to explore architecture Beyond Geometry....... Beyond Geometry. Frei Otto x Kengo Kuma,
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In context of the exhibition Tischkultur at Galerie Handwerk München, and as seen during Munich Creative Business Week 2025, we noted, opined, that tables exist as "the physical and metaphoric centre of any community and society"; yet regardless of how many can sit at that table, not everyone is always invited, enabled, empowered to sit at that table. With the project A Seat at The Table! students from Berlin International University explored approaches towards the Designing Spaces of
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In a world in which architecture is often corporate, egotistic and (one could be mistaken for thinking, more) about the vision of a particular architect (than actual needs), one can forget that not only the origins of architecture as an art and as the practical framing of space beyond the trade of construction, are, arguably, to be found in religious houses, but also that some of the most important and influential European architects of more recent (hi)story, architects who often worked on
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Recycling and upcycling are in themselves never enough, are in themselves never an argument, much as blacksmithing, carpentry or 3D printing aren't arguments, aren't enough, in themselves; rather are components of a processes of creating, are means to an end. And it's always about how you employ that means, and the objects that result. Nor are recycling and upcycling inherently positive: over the years we've seem some truly distressing recycling and upcycling, objects the world don't need and
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As oft opined in these dispatches, one of our favourite aspects of any design week is the presentations held in national embassies, officially curated impressions of a nation's creativity that for all we appreciate and understand the degree of hoop jumping and conforming that are often necessary to being showcased, appreciations sharpened recently via many conversations in a European capital we'll refrain from naming at this juncture... despite the centralised control that regularly exists in
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One of the two central locations of the otherwise decentral Berlin Design Week, BDW, 2025 is and was the new Kalle complex in Neukölln, a former Kardstadt department store transformed into a mix of office, retail, hospitality and event spaces that hosted a number of BDW showcases, and a phenomenally loud building site, but less said, soonest mended. And also, certainly when we were there, hosted a fascinating demonstration of the black art of floor cleaning; albeit one that we couldn't help
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With their own gallery currently closed for renovations the Design Department of the Universität der Künste, UdK, Berlin relocated across the city for Berlin Design Week 2025 to the Feldfünf project space where under the title AAAAH! die UdK! they presented UnDogmatiK, a showcase of works realised in context of semester projects at the institution, a showcase which included a very pleasing wiedersehen with the chairs from the Find Your Footprint project we first met in context of Passagen
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As discussed in context of Berlin Design Week 2024, not only is the (hi)story of design weeks in the German capital looooong, complex and entertaining, if at times very painful so, but so is our relationship with design weeks in the German capital. We refer you therefore to our post from Berlin Design Week 2024 for more detail, or at least the degree of detail we're prepared to publicly expose at this stage in our lives, and dive here straight into Berlin Design Week 2025. An event that is now
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How can we more constructively co-exist, exist, as a society? How can we manage and employ the, invariably finite, resources at our disposal, be they, for example, space, buildings, energy, water, food, whatever, in manners that are not only sustainable and responsible but that promote and advance individuals, communities and societies rather than leading to conflict and division? Such, and similar questions, are not only very inherent in the Munich Creative Business Week, MCBW, 2025 motto
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Presented during Munich Creative Business Week 2025, but not part of the official Munich Creative Business Week, MCBW, 2025 programme, which is cheeky; not that guerilla cheeky Nils Holger Moormann, man and company, are known, rightly celebrated, for, rather just plain cheeky, approaching rudeness cheeky. A cheekiness that we felt duty bound to mention, not least because it's not something one should do without having very, very good reason; but a cheekiness, for all we disapprove, that didn't
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Initiated at the HTWG Konstanz in 2024 as a Master's thesis in Communication Design by Corinna Gratzl and Julia Klass, and a project very much in keeping with the motto of Munich Creative Business Week, MCBW, 2025, How to design a vibrant community, if in a very specific context, Dialog Beyond Disciplines asked questions such as, What defines and shapes the practice of designers working across disciplines? or What impulses do open-disciplinary approaches offer for a broader understanding of
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Not only the food and drink one serves is part of a prevailing table culture and by extrapolation part of a prevailing culture, the table being as it is the physical and metaphoric centre of any community and society, but also the objects and tools one employs for serving and consuming that food and drink are part of that, those, culture(s). Whereby, we speak less of the, invariably, invented romanticised folkloric definitions of culture, those cultures imagined as they may have been in the
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A feature of the international design calendar since 2012, we (briefly) discussed the (hi)story of Munich Creative Business Week from the 2024 edition, and so refer you, dear reader, to our post from 2024 by way of an introduction, and will stop here only to note that the motto of the 2025 edition is: How to design a vibrant community. A motto motivated by a sensing of a widespread desire for a little more togetherness in a world increasingly defined by division and isolation, and a motto to be
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The 1985 Alchimia Manifesto proclaims, "Per Alchimia le discipline non interessano quando sono considerate al l’interno delle loro regole", 'For Alchimia, disciplines are of no interest when considered within their rules', rather, and much as the alchemists of yore advanced, "è importante indagare nei grandi spazi liberi esistenti fra di essere"1, 'it is important to explore the vast free spaces existing between them'. With Alchimia. The Revolution of Italian Design the Bröhan Museum, Berlin,
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For all that the (hi)story of the human species is one of movement, of the physical relocation of individuals and communities, be that temporarily or permanently, it is also one of the development of forms of movement and of the development of our relationships with the act of moving. With the exhibition On the Move! Frankfurt and Mobility the Historisches Museum Frankfurt explore those developments....... On the Move! Frankfurt and Mobility, Historisches Museum, Frankfurt As an exhibition
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As Heinrich Heine so very, very nearly wrote in 1827, May is here with its golden lights, And silky breezes and spiced scents, And it beckons with a friendly plenitude of new architecture and design exhibitions.1 Our recommendations from the plenitude opening amidst the golden lights, silky breezes and spiced scents of May 2025 can be found in Frankfurt, Ljubljana, Vienna, Rome and Amberg....... "Yes, we care. The New Frankfurt and the Pursuit of the Common Good" at Museum Angewandte Kunst,
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The environment in which we exist isn't just physical, tactile, nor only to be experienced and navigated visually, rather it continually involves, and continually makes demands upon, all of our senses. Yet despite the complexity of the environment in which we exist, and the varied and various organs our body provides us with to enable us to employ all our senses in approaching that environment, the vast majority of us consider our other senses, refer to our other senses, use our other organs,
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Love it or loath it Milan Design Week remains the biggest event in the global furniture industry's calendar. We loath it. Our colleagues at smow love it. And we're delighted they do: not only because it means we don't have to go, but because we know they take a lot of pleasure from the experience. And we also know from decades of trips to Salone how indescribably agreeable the weather in Milan in early April is. Our colleagues are now back from Milan, back from cacophony of Milan to the
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"Det är omöjligt att göra ett stort hus osynligt"1, opined once Swedish architect Léonie Geisendorf, 'It is impossible to make a large building invisible'. Yet while a building can't be invisible, its architect can. Especially when they are female. In an eponymous showcase ArkDes, Stockholm, seek to remove the cloak of invisibility that currently shrouds both Léonie Geisendorf and her contribution to the (hi)story of architecture and interior design in Sweden....... Léonie Geisendorf,
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"How does it feel?", asked once Bob Dylan, "To be without a home, Like a complete unknown, Like a rolling stone"1 A valid question, but one that needs must requires first defining "home". A tricky task Dylan doesn't concern himself with; but which Swiss artist Sandra Knecht seeks to approach in the exhibition, essay, Home Is a Foreign Place at Kulturstiftung Basel H. Geiger, Basel....... Sandra Knecht - Home Is a Foreign Place, Kulturstiftung Basel H. Geiger, Basel .......or perhaps more
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The Pinakothek der Moderne, Munich, houses four museums: the Modern Art Collection of the Bavarian State Painting Collections, the Staatliche Graphische Sammlung München, the Architekturmuseum der TU München and Die Neue Sammlung – The Design Museum. A quartet whose collections for all that they are separate, autonomous, aren't independent of one another, rather they intersect, support and contradict one another and thereby exist in context of one another. With 4 Museums – 1 Modernism that 1
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"Einfach machen", 'Just do it'– a simple piece of advice from Volker Albus, her Professor at the Hochschule für Gestaltung Karlsruhe, has guided designer Marie Luise Stein to this day. Our colleagues from smow met up with Marie Luise to discuss her design philosophy, the creation of her first work, the Liesl shelving system, and Einfach machen....... After graduating from the Hochschule für Gestaltung Karlsruhe Marie Luise Stein gained experience in a variety of design disciplines before
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Reflecting back on the summer of 1923 Xanti Schawinsky recalled, "one day, during a break, a tennis coach named Niels Peterson asked me if I knew a school in Weimar called 'Bauhaus'". Xanti Schawinsky didn't. Niels Peterson explained. "My curiosity was fully ignited, and the very next day, I took a leave of absence and, with financial help from my father, traveled to Weimar"1 With Play, Life, Illusion. Xanti Schawinsky the Kunsthalle Bielefeld explore what happened next....... Play, Life,
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