It was Okay-design’s flip to get entrance and centre of the Seoul cultural scene this season. Hot on the heels of Frieze’s second spherical within the metropolis in September, Seoul Design 23 happened contained in the Zaha Hadid-designed Dongdaemun Design Plaza, coinciding with Seoul Design Week, as an annual celebration of small companies, younger designers and collaboration.
“Seoul city is dynamic,” says Yoo Ehwa, a curator who organised the areas of Seoul Design 2023, which opened with the theme of ‘Valuable Life’ and centered on essential problems with the atmosphere, governance and social impression. “Seoul is always ready to accept changes in the future. These changes are necessary and will add freshness to the event.” Ehwa is an architect herself, serving because the president of ITM Yoo Ehwa Architects. From the very starting of planning Seoul Design, she created pointers of the right way to use waste from exhibitions – a dedication to the “critical issues that society has to address.”
As a platform, Seoul Design aimed to get wider audiences enthusiastic about Okay-design – a festive second mixing craft, industrial and furnishings design and structure. Read on for our occasion report.
Young expertise to observe
Nurturing the subsequent era of creatives was seen all through Seoul Design. One part featured college students from 9 universities in Seoul staff up with manufacturers to create design ideas. An instance of this was the experimental ‘Amoredo,’ a set of playful however practical hair care instruments made to rethink how we wash our hair, with a give attention to accessibility.
Amoredo Hair Tools
Amoredo Hair Tools
Amoredo Hair Tools
Amoredo Hair Tools
Amoredo Hair Tools
“The behaviour of washing hair may seem trivial, but even a small cut on our finger can impact our ability to do it,” mentioned the four-strong feminine design staff behind the undertaking, fourth 12 months college students within the Seoul National University Industrial Design course, Celynn Kim, Jiham Lee, Dayeon Kim and Yeongwon Lee. “This project was looking at keeping our human integrity.” The staff was supported by Okay-beauty giants, AmorePacific for the educational and improvement of the items that use bioplastics comprised of coconut shells for the physique of the ‘brushes’.
New supplies and merchandise on the block
“We have an incubation programme to look after brands and designers with not much experience,” mentioned Seoul Design Foundation’s CEO, Rhee Kyung-Don on platforming small companies at Seoul Design 23. In the ‘Design Launching’ part, manufacturers Lowlit Collective and Nature & have been each making bioplastics from upcycling oyster shells, a regionally sourced materials that may be pressed right down to make a powder to kind homewares and tables.
Sanro
Sanro
Sanro
Sanro
New model Sanro appeared on the reuse of manufacturing supplies. Sanro is the brainchild of commercial design studio COG, primarily based in Paju within the Gyeonggi Province, who create bespoke furnishings for purchasers, and use leftover metallic plates from their manufacturing facility to make the Sanro assortment. Adopting an industrial look, the items are described as ‘daily essentials’ like a metallic change cowl, price ticket, incense holder and a speaker stand.
Innovative use of metallic, and specifically aluminium, was displayed within the ‘Collaboration’ part that noticed designers paired with makers to make a singular product. ‘Circular Connection’ by Studio CONTOUR and Sehyeon Tech was a modern accent tray impressed by notions of connection and concord – bringing collectively the fashionable design with skillful aluminium crafting. Meanwhile a brand new desk by Tipi and NOI Record noticed bent metal married to stained darkish wooden for a monolithic piece.
Studio Contour And Sehyeon Tech
Tipi And Noi Record
Studio Contour And Sehyeon Tech
Capitalising on the rising pattern of riverside tenting in Seoul was model Mo-on, who introduced a conveyable vacuum cleaner – the Obicuum air camper. This is a one-stop-shop mini package to maintain clear within the wilderness, created in muted tones like khaki inexperienced or gray. Mo-on prides itself on its pillars of sustainability with its merchandise, devoted to decreasing waste, having longevity and the reuse of plastic from outdated or damaged devises.
Shigeru Ban’s Seoul spin
While the dialog of how we use supplies and the place they arrive from rippled by way of the present, Japanese architect Shigeru Ban, recognized for creating paper shelters in catastrophe zones, requested, “what is sustainability?” throughout the Seoul Design 23 convention. He was addressing the truth that because the Nineteen Eighties, his means of working has been naturally sustainable.
Shigeru Ban Pavilion
Shigeru Ban Pavilion
Two prototype Paper Temporary Houses have been on view on the grounds of Dongdaemun Design Plaza, examples of his pavilions constructed throughout earthquakes, floods and areas hit by warfare. Showcasing the worth of paper as an architecturally viable materials, the buildings are created from paper tubes, the partitions are comprised of honeycomb boards with hanji (Korean paper sourced from the Jeolla Province) and the bottom was product of plastic crates that beforehand held the Korean alcoholic drink, Makgeolli. Ban appeared again to his visits to South Korea to emulate how Koreans reside of their house, with delicate particulars like soybean oil protecting the partitions and flooring to guard from moisture and bugs.
So why carry Ban’s paper pavilion to Korea? “Compared to Japan, South Korea hasn’t had earthquakes, but it’s not really safe from disaster. There has been mass damage by flooding each year here.” mentioned Ehwa who commissioned Ban for the undertaking. “The general public of Seoul should understand and be prepared.”
Seoul Design happened in October.
