What We're Looking for at Feria Hábitat Valencia
We have a list. We’re more interested in what isn’t on it.
We have a list. What’s not on it matters more.
We have a list. Lighting. Furniture. Textiles. Materials. Manufacturers we haven't encountered before. Craftspeople whose work might lead us somewhere unexpected. But a design fair isn't particularly interesting if you leave having found only what you went looking for.
Feria Hábitat Valencia.
We’re not new to large design trade shows. What interests us about Feria Hábitat Valencia is the opportunity to encounter a different frame of reference.
There will be hundreds of exhibitors and thousands of people, with furniture, lighting, textiles and materials alongside conversations about how and where design is headed. At that scale, it would be easy to simply take it all in.
We’re more interested in asking questions.
Materials before products.
We love seeing furniture and talking with manufacturers about their work, but we're often most interested in how something was made. Why this material? Why this construction? What decisions aren't immediately visible?
We’re eager to encounter unfamiliar materials, see familiar ones used differently, explore surface treatments, study joinery, texture and fabrication, and notice combinations we wouldn’t instinctively make. We’re also interested in what materials and processes are particular to place.
Evidence of the hand.
I’m interested in where the process still reveals the people who made something: ceramics, weaving, upholstery, woodworking, metalwork, stone and the decorative arts. Handmade has its place, but I’m particularly interested in the intersection of craft and contemporary production. Much like our conversations with tradespeople on AHID job sites, I want to understand which traditional skills remain relevant, how they’re being adapted, and what contemporary production can learn from them.
Different Constraints. Difference Answers.
This isn't necessarily an expedition to find European products to specify. I'm interested in how designers working within different cultural, architectural, environmental and spatial constraints arrive at solutions to problems we encounter too.
How does a smaller footprint change the approach to storage? How do historic architecture and contemporary ways of living coexist? What does a different relationship between indoors and outdoors change? How do energy, climate and density affect the decisions being made?
There will undoubtedly be beautiful products and materials to see. I'm more interested in understanding the thinking behind them.
Unexpected relationships in color.
Anyone familiar with AHID knows we aren't afraid of color. We're particularly interested in the combinations we wouldn't instinctively make, the ones that feel strange at first and become compelling the longer you look.
We're less interested in identifying what's “trending” than understanding why a particular relationship works. What is the proportion? The context? The material? What makes something unexpected feel inevitable once you see it?
“What makes something unexpected feel inevitable once you see it?”
What feels particular to place?
I'm curious to see what feels particular to Spain. And what doesn't. Where does contemporary work reveal regional craft, climate, history or ways of living? What feels completely international? I'm equally interested in having some of my own assumptions about Spanish design proven wrong.
The people behind the things.
And perhaps most of all, we're interested in the people. Designers. Makers. Manufacturers. Craftspeople. Family businesses. Emerging designers. People experimenting with processes and materials. We're interested in what conversations with them can reveal that the objects alone can't.
Why was this made this way?
What problem were you solving?
What is particular to where you work?
What has changed in your industry?
What do you wish designers understood about your craft?
What we’re not looking for.
For us, this isn't simply about product. We're not looking for “the next big thing,” a Spanish aesthetic to bring home, a list of trends to adopt, objects to copy, or proof that Europe is somehow inherently more sophisticated than the U.S.
We're looking for conversations, materials, relationships and ideas that make us reconsider something.
We have some idea what we're looking for. We're more interested in what we don't yet know to look for.
The real question is what gets added to the list once we're there.