Handspring Puppet Co. and ZANews at Design Indaba 2010

Posted on 09. Mar, 2010 by heidi in 4669, Design, Politics

The Handspring Puppet company fascinated us all. We moved to the edges of our seats as they announced that they were about to bring their latest creation on stage. Moments later a tall horse was slowly walked in, all flowing movement and subtle expression. Truly breathtaking.
You had to be there.
Visit The Handspring Puppet Company here [...]

Future Farmers at Design Indaba 2010

Posted on 09. Mar, 2010 by heidi in Design, Food, change, innovation

A number of last year’s Design Indaba speakers returned to the stage this year, having applied their minds to a particular topic: future farming.
5.5 presented a book that displayed all the typical fauna and flora in cities, Dunne and Raby presented a concept on futuristic foraging, Frank Tjepkema shared his ideas of self-contained farming systems.
Learn [...]

Alejandro Aravena at Design Indaba 2010

Posted on 09. Mar, 2010 by heidi in Design, change, innovation

Creativity, Alejandro said, is what you use, when there is not enough available knowledge: It’s because the world is changing that we need creativity – to answer new questions that are constantly arising in the world.

Alejandro’s mission is to give simple answers, without being reductive.
To clarify, he showed the audience a stick drawing of [...]

Martha Stewart at Design Indaba 2010

Posted on 09. Mar, 2010 by heidi in Business, Design, Food

Let them eat cake.
She might as well have said it. (Or it might have been, Let them eat pork, with glitter?)
Poor Martha. She was savaged, by an audience that walked out en masse.
How could she have gotten it so wrong? How did she manage to alienate her audience so thoroughly?
Was it that she…
i)              …talked [...]

A Minute with Christien Meindertsma

Posted on 09. Mar, 2010 by heidi in Design

Q: How does connecting the dots, making the invisible visible, as you have done in your book Pig, affect consumers, or industry?
A: Ah I think it’s difficult to have a real effect, on industry, this is more of an awareness product. I wanted to show the complexity, show how little we know as consumers. And [...]

Christien Meindertsma at Design Indaba 2010

Posted on 09. Mar, 2010 by heidi in 4669, Design, Food

Christien is interested in tracing the origins of the things around us. She spoke of her projects related to three raw materials: wool, flax, and pig (yes, pig.)
As part of her wool project, she journeyed to Idaho, to spend time with a flock of organic sheep. She created a series of cardigans and jerseys that [...]

Han Feng at Design Indaba 2010

Posted on 09. Mar, 2010 by heidi in Design

Han shared the story of her modest upbringing, and her irrepressible hunger for more. Her willingness to go the extra mile to make things happen got this fashion designer to where she is today. She told the audience how she had moved from China to the US to go to art school, only to suffer [...]

Li Edelkoort at Design Indaba 2010

Posted on 09. Mar, 2010 by heidi in Design, change, innovation

………………………………………………………We are family.
And… that pretty much sums it up. According to Li, relationships are more important than ever before. Our craving for stiller lives is a consequence of the global recession. The crisis has been helpful in bringing people back together. People are starting to prioritise their relationships with each other. A softer, more [...]

Tord Boontjie at Design Indaba 2010

Posted on 09. Mar, 2010 by heidi in Design, green

In his work, Tord has managed to raise questions about the uneasy relationship between craft, and design.
Initially in response to feelings of alienation, he developed ‘acts of vandalism against modernity’ as expressed in his crow chair. His resistance to the finished, the machine-made, was also evident in his DIY chair. His glass bottle vases were [...]

Bouroullec Brothers at Design Indaba 2010

Posted on 09. Mar, 2010 by heidi in Design

The furniture and product designers Bouroullec Brothers’ work was presented with Parisian subtlety, and melancholy. Sources of inspiration included organic materials, and many products were an attempt to mimic nature in some way or another. Their algae style tapestries, and their Vegetal chairs, were prime examples, with stunning visual, and unexpected acoustic results.
Somewhat bizarre, was [...]