Nominated by Bjarke Ingels
I’d like to nominate the designers Aamu Song and Johan Olin, who together form Company.
They have done a series of projects where they went and visited old factories and craftsmen in different provinces in Southern Germany, Finland and Korea, among others. Through conversations with the factory workers and craftsmen they came up with new products that explore and exploit the potential of those people and their knowledge.
Rather than letting these traditional factories die out, victim to global outsourcing, they propose to take charge of the skills already out there and see if they can actually foster new kinds of contemporary products. Rather than first designing some cool thing, and then getting someone to do it, Song and Olin start with the person who is going to manufacture it, and through conversations with those people, they evolve their ideas. And the stuff is both clever and cute -- as are the two designers!
Secret shop (Salakauppa) was touring around as temporary shop in 2007-2008 before finding a permanent loacation. Secret shop toured in Milan, Berlin, Oslo and Jyväskylä.
Bjarke Ingels is Founding Partner of the Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG) in Copenhagen.
Top photo: "Dance Shoes, For the Father and the Daughter." Design by COMPANY (Aamu Song & Johan Olin). Material: moulded felt (100% wool). Made by Lahtinen in Jämsä, Finland. Jukka and Riitta are running their father's felt factory in Jämsä, Finland. See more designs here.
This piece is part of Worldchanging's Attention Philanthropy campaign. All week long, the Worldchanging Network will be delivering "attention grants" to worthy projects, individuals, resources and more. You can learn more about these gifts of notice and find other entries by clicking here.
Help us change the world - DONATE NOW!
Please note that comments will remain open for only 14 days after the article is posted. While previous comments will remain visible, attempts to post new comments after this period will fail. This helps stop comment spam, so your forebearance is appreciated.
The Worldchanging comments are meant to be used for further exploration and evaluation of the ideas covered in our posts. Please note that, while constructive disagreement is fine, insults and abuse are not, and will result in the comment being deleted and a likely ban from commenting. We will also delete at will and without warning comments we believe are designed to disrupt a conversation rather than contribute to it. In short, we'll kill troll posts.
Finally, please note that comments which simply repost copyrighted works or commercial messages will be summarily deleted.
