3DAYSOFDESIGN
May 2022
Copenhagen has been abuzz lately. The design industry, which recently met in Milan, now got together in summer-clad Copenhagen around lots of design and endless amounts of fresh-brewed morning coffee with croissants, lunches, evening events and cocktail parties as well as many, many talks about anything from technical design topics to more mercantile presentations.
Unlike the Milan Design Week, 3daysofdesign is partially aimed at consumers. Good idea, since after all, it’s up to us to decide what is possible.
Do we want furniture made from recycled plastic, craft objects styled as design, sophisticated international design or Danish design legacy, new talents or a little bit of anything – or have we imposed a shopping moratorium on ourselves for the sake of the planet and because we already have plenty of stuff?
One thing is fore sure: we want experiences and aesthetics, judging from the conversations in streets and squares and what is celebrated on social media.
The exhibition is the Guild’s first 3daysofdesign initiative. According to Guild Master Mads Raaschou, it was launched to offer the members a good tangible reason to be join the old guild, which in recent years has struggled to motivate young carpenters to become a part of this professional community. ‘I want the Guild to be more than a social network,’ he says when I catch up with him at the event. The exhibition seems to have been a good move. He is happy about the interest it has generated and says that several of the 16 exhibitors are new guild members who recently joined. His own representation in the exhibition is not products but photographs. His company is not the one to contact if you want a piece of furniture with his signature but rather if you need a bespoke solution, wine cellar, kitchen, or wardrobe or, for that matter, if you’re about to furnish an airport or a series of bakery cafes, like the Danish Lagkagehuset.
One of the new member companies of the Copenhagen Carpenters’ Guild is Egeværk, which is run by Mette Bentzen and Lasse Kristensen. I met her at the Egeværk stand, while he was demonstrating craft skills at the planing bench that was part of the exhibition. Mette is a familiar face to many Danes, after her participation in the latest season of Danmarks næste møbelklassiker (Denmark’s Next Furniture Classic) on DR1 (Danish Broadcasting Corporation, Channel 1). Here, she fought passionately to prove that a design classic can be inspired by an artistic vision rather than by a design perspective. Our conversation followed up on her participation and thus revolved around the difference between art objects and design objects and whether an art object can become a furniture classic, or whether a furniture classic has a different anatomy.
Egeværk has considerable international success, selling its perfectionist furniture and installations as ‘collector’s items’ from galleries and art fairs, especially in the United States. She explains that their customers buy the furniture both because it speaks to them, at a deep level, and because they wish to help preserve the existence of workshop production; she calls this latter concern the charity aspect. An interesting conversation, which I look forward to continuing later.
THE EXHIBITION OVERALL:
The upside:
It is important for the profession – and for public awareness of it – to showcase what our finest carpenters have to offer and what contexts they work in.
The high level of quality is indisputable.
Many exquisite details and solutions.
Wide stylistic range.
The carpenters who are present are passionate advocates for their profession.
The downside:
Even though the newly renovated Moltke’s Palace is a masterpiece of craftsmanship, the setting seems old-fashioned and does not help to convey the role of crafts in modern society.
The exhibition stylist failed to incorporate and take advantage of the building’s architecture and colour scheme (I acknowledge that this is no easy task!) but instead sought to neutralize it by using light grey podiums for all the exhibits. The outcome is neither fish nor fowl.
Several of the masterpieces on display are decorated with little home-made building-block sculptures of the type you might see in home interior design magazines on the coffee tables of people who buy books to put them on display rather than to read them. That is disrespectful to the craft they are seeking to embellish and style.
Come again
See you next year, with added experience and hopefully razor-sharp.
For a presentation to truly shine at 3daysofdesign, everything has to come together as a whole.
København har summet af liv. Designbranchen, som forrige uge var samlet i Milano, sås nu i et sommerklædt København til design og uendelige mængder friskbrygget morgenkaffe med croissanter, frokostanretninger, aftenarrangementer og cocktailparties foruden mange, mange talks om alt fra fagligt tunge emner til det mere merkantile.
Til forskel fra designugen i Milano, retter 3days of Design dele af sin opmærksomhed mod forbrugerne. God ide, det er jo os, der til syvende og sidst bestemmer, hvad der kan lade sig gøre.
Vil vi have møbler fremstillet af genbrugsplast, vil vi have brugskunst iscenesat som design, vil vi have sofistikeret internationalt design eller dansk designarv, nye talenter, lidt af det hele, eller har vi underlagt os selv købsstop for planetens skyld og fordi vi har rigeligt i forvejen?
Uanset hvad, vil vi have oplevelser og æstetik, at dømme efter hvad der blev talt om på gader og stræder, og hvad der blev hyldet på sociale medier.
Udstillingen var laugets første 3days og design initiativ. Den var, ifølge Oldermand Mads Raaschou, sat i verden for at tilbyde medlemmerne en ”hands on” god grund til at slutte om det gamle laug, som i en årrække har haft vanskeligt ved at forklare unge snedkermestre, hvorfor de skal prioritere at være medlem af det faglige fællesskab. ”Jeg ønsker at lauget skal være mere end en selskabsforening”, sagde han, da jeg fangede ham i udstillingen. Meget tyder på at han set rigtigt. Han er tilfreds med tilslutningen, og fortæller at flere af de 16 udstillere er medlemmer, som netop er blevet optaget i fællesskabet. Selv udstiller han ikke produkter men fotografier, hans inventarsnedkeri skal man ikke kontakte for at købe et møbel med hans signatur, men hvis man ønsker en kundetilpasset løsning, en vinkælder, et køkken, en garderobe, eller for den sags skyld skal have indrettet en lufthavn eller en hel stribe ”Lagkagehuset”.
En af Snedkerlaugets nye medlemsvirksomheder er Egeværk, som drives af Mette Bentzen og Lasse Kristensen. Hende fandt jeg ved deres stand, han stod ved udstillingens høvlbænk og demonstrerede håndværksmæssige færdigheder.
Mettes ansigt er kendt af mange, fordi hun deltog i den seneste DR1 ”Danmarks næste møbelklassiker” hvor hun stred en følelsesladet kamp for at vise, at en klassiker kan have et kunstnerisk afsæt snarere end et designmæssigt. Vores samtale fulgte op på endes deltagelse og kredsede derfor om forskellen på kunstobjekter og designobjekter, og afledt heraf om hvorvidt et kunstobjekt kan blive en møbelklassiker, eller om anatomien af en møbelklassiker er noget andet.
Egeværk har stor international succes og sælger deres perfektionerede møbler og installationer som ”collectors items” fra gallerier og på kunstmesser, navnlig sælger de godt i USA. Hun fortæller, at kunderne køber deres møbler, både fordi de taler til noget dybt i dem, men også fordi de er værkstedsfremstillede, og fordi de gerne vil støtte at noget sådant fortsat kan finde sted.
Hun kalder det charityelementet. En interessant samtale, jeg vil glæde mig til at fortsætte den ved lejlighed.
UDSTILLINGEN I SIN HELHED:
På plus siden:
Det er vigtigt for faget og for publikums forståelse af faget, at opvise hvad vores absolut dygtigste snedkere kan, og hvilke sammenhæng faget kan indgå i.
Kvaliteten er uomtvistelig.
Mange udsøgte detaljer og løsninger.
Stor bredde stilmæssigt.
De snedkere, som selv er til stede, fortæller passioneret om deres fag.
På minussiden
Om end det nyrenoverede Molktes Palæ er et mesterstykke ud i håndværksmæssige færdigheder, så er rammen altmodisch og bidrager ikke til at forstå håndværkets rolle i et moderne samfund
Udstillingsstylisten har på ingen måde udnyttet husets arkitektur og farvesætning (jeg medgiver at det er en vanskelig opgave), men i stedet forsøgt at neutralisere den, ved at lade bygge lysegrå poder til alle deltagende produkter, hvilet gør helhedsoplevelsen til hverken fugl eller fisk.
Flere af de udstillede mesterstykker er dekoreret med små hjemmelavede byggeklodsskulpturer, af dens type man kan se i boligmagasinerne, på sofabordet hos folk som køber bøger for at udstille dem, snarere end for at læse i dem. Det er decideret respektløst over for det håndværk de forsøger at udsmykke og iscenesætte.
Kom igen
Vi ses næste år, en erfaring ringere og forhåbentlig knivskarp.
Hvis man skal brænde igennem under 3daysof design skal det være en totaloplevelse.
Related stories
A crop of knowledge
PROCESS
