If the last five years of trading were a tragic novel, I would like to think of 2013-2014 as its inevitable denouement. This is our chance to release old hang-ups, and purge obsolete ideas alongside all that old furniture stock, as we try to close the last harrowing chapter of our business cycle.
And, following that with our collective Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats (SWOT) analyses in hand, re-stocking our old business plans with new ideas, trends, and practices has got to be a priority for all.
In our own little way, the new free-to-attend Trends Seminar at the Irish Furniture & Interiors Fair is a bid to restore more than just the warehouse. It’s an attempt to start a discussion on the new ideas and practices that should matter now. However, the more I think about what new ideas and practices should come to the fore, the more I realise that there’s wisdom in the older ways of doing things.
By ‘older’, I mean a step back from the frenetic globalised mass coma of stack-it-high consumption we have all willingly benefited from. I am talking about re-examining how past generations have dealt with difficult crises, and what held them together through those times. Sustainability crops up as a no-brainer here. To me it means making do with what we have, and making it last.
“Our next generation has to learn how to reinvent something spectacular from what we have discarded”
Cognisant of the new EU environmental directives, consumer preferences, diminishing resources – both globally and within our respective coffers – cause-related marketing trends, climate change awareness and the rising costs of materials, the case for embedding sustainability as our primary approach to design is strong, if not urgent.
Past features at our show have nodded in this direction time and again, much to the chagrin of some stakeholders in our sector. Upcycling and reclaiming has been a regular topic close to my heart from the moment we featured the Northern Irish Refound Project, connecting discarded furniture with artists to generate original work, in 2010. That was followed by our feature with the Busy Bee Furniture project. This not-for-profit organisation connected training for the unemployed to upcycling products and demonstrations. Their work aimed for the eventual re-employment of both people and product.
This year we will connect students at our local Griffith College of design with discarded vintage chairs. Their little hackathon will furnish our seminar with eclectic upcycled homework whilst generating more awareness on the topic. Why? Our next generation has to learn how to reinvent something spectacular from what we have discarded.
These features have attracted criticism from some of our stakeholders as counter-intuitive and yes, I do see their logic. Why encourage people to value old furniture when we are trying to sell the new stuff? No doubt the editor of this magazine faces the same question now as he reads my piece on upcycling and wonders if he should print it.
Is it possible to defend these show features on the basis of commerciality alone? I doubt it, but I can tell you why they are irresistible to me. Apart from sustainability in design, they remind us of the benefits of creating a collaborative economy, crowd-sourcing ideas, and the art of making win-win connections. They remind us of the need to work with our communities and to act as one. They reveal the life-hacking, alchemising power of creativity, colour and ingenuity. All of the above are essential tools for navigating a world with fewer and fewer resources – the stuff to restock your business plans with.
And then there’s heritage. Our critics will also be alarmed by our forthcoming Retro Lounge and its Lunch and Learn sessions on mid-20th century Madmen-style furniture design. I believe this provides yet another avenue into sustainability. More than just an opportunity to ruminate on the design credentials of vintage furniture whilst rekindling Proustian moments from granny’s parlour, it is a chance to revalue our past. It’s an opportunity to understand what makes a design classic timeless, and maybe help you spot the next one in the making.
Sustainability also brings to mind the recent film short, Irish Folk Furniture, by Irish historian Tony O’Donoghue, that has been highlighting the rural traditions bound to our history of craftsmanship and furniture making. Winner of several film festivals including Sundance, this charming short records our island’s furniture design heritage, and a call to preserve it. The Americans have made design icons of their Quaker furniture. Can we not do the same?
Let’s not think of heritage as looking backwards in time – let’s look into it as a well of collective wisdom for the taking. We have looked outward in the last decade of rampant globalisation, and some of us have had to scale back to survive. Could it be time to examine the treasures in our backyard, and in our communities, and find a way to give local creativity a sustainable future?
Elish Bul-Godley is the event manager at Irish Services Ltd, organiser of the Irish Furniture & Interiors Fair. The next edition of the show will take place at Dublin’s RDS venue between 6-8th October. For an opportunity to get involved with these features or exhibit to Irish trade buyers contact Elish at [email protected] or on 00353 (0)1 288 8821.
