After a morning in Stromboli, we are now at Abadir, on the slopes of the mother of all volcanoes. Swimming some, frolick
LETTER no.83 Wednesday, March 23, 2016 on iversity / on design 1o1 redux website Part 3 - My World / Week 04 - My Nature From the Netherlands, we flew back to Belpaese. Greetings from the land of volcanic islands! Greetings from Sicily! After a morning in Stromboli, we are now at Abadir, on the slopes of the mother of all volcanoes. Swimming some, frolicking under the stark Sicilian sun, dreaming about Ingrid Bergman and Roberto Rossellini...
Question of the day: Are you ready for more? Are you? Traveling has always been synonymous to knowing. This applies to all disciplines, all ages and all countries. It applies to anyone who wants to design in the globalized world. Traveling is essentially about seeing new places, learning about them, meeting unexpected people and seeing the world you came from with new glasses of interpretation. To better understand other cultures (something quite difficult to do...).
What will I do today? Today, as you did in the past two days, you will keep on walking / hiking / travelling into your chosen natural landscape and meet someone (or something). You will then document this meeting and share it with us using 3 images.
Once you have your 3 images ready, share them on Instagram using the hashtags: #BackToBelpaese and #Design1o1Redux. Then, share a nice (and meaningful) caption to accompany your images and hashtags.
What will I learn doing this? That your own voyage of discovery depends on yourself and on yourself only. One of our favourite songs about this: Ain’t Got No... Turn the volume up. Listen to it. Put it on repeat.
Why do we do this? Because our own voyage of discovery starts from ourselves. It starts from our toes, our livers, our heads and our tongues and our blood. And then, from there (from the “life” we have and recognize), we can start adding more complexity to the whole. We can start adding love and dreams, for example. Today, we are on the land of volcanoes. Why would do we dream of Roberto Rossellini and Ingrid Bergman? Because it is a story of great love. And design, without love, goes nowhere... A great island with a big vulcano, a great actress and a fantastic director. Who could ask for more?
Something to remember: Design, without love, goes nowhere.
Further inspiration What else do we have on today’s postcard? Floating chairs and the Sputnik 1 launch platform. Charles and Ray Eames, the XXth Century designers. Check their fiberglass chairs. Check their work. Browse YouTube for their videos. Again and again. Here again, we deal with a story of great love... Charles Rennie Mackintosh’s Hill House chair tells us a very relevant concept of contemporary design: some things are timeless. Some things don’t belong to a specific time or period or movement. They float in time. These special things. These things, we like them very much. What about the Thonet chair? Well, once again here we are into ¨timelessness¨. When was this chair was built? Not very clear. It could have happened at any time in the last 200 years. But then, there is another thing. Design is made by designers. But so many times, design is made by companies. Commercial entities. Our beloved superheroes wouldn’t go anywhere, if there was no commerce. Design is foremost trade, exchange, money. Of course there is passion and love. But then, there is this other layer related to being professional, related to money. One is not more important than the other. They are both necessary.
Today’s Postcard References Roberto Rossellini
Ingrid Bergman Stromboli
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