Many good ideas are seeking to make headway at the LABoral Design Market
Many good ideas are seeking to make headway at the LABoral Design Market.
View of the façade of LABoral with the arches where the MercadilloLAB [LABmarket] was set up. Photo: Nuria García Arias.
By Nuria García, @VeoArte, Veo Arte en todas pArtes
The end of July could not have ended in a better way than with the summer edition of the Design Market at LABoral. In a week which saw Gijón dressed up to host the Atlantic Arc festival.
The design market at LABoral presents an opportunity for small traders and craftspeople to demonstrate that there are great ideas in the least likely places. We are a bright country with people who are capable of developing big initiatives but, unfortunately, it has been plunged into a crisis that saps any kind of hope. It doesn’t seem likely either that this situation will change in the short-term.
Fortunately, initiatives like this one that LABoral started up, allow for greater visibility for a large number of proposals and professionals while, at the same time, nurtures a commercial circuit around the retail trade and the so-called “handmade” sector.
Rescuing and giving a new sense to the classic trader, this proximity which Web 2.0 has sought to boost digitally and which it is also important to achieve in analogue as well.
This tête-à-tête is both valuable and effective, where the buyer not only acquires the product, but also supports a commitment to personal development. It only takes a few minutes chatting to the protagonists in this market to get an idea of all the human stories that are behind each product and each sale.
LABoral presented, as another participant, some of its residency projects underway in fabLAB Asturias, the Digital Fabrication Laboratory at the art centre, which are based on the development of drones and 3D printers.
Among the different proposals that can be found there, I would like to highlight those I considered the most interesting for a number of reasons.
The first of these is Aventuras literarias. This is a very interesting project aimed at analogue hypertext while keeping digital means. The simple idea is based on a travel book such as The Man Who Would Be King, which includes a series of objects and resources that have been edited to allow you to go deeper into the story and enjoy this book in a different way.
From Madrid to Asturias Studio Duermevela travels all over the world showing their qualities as illustrators, marketing their creations in a wide range of formats, from cups and trays to traditional serialised work.
From Valle de Iguña, Bardal, a Cantabrian company which aims to make known the different characters from Cantabrian mythology through its products, came to Gijón. Illustration forms the foundations of its goods, where the quality of its line and colour scheme makes up its brand identity and highlights its difference.
Sunday Girl is the project by a young teacher who decided to emigrate to Edinburgh in search of new opportunities. Finding it impossible to get a job in their profession, many young people decide to set out on a parallel path by returning to family trade. This mixture of tradition and new ideas is why Sunday Girl, a business with a special atmosphere, goes beyond the idea of “vintage because it’s the fashion”.
I would also like to highlight Defectos Especiales, a project by Ester Roldán, an architect by profession, who produces free-standing objects able to bring back memories for natives of Gijón of their city’s most popular bars. An idea that surfaced from the reality of migration which a large number of professionals in our country have found themselves caught up in. These objects help us to remember what has been left behind and their small size allows them to be easily transported in a suitcase.
Finally I would like to thank again in this entry the staff at LABoral with who I could share at first hand the development of this fantastic initiative.
