The discoveries of Brussels Design September

Brussels not only hosts a lot of contemporary artists and performers, but it also accommodates an interesting design scene. With bigger names such as Xavier Lust, who’s presenting his new vase Arums during the festival, Maarten de Ceulaer and Alain Gilles. Besides young talents such as the foursome Vormen, who swapped their atelier from Ghent to Brussels, are attracted by its international dynamics. “After five years we needed to break free from our familiar context. Moreover, Brussels has an interesting cultural scene, and it empowers our international ambitions. In our workshop we will experiment and create our own prototypes on scale”, tells Leon Duyck.

Another interesting new space, which hosts several designers, is Studio CityGate. In the former factory you’ll find amongst others the studio’s of Alexander Marinus, who’s researching new possibilities of jute, and of La Gadoue, a French duo who’s experimenting with different materials such as ceramics, textiles and latex. “Our Hévé textile is the result of our research on natural rubber coating on linen and jute canvas. With this composite material we want to create a vegetal alternative to PU and PVC plastic, but also to leather”, tells Eloïse Maes.

Jonathan Muecke © Jeroen Verrecht

A little bit outside Brussels Ateliers Zaventem is worth a stop. In the magnificent industrial building you’ll not only find around twenty design workshops, but also temporary exhibitions such as ‘Design as we speak’ from Swiss artist Stéphane Barbier Bouvet. Within this framework Barbier Bouvet explores three possible but concrete outcomes around the concept of the hut. The exhibition functions as a platform to test the different renovation solutions.

Contemporary versus vintage

Linen © Jeroen Verrecht

The biggest novelty of this year’s festival is without doubt the Contemporary Design Market, an organisation of Flanders DC, Wallonie Design and Brussels Design September. In the industrial context of Tour & Taxis it brings together around sixty young, mostly Belgian designers and brands such as the above mentioned Vormen and La Gadoue, but also Nathalie Van der Massen x Hija, Labt, Bram Kerkhofs and Alinea by Leo Aerts.

The new initiative is organised as the counterpart of the well-known and biggest European Vintage Design Market. “This year we wanted to pay homage to Jules Wabbes, who was born exactly a hundred years ago. As most people know him for his rather luxurious furniture, we wanted to highlight his more social projects such as the school furniture he designed out of plywood and the interior he designed for a medical cabinet in Schaarbeek”, tells founder Thierry Belenger.

Teddy Picket © Kaatje Verschoren

Young talent takes the lead

Another place to discover during Design September is the design hotel to be Teddy Picker Hotel, an initiative of a young creative couple in the Dansaert neighbourhood. During the festival the hotel hosts an installation by textile designer Bram Van Breda, whose carpets will be part of the room design. “As transition is at the core of my design, they perfectly fit into the context of a hotel. To transform this concept into concrete pieces I use the parts which are in between one weaving and the other, and which are normally thrown away. In my studio I transform them manually into made-to-measure usable carpets. The rough finishing of my carpets perfectly fits into the concrete interiors of the hotel”, states Van Breda.

If you’re keen on discovering young talent, the show of B Collective – a new platform for Belgian creative – is a must. The show brings together works from among others product designers Amorce Studio, textile designer Ana María Gomez and the label Vol+Maakt. Young talents from Czech Republic show their works in the beautiful setting of the Prague house. Although most of them value the traditional craftsmanship of leather working, Tomás Rachunek choose to work with Fomes Fomentarius and its mycelium as an environmentally friendly alternative.

Other venues which are always worth stopping by if you’re in Brussels, are Atelier Jespers, where nowadays the work of Libanese designer Marc Baroud is on show, and Maniera, which hosts a show with the experimental work of the American designer Jonathan Muecke.