Today, the Old Galata Bridge slowly returns back to its usual state after giving home to thousands of products and objects including those who designed them. Most visitors at this year's Istanbul Design Week used the weekend to get a view on Istanbul design treat and made the bridge feel its historical bolts.
Visitors clearly enjoyed the 'XXX exhibition' edited by Erdem Akan, featuring some 30 projects by Turkish designers inspired by "sex" as universal theme. The exhibition reaches out to a world where social taboo is high and design consciousness is low.
Architect Serhan Guerkan took a year to start designing products, and call it a good year. He unlike problem solving, he started exploring historical forms and mathematical rules used in architecture. With an eye for detail he transforms architectural principles into everyday products such as these furniture pieces.
Apart from bringing the Turkish design perspective towards its visitors, the design week is also an opportunity for international speakers and exhibitors to get in touch with the Turkish market.
The Futurotextiles exhibition, earlier featured in France, is one the visitors' favorites with a lot of square meters of inspiration at the design week. An overview of the textiles industry demonstrated with everyday products and textile samples made us visitors get a good understanding of the many sided role of the textile industry.
Also, the Swedish IKEA uses the design week to highlight its first store in Istanbul. That design is not only about making good crafts but also about good business is clearly illustrated by the clear price tags on each exhibited product.
We have been enjoying inspiring talks with the local designers on the future of Turkish design. One of the goals of the design week is to make companies aware of the importance of design for good business. Here, upcoming designers will play an important role in supporting companies to create their own (Turkish) identity and keeping them from copying foreign benchmarks.
In other words, the Istanbul Design Week gives us good preview of the potential of Turkish design where a culture of craftsmanship slowly fuses with the business of design. With this in mind, we can't wait to see next year's trends and developments of a promising country developing a brand new culture, a culture of design.
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