If companies want to be successful in the long term these days, they have to concentrate on promoting the younger generation. However, an accomplished and sound education is not always enough in the creative field – one needs talent and, of course, the famous bit of luck. Axor took a step in the right direction and organised a five-day workshop for students in Lausanne in conjunction with the ‘École Cantonale d’Art (ECAL)’ at the end of May. The committed young designers were given the task of designing products for the bathroom of the future.
“If you are running such a workshop, you don’t simply give the signal to start and allow the crowd to run,“ commented Philippe Grohe and ECAL director Pierre Keller. “An important part of this idea was to get the students to focus on the topic ‘bathroom’ and have them supervised by skilled and experienced designers.” At Lake Geneva the English designers Edward Barber and Jay Osgerby – famous for their designs for Cappellini, Coca-Cola and Levis – supported the students and gave suggestions for the successful development of a topic.
Axor brand manager Philippe Grohe was very happy to put forward this definition of the project and give the concluding feedback when he said: “At Axor we benefit a lot from the ideas of designers – and not only the established ones with whom we develop our bathrooms concepts, our so-called ‘WaterDreams’ and our bathroom collections. We also make an effort to stay in contact with young talent. Here it is important that it is not a one-sided affair, but one of mutual give and take. That’s the reason why we liked this project very much.” Helped by extensive experience of cooperating with designers, the Axor brand has already gained a sound understanding of the design process. Students can benefit from this and use it later in their work with the industry or other clients.
After five busy days and nights, the workshop participants presented their designs which approached the set task from very different angles. The spectrum of ideas for the bathroom of tomorrow ranged from individual products like a bathtub in the style of a cocoon to room concepts like an artificial geyser landscape. It promises to be very exciting to observe what evolves from these draft designs.
)
)
)
)
)
)
)
)
)