Habitare Materials
Habitare Materials
Habitare Materials is a new kind of interactive material library at Habitare, where visitors can explore surface materials and experiment with combinations of different materials for their projects and purchases. As a visitor, you can choose, combine, and arrange the displayed material samples to create your own collage on the collage table, which you can capture and share. Additionally, you will receive product information from manufacturers for the materials you like, helping with future purchases.
The goal is to provide a participative exhibition experience for the visitors, increase material awareness and enable a new way of participation for material manufacturers.
Habitare Materials shows the direction in which materials are heading. Maria Klemetti Laine and Jussi Laine of Nemo architects, who designed and curated the material library, believe in respecting the layered nature of spaces and highlighting old. The new and revised Habitare Materials will be featured at Habitare this autumn.
Behind Habitare Materials are NEMO architects Jussi Laine and Maria Klemetti Laine
“Habitare Materials is a material library that is available to everyone, letting people touch the samples, experiment, and create something new. The exhibition offers visitors space and freedom to browse through materials and explore their own tastes by experimenting with different combinations of surfaces and colours. The materials are attractively presented, and there is product information on each sample that visitors can photograph and take with them for making purchases,” say Jussi Laine and Maria Klemetti Laine of NEMO architects.
“Although we encourage playfulness, experimentation, and having fun in our booth, we want to challenge the trade fair visitors to think beyond the surface of materials,” Maria and Jussi explain. NEMO architects will be present at the booth throughout the entire fair to engage in discussions with visitors about materials, their effects, and characteristics.
The selection of building and interior materials is vast, and information is only available if one is willing to make an effort to seek it. Habitare Materials aims to provide information about the possibilities of materials to trade fair visitors and hopefully inspire people to reflect on their material choices and their reasons, the impacts of choices, and to make conscious decisions for their homes.
This year, the exhibition will feature imperfection and incompleteness
Maria Klemetti Laine and Jussi Laine of Nemo architects, who designed and curated the material library, believe in respecting the layered nature of spaces and highlighting old. “Combining new things with something old, worn and patinated – which may have been cared for, repaired, renewed and painted over – forms layers of eras and cultures.”
Nemo Architects also encourage embracing imperfection, whether it’s with natural materials, DIY color experiments, or wallpaper installation. They reveal that this year’s exhibition will also feature incomplete and unfinished elements. The design will have something of a construction site feel to it.
This year, the exhibition architecture of Habitare Materials has gained new layers and is more spatial than last year. There will be room-like spaces featuring larger pieces of materials, both hanging and fixed, adding a spatial collage element to the exhibition.
The Habitare Materials exhibition attracted tremendous interest during Milan Design Week
The Habitare Materials exhibition was seen in Milan from 17 to 23 April 2023. The Exhibition was part of the Alcova showcase, which is curated by Joseph Grima and Valentina Ciuffi. Alcova has been one of the most fascinating and followed events of Milan Design Week in recent years.
The Habitare Materials exhibition, which debuted at Milan Design Week, and the 14 Finnish material manufacturers featured at the exhibition, received a wonderful reception at the Alcova showcase. A staggering 90,000 professionals visited Alcova during the week.
Alcova, held every year concurrently with the Salone del Mobile fair, is a platform for designers and companies investigating the future of living and making, and is part of the programme of the Fuorisalone event. The Salone del Mobile fair and the concurrent Fuorisalone event, which spreads around the city, together form Milan Design Week. The Alcova showcase, staged in various locations, was, this year, activate for the first time never-before-seen spaces in the historical quarter of Ex Macello, near Porta Vittoria.
14 Finnish materials manufacturers participated Habitare Materials in Milan
Habitare Materials Milan consisted of a spatial exhibition design, samples from Finnish material suppliers, and unique furniture made from materials from participating companies. 14 Finnish companies participated the exhibition: Cover Story, CWP, Durat, Johanna Gullichsen, Karava, Nordic Copper, Novo Wood, Pihlgren & Ritola, Sera Helsinki, Stala, Luonnonbetoni, Laatupaneeli, Tulikivi and VMCarpet.
The exhibition, which is unique even internationally, provided a unique platform for Finnish companies to become recognised within the international design community and to profile themselves internationally, as Milan Design Week and the concurrent Salone del Mobile furniture fair constitute the most important event in the industry, inviting pioneers from all over the world to come together.
“We are very happy that it is specifically Habitare Materials that will be showcased in Milan. The topicality and novelty of the exhibition make it a perfect fit with the Alcova content. We are especially happy to be presenting responsible Finnish materials companies and organisations,” says the creative director of Habitare, Laura Sarvilinna.
The media partner of Habitare Materials Milan is Asun magazine.
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