Name: The Imperfect Future – WOOD: Design between Symbiosis and Standardisation
Start: 2026-05-21T18:30:00+02:00
End: 2026-05-21T21:00:00+02:00
Location: Aedes

$The Imperfect Future \u2013 WOOD: Design between Symbiosis and Standardisation$

What does it mean for design when materials are not perfect?
About this Event

Next! Young European Design by EUNIC Berlin and Aedes brings together young designers from eleven European countries to discuss wood as a material in the context of climate change, resource scarcity and new production methods. The Imperfect Future – WOOD: Design between Symbiosis and Standardisation examines how designers are respondingto flawed materials, the slow growth cycles of natural resources and the tension between craftsmanship and industrial standardisation.

The talk opens with short presentations by invited designers and studios, whose work ranges from experimental furniture and material research to site-specific design approaches. Some engage with locally sourced or reused wood, while others explore news forms of collaborations against the backdrop of natural growth processes or develop strategies for durable, sustainable products.

These presentations are followed by a moderated discussion addressing the origins, uses and future of wood and asking how imperfection, reparability and material constraints can become productive starting points for contemporary design. More

The Lab Talk forms part of the wider Next! Young European Design programme, which includes studio visits, workshops and exchange formats for participating designers. The programme is developed in collaboration with partners including the Werkbundarchiv – Museum der Dinge, the Wood Design programme at the Schneeberg Faculty of Applied Arts, the project BeFallen - Art from Infestation and Studio J.Mayer.H.

PROGRAMME

Welcome and Introduction

Dunya Bouchi, Aedes, Berlin
Saša Šavel Burkart, Head of the Slovenian Cultural Information Center – SKICA Berlin and Lead of Next! Young European Design by EUNIC Berlin
Simona Binko, Art Historian and Cultural Manager / curator of Next! Young European Design, Berlin

Presentations

, Austria
, Estonia
, Finland
, Ireland
, Luxembourg
, Netherlands
, Poland
, Romania
, Slovakia
, Slovenia
, United Kingdom

Discussion

with the designers and the audience, moderated by Simona Binko

In collaboration with EUNIC Berlin

EUNIC Berlin is the network of European cultural institutes in Berlin and part of the global EUNIC – European Union National Institutes for Culture – network.

Image: Richard Seneši, Morphosis. © Peter Čintalan