Who wants to know what else a LAMPAN can be besides a lamp or how the PRODUKT milk-frother can also be used for other purposes, looks at Hacking IKEA for inspiration.
Hacking existing design is a recent phenomenon. Around the world, for a variety of personal motives, professional and nonprofessional designers are making individual alterations to off-the-shelf products. In the process, they pay little or no attention to a product’s original function. Some do it for fun, others out of necessity, and still others out of a critical attitude toward mass production. IKEA hacks – the appropriation, adaptation and transformation of standard IKEA products – are among the most noticeable expressions of this movement.
IKEA is a very successful and consumer friendly multinational, with a large fan base all across the Western and Asian world. But it is also a cultural entity, an economic force and an icon of global change. Therefore it is not surprising that numerous artists and designers as well as the general public, have a special relationship with IKEA.
Platform21 = Hacking IKEA shows the work of those professionals and amateurs and commissions new work by makers to whom the practise of hacking is central.
GYNEA by Sander van Bussel - Photography Leo Veger
Platform21 = Hacking Ikea was part of the festival 4 Weeks of FreeDesignDom (September 2008) in Amsterdam and showed an adjusted version of the exhibition during the Dutch Design Week in Eindhoven. It travelled to South Korea to be part of Design MADE - Manifesto for Annual Design Exhibition - in November 2008 and will travel to the 2009 Biennale Montreal later this year.
With a growing amount of contributions by a.o. designers and artists: Bas van Beek, Joe Scanlan, Cynthia Hathaway, Remy&Veenhuizen, Bjorn Andreassen, Sander van Bussel, Eric Morel, Studio VOLLAERSZWART, Helmut Smits, Frank Bruggeman, Daan van den Berg, Stefaan Dheedene, Jason Salavon, Maarten Vanden Eynde, Kieren Jones, Eric Von Robertson, Rutger Emmelkamp, Studio Plus, Mark Hoekstra, Alan D. Joseph, Daniel Saakes, Dinie Besems, Guus Alders and Sander Kunst, Zinoo Park, Kira Kim, Kyum Bi, Jihoon Ha, Sanghyun Joo, Mikyung Lee and Heesung Kim.
ONBEWOOND EILAND (uninhabited island) by Sander van Bussel - Photography by Leo Veger
