#BeOpenDESIGN
Hands On Light by Gustav Friebel reimagines the table lamp as both a functional object and a sculptural exploration of light. Created for ERCO and UDK Berlin's Hands On Light exhibition at Berlin Design Week 2026, the design combines seven frosted glass spheres, a deep-red PMMA shell, and a chrome framework to mimic the segmented beauty of natural light. The result is a striking piece that blurs the line between lighting, art, and experimentation, proving that a lamp can shape not only a room but also the way we experience light itself.
Hands On Light by Gustav Friebel reimagines the table lamp as both a functional object and a sculptural exploration of light. Created for ERCO and UDK Berlin's Hands On Light exhibition at Berlin Design Week 2026, the design combines seven frosted glass spheres, a deep-red PMMA shell, and a chrome framework to mimic the segmented beauty of natural light. The result is a striking piece that blurs the line between lighting, art, and experimentation, proving that a lamp can shape not only a room but also the way we experience light itself.
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Chromaterico Textile Objects applies Textilite, a composite developed by Archeomaterico (Davide Balda) @archeomaterico and Chroma Composites, to a series of furniture and objects made from recycled textile waste. Discarded garments, production offcuts, and unsold textiles are mechanically ground into mixed fibers and consolidated through the proprietary Mersus process, producing a stone-like material with the structural properties required for furniture, interior applications, and architectural components.
Chromaterico Textile Objects applies Textilite, a composite developed by Archeomaterico (Davide Balda) @archeomaterico and Chroma Composites, to a series of furniture and objects made from recycled textile waste. Discarded garments, production offcuts, and unsold textiles are mechanically ground into mixed fibers and consolidated through the proprietary Mersus process, producing a stone-like material with the structural properties required for furniture, interior applications, and architectural components.
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PEEL transforms discarded salak and lychee skins into a durable, fully biodegradable textile that celebrates the natural character of fruit waste rather than disguising it. Developed by Greek-Indonesian designer Nefeli Vitoraki, the material is made without adhesives, synthetic polymers, or toxic chemical treatments, offering a regenerative alternative to leather with up to 95% lower estimated CO2 emissions. Rooted in Indonesia's existing food waste streams, PEEL demonstrates how overlooked agricultural by-products can become honest, locally sourced materials with a distinct identity.
PEEL transforms discarded salak and lychee skins into a durable, fully biodegradable textile that celebrates the natural character of fruit waste rather than disguising it. Developed by Greek-Indonesian designer Nefeli Vitoraki, the material is made without adhesives, synthetic polymers, or toxic chemical treatments, offering a regenerative alternative to leather with up to 95% lower estimated CO2 emissions. Rooted in Indonesia's existing food waste streams, PEEL demonstrates how overlooked agricultural by-products can become honest, locally sourced materials with a distinct identity.
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BE OPEN Art has named figurative oil painter Megan Weeda its Artist of the Month for June 2026. Based in Dayton, USA, Weeda creates expressive paintings that examine memory, perception, and identity through the lens of aphantasia—the inability to form mental images. Blending vivid color with visual distortion, she reconstructs personal recollections into emotionally charged compositions that challenge conventional ideas of remembering. As the June winner, Weeda advances to the BE OPEN Art Artist of the Year 2026 competition.
BE OPEN Art has named figurative oil painter Megan Weeda its Artist of the Month for June 2026. Based in Dayton, USA, Weeda creates expressive paintings that examine memory, perception, and identity through the lens of aphantasia—the inability to form mental images. Blending vivid color with visual distortion, she reconstructs personal recollections into emotionally charged compositions that challenge conventional ideas of remembering. As the June winner, Weeda advances to the BE OPEN Art Artist of the Year 2026 competition.
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With Carte Blanche, Dutch designer Annebet Philips turns porcelain into a visual sleight of hand. Built from cardboard-inspired forms rather than wheel-thrown symmetry, the collection swaps rounded ceramic archetypes for folded, faceted vessels outlined in hand-painted black lines. Cups, teapots, and plates read almost like sketches lifted off a page, collapsing three-dimensional tableware into something that feels graphic and flat. The result is a playful but conceptually sharp collection that challenges two long-standing assumptions of ceramics at once: that vessels should be round, and that they should look solidly, unmistakably real.
More unconventional ceramics on our blog.
With Carte Blanche, Dutch designer Annebet Philips turns porcelain into a visual sleight of hand. Built from cardboard-inspired forms rather than wheel-thrown symmetry, the collection swaps rounded ceramic archetypes for folded, faceted vessels outlined in hand-painted black lines. Cups, teapots, and plates read almost like sketches lifted off a page, collapsing three-dimensional tableware into something that feels graphic and flat. The result is a playful but conceptually sharp collection that challenges two long-standing assumptions of ceramics at once: that vessels should be round, and that they should look solidly, unmistakably real.
More unconventional ceramics on our blog.
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BE OPEN Art has announced Ana Montoya as the June 2026 winner of its Art Limitless programme. A Colombian artist based in Marseille, Montoya creates layered collage works informed by textile traditions, anthropology, and her experiences working with Indigenous communities in the Amazon. Her tactile practice explores migration, identity, memory, and materiality while celebrating the enduring connection between handmade craft and contemporary art.
As a monthly winner, she advances in the Art Limitless programme's annual awards. Each month, a winning artist is selected and featured in the online gallery, and at the end of the year, three artists will be chosen from the monthly winners by members of the BE OPEN community to receive monetary awards and increased international visibility from the BE OPEN Foundation.
BE OPEN Art has announced Ana Montoya as the June 2026 winner of its Art Limitless programme. A Colombian artist based in Marseille, Montoya creates layered collage works informed by textile traditions, anthropology, and her experiences working with Indigenous communities in the Amazon. Her tactile practice explores migration, identity, memory, and materiality while celebrating the enduring connection between handmade craft and contemporary art.
As a monthly winner, she advances in the Art Limitless programme's annual awards. Each month, a winning artist is selected and featured in the online gallery, and at the end of the year, three artists will be chosen from the monthly winners by members of the BE OPEN community to receive monetary awards and increased international visibility from the BE OPEN Foundation.
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Live Beats rethinks the role of headphones in noisy environments by shifting music from sound to touch. Designed by Haji Yang, the concept wearable uses soft tentacle-like extensions that rest against the cheek and tap in sync with a song’s rhythm when ambient noise becomes too overwhelming for audio alone. Rather than treating surrounding sound as something to cancel out, Live Beats adapts by translating musical patterns into tactile feedback, turning the face into a new interface for listening. With its organic, almost bio-mechanical form and its focus on rhythm as a physical sensation, the project offers a striking alternative to conventional noise-canceling design and hints at a broader future for wearables that communicate through touch.
More offbeat headphones on our blog.
Live Beats rethinks the role of headphones in noisy environments by shifting music from sound to touch. Designed by Haji Yang, the concept wearable uses soft tentacle-like extensions that rest against the cheek and tap in sync with a song’s rhythm when ambient noise becomes too overwhelming for audio alone. Rather than treating surrounding sound as something to cancel out, Live Beats adapts by translating musical patterns into tactile feedback, turning the face into a new interface for listening. With its organic, almost bio-mechanical form and its focus on rhythm as a physical sensation, the project offers a striking alternative to conventional noise-canceling design and hints at a broader future for wearables that communicate through touch.
More offbeat headphones on our blog.
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Designed by Georgia Institute of Technology student Zoe Mocklar, TULIP is a sustainable women’s shoe developed for professional settings, combining ergonomic performance with a materially conscious construction. The shoe features a refined, timeless silhouette with stitched detailing and a ventilation gap at the heel, while its sole made from tulip poplar offcuts is engineered to support a natural rolling motion of the foot for improved comfort in wear. The upper is formed from recycled wool, reinforced with vertical cotton stitching and paired with a reclaimed cotton lining, creating a construction that prioritises both durability and reduced material waste. Finished with biodegradable adhesives, TULIP is designed with end-of-life decomposition in mind, presenting a considered approach to footwear that integrates longevity, comfort and circular material thinking.
Designed by Georgia Institute of Technology student Zoe Mocklar, TULIP is a sustainable women’s shoe developed for professional settings, combining ergonomic performance with a materially conscious construction. The shoe features a refined, timeless silhouette with stitched detailing and a ventilation gap at the heel, while its sole made from tulip poplar offcuts is engineered to support a natural rolling motion of the foot for improved comfort in wear. The upper is formed from recycled wool, reinforced with vertical cotton stitching and paired with a reclaimed cotton lining, creating a construction that prioritises both durability and reduced material waste. Finished with biodegradable adhesives, TULIP is designed with end-of-life decomposition in mind, presenting a considered approach to footwear that integrates longevity, comfort and circular material thinking.
#BeOpenNEWS
BE OPEN has announced the winner of the Cyprus Future Heritage Competition, an initiative created in partnership with the Cyprus Handicraft Service of the Deputy Ministry of Culture and the Society of British and International Interior Design to celebrate and reinterpret the island’s weaving and embroidery traditions through contemporary design. Open to Cyprus-based students, graduates, and young professionals aged 18 to 30, the competition invited emerging creatives to engage with local craft heritage across four categories. The top prize went to 21-year-old UCLan Cyprus student Voula Sakka for A dress stitched with the threads of a story, a fashion piece that draws on Cypriot nature and craftsmanship through details such as Lefkara lace embroidery and a reimagined pomegranate structure, earning her a fully funded international internship organized by BE OPEN and SBID.
BE OPEN has announced the winner of the Cyprus Future Heritage Competition, an initiative created in partnership with the Cyprus Handicraft Service of the Deputy Ministry of Culture and the Society of British and International Interior Design to celebrate and reinterpret the island’s weaving and embroidery traditions through contemporary design. Open to Cyprus-based students, graduates, and young professionals aged 18 to 30, the competition invited emerging creatives to engage with local craft heritage across four categories. The top prize went to 21-year-old UCLan Cyprus student Voula Sakka for A dress stitched with the threads of a story, a fashion piece that draws on Cypriot nature and craftsmanship through details such as Lefkara lace embroidery and a reimagined pomegranate structure, earning her a fully funded international internship organized by BE OPEN and SBID.
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Created by Nikita Bukoros Design, the Nothing Book is a concept laptop that imagines how Nothing could translate its transparent, minimal aesthetic into a high-performance device for gamers and creators. Building on the brand’s signature approach to exposed components and stripped-back industrial detailing, the concept reveals the laptop’s internal architecture beneath a translucent housing, turning cooling systems, circuit boards and structural elements into part of the visual composition. A secondary display integrated into the lid extends Nothing’s graphic language by allowing users to show messages, symbols and animations externally, while colour variants in red, green, pink and teal push the concept beyond the brand’s usual monochrome palette. Paired with a purpose-built charging dock and a practical port selection, the proposal positions the laptop as both a speculative consumer device and an industrial design statement.
Created by Nikita Bukoros Design, the Nothing Book is a concept laptop that imagines how Nothing could translate its transparent, minimal aesthetic into a high-performance device for gamers and creators. Building on the brand’s signature approach to exposed components and stripped-back industrial detailing, the concept reveals the laptop’s internal architecture beneath a translucent housing, turning cooling systems, circuit boards and structural elements into part of the visual composition. A secondary display integrated into the lid extends Nothing’s graphic language by allowing users to show messages, symbols and animations externally, while colour variants in red, green, pink and teal push the concept beyond the brand’s usual monochrome palette. Paired with a purpose-built charging dock and a practical port selection, the proposal positions the laptop as both a speculative consumer device and an industrial design statement.
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Designed by Duncan Shotton, Soy Shape is a set of dipping dishes that uses the natural colour gradation of soy sauce to create the illusion of three-dimensional geometric forms when filled. Formed with irregular interior surfaces, the dishes transform from flat ceramic trays into compositions that appear to depict impossible triangles and cubes, turning a simple dining ritual into an optical experiment. Made in Japan by craftspeople in Gifu prefecture, the project pairs playful visual effect with careful production, and is offered in two packaging formats: a standard box containing two matching dishes, and a limited-edition hand-signed slide-box version featuring a layered cardboard presentation case assembled by hand at Shotton’s Tokyo studio.
Designed by Duncan Shotton, Soy Shape is a set of dipping dishes that uses the natural colour gradation of soy sauce to create the illusion of three-dimensional geometric forms when filled. Formed with irregular interior surfaces, the dishes transform from flat ceramic trays into compositions that appear to depict impossible triangles and cubes, turning a simple dining ritual into an optical experiment. Made in Japan by craftspeople in Gifu prefecture, the project pairs playful visual effect with careful production, and is offered in two packaging formats: a standard box containing two matching dishes, and a limited-edition hand-signed slide-box version featuring a layered cardboard presentation case assembled by hand at Shotton’s Tokyo studio.
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RIFFMATE reimagines the electric guitar through subtraction, stripping away strings, fret wires, and the traditional solid body in favor of a skeletal, modular form that feels as much like a smart device as a musical instrument. Designed by LKK Design Beijing for Shanghai’s Wo Tan Ni Chang Technology, the concept pairs a touch-sensitive neck with a central pod housing the speaker, electronics, and acoustic chamber, creating a portable, self-amplifying instrument aimed at beginners and curious returnees alike. Its one-key disassembly, swappable shells, and AI-assisted interface position it less as a conventional guitar and more as a flexible, approachable system for making music.
More folding electric guitars on our blog.
RIFFMATE reimagines the electric guitar through subtraction, stripping away strings, fret wires, and the traditional solid body in favor of a skeletal, modular form that feels as much like a smart device as a musical instrument. Designed by LKK Design Beijing for Shanghai’s Wo Tan Ni Chang Technology, the concept pairs a touch-sensitive neck with a central pod housing the speaker, electronics, and acoustic chamber, creating a portable, self-amplifying instrument aimed at beginners and curious returnees alike. Its one-key disassembly, swappable shells, and AI-assisted interface position it less as a conventional guitar and more as a flexible, approachable system for making music.
More folding electric guitars on our blog.
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Burls Art has built a fully playable electric guitar from what is essentially air and recycled cardboard. Inspired by a cardboard guitar developed by Fender and Signal a decade ago, the maker revisits the material with a more refined approach, laminating resin-soaked cardboard sheets to create a lightweight yet durable instrument. The hollow corrugated structure keeps the body exceptionally light, while the neck is reinforced through alternating cardboard layers, full resin saturation, and a truss rod for added strength under string tension. Finished with standard electric guitar hardware, clear coating, and visible corrugated openings, the project turns an everyday packaging material into a functional musical instrument with a surprisingly sculptural, semi-transparent presence.
Burls Art has built a fully playable electric guitar from what is essentially air and recycled cardboard. Inspired by a cardboard guitar developed by Fender and Signal a decade ago, the maker revisits the material with a more refined approach, laminating resin-soaked cardboard sheets to create a lightweight yet durable instrument. The hollow corrugated structure keeps the body exceptionally light, while the neck is reinforced through alternating cardboard layers, full resin saturation, and a truss rod for added strength under string tension. Finished with standard electric guitar hardware, clear coating, and visible corrugated openings, the project turns an everyday packaging material into a functional musical instrument with a surprisingly sculptural, semi-transparent presence.
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Yeonsu Ra’s Poetic Beauty Vase transforms the humble planter into a ceiling-suspended statement piece, merging the elegance of a chandelier with the vitality of indoor greenery. Designed as a two-tier hanging vase system with 13 plant vessels, the concept uses a self-watering mechanism that feeds each planter through central trays and clear pipes, while buoyant containers rise and fall with the water level to signal when it is time to refill. The result is a poetic fusion of ornament, engineering, and biophilic design that turns plant care into a ritual and brings a sense of life, softness, and quiet drama to interior spaces.
More extraordinary planters on our blog.
Yeonsu Ra’s Poetic Beauty Vase transforms the humble planter into a ceiling-suspended statement piece, merging the elegance of a chandelier with the vitality of indoor greenery. Designed as a two-tier hanging vase system with 13 plant vessels, the concept uses a self-watering mechanism that feeds each planter through central trays and clear pipes, while buoyant containers rise and fall with the water level to signal when it is time to refill. The result is a poetic fusion of ornament, engineering, and biophilic design that turns plant care into a ritual and brings a sense of life, softness, and quiet drama to interior spaces.
More extraordinary planters on our blog.
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Designed by Sol Rybakken Kallin, the 12-year-old daughter of Norwegian designer Daniel Rybakken, Solaris is a table lamp created for Swedish lighting manufacturer Blond that combines illumination, display and storage within a compact, sculptural form. The lamp features a curved frame with a hollow central compartment for small personal objects, allowing it to function as both a lighting object and a domestic accessory. Vertical light tubes at either end are enclosed by curved panels of either frosted glass or perforated steel, producing either a soft diffused glow or a more graphic effect. Held between lozenge-shaped aluminium side panels, Solaris translates a playful concept into a resolved product that explores simplicity, material contrast and multifunctionality.
Designed by Sol Rybakken Kallin, the 12-year-old daughter of Norwegian designer Daniel Rybakken, Solaris is a table lamp created for Swedish lighting manufacturer Blond that combines illumination, display and storage within a compact, sculptural form. The lamp features a curved frame with a hollow central compartment for small personal objects, allowing it to function as both a lighting object and a domestic accessory. Vertical light tubes at either end are enclosed by curved panels of either frosted glass or perforated steel, producing either a soft diffused glow or a more graphic effect. Held between lozenge-shaped aluminium side panels, Solaris translates a playful concept into a resolved product that explores simplicity, material contrast and multifunctionality.
#BeOpenDESIGN
Dutch textile designer Luna Haverkorn is using knitting as a construction system for interactive, body-scale objects that shift, fold, and respond to the people who use them. Currently completing her Master’s in Textile Interaction Design at the Swedish School of Textiles, Haverkorn develops sculptural knitted forms that can be sat on, reclined in, balanced against, or even hidden inside, treating knitting less as decoration and more as a method for building transformable structures. Developed through hands-on experimentation and programmed on industrial flatbed knitting machines, her work challenges conventional ideas of craft while arguing for knitting as a site of innovation, where material knowledge, movement, and user interaction are just as important as technology.
Dutch textile designer Luna Haverkorn is using knitting as a construction system for interactive, body-scale objects that shift, fold, and respond to the people who use them. Currently completing her Master’s in Textile Interaction Design at the Swedish School of Textiles, Haverkorn develops sculptural knitted forms that can be sat on, reclined in, balanced against, or even hidden inside, treating knitting less as decoration and more as a method for building transformable structures. Developed through hands-on experimentation and programmed on industrial flatbed knitting machines, her work challenges conventional ideas of craft while arguing for knitting as a site of innovation, where material knowledge, movement, and user interaction are just as important as technology.
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Irish designer James Murphy has reimagined children’s furniture as a compact play system with Casul, a plywood chair that transforms into a rudimentary castle in just two moves. Developed as part of Murphy’s final-year project at Nottingham Trent University and recognised at London’s New Designers showcase, the design combines furniture and imaginative play through kid-safe hinges, interlocking timber joints, and fold-out elements that allow the seat to open into an abstract castle setting. Versions finished in chalkboard paint or equipped with hidden foam swords and shield-like cushions further encourage open-ended storytelling, while the project’s simple construction, affordability, and emphasis on unsupervised analogue play position it as a thoughtful update to transformable children’s furniture.
Irish designer James Murphy has reimagined children’s furniture as a compact play system with Casul, a plywood chair that transforms into a rudimentary castle in just two moves. Developed as part of Murphy’s final-year project at Nottingham Trent University and recognised at London’s New Designers showcase, the design combines furniture and imaginative play through kid-safe hinges, interlocking timber joints, and fold-out elements that allow the seat to open into an abstract castle setting. Versions finished in chalkboard paint or equipped with hidden foam swords and shield-like cushions further encourage open-ended storytelling, while the project’s simple construction, affordability, and emphasis on unsupervised analogue play position it as a thoughtful update to transformable children’s furniture.
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Developed during a residency at Metropolitan Fukujusou in Kyoto, Hacienda Okazaki is a collection by Hoi Kaloi that explores contemporary Japanese material culture through reuse, bricolage, and everyday objects. Drawing from the Okazaki neighborhood, the project combines found materials, Mingei antiques, Showa-era souvenirs, and components from hardware and discount stores to create hybrid objects that sit somewhere between craft, critique, and collage. In doing so, Hoi Kaloi challenges romanticized ideas of Japanese craftsmanship and the figure of the shokunin, instead shifting attention toward the overlooked design intelligence of ordinary urban life, from 100-yen shop objects to the visual language of hazard stripes.
Developed during a residency at Metropolitan Fukujusou in Kyoto, Hacienda Okazaki is a collection by Hoi Kaloi that explores contemporary Japanese material culture through reuse, bricolage, and everyday objects. Drawing from the Okazaki neighborhood, the project combines found materials, Mingei antiques, Showa-era souvenirs, and components from hardware and discount stores to create hybrid objects that sit somewhere between craft, critique, and collage. In doing so, Hoi Kaloi challenges romanticized ideas of Japanese craftsmanship and the figure of the shokunin, instead shifting attention toward the overlooked design intelligence of ordinary urban life, from 100-yen shop objects to the visual language of hazard stripes.
#BeOpenDESIGN
Swedish designer Gustaf Westman has turned one of the home's least glamorous objects into a playful design statement with the Chunky Cat Tree. Inspired by the rounded forms of his signature Blob collection, the made-to-order piece reimagines the conventional cat tower as a sculptural object upholstered in vibrant wool. Rather than hiding pet furniture from view, Westman's design embraces bold color, exaggerated proportions, and soft geometry, creating a functional climbing and lounging space that doubles as a striking centerpiece for contemporary interiors.
More design-minded cat towers on our blog.
Swedish designer Gustaf Westman has turned one of the home's least glamorous objects into a playful design statement with the Chunky Cat Tree. Inspired by the rounded forms of his signature Blob collection, the made-to-order piece reimagines the conventional cat tower as a sculptural object upholstered in vibrant wool. Rather than hiding pet furniture from view, Westman's design embraces bold color, exaggerated proportions, and soft geometry, creating a functional climbing and lounging space that doubles as a striking centerpiece for contemporary interiors.
More design-minded cat towers on our blog.