23. 11. 2015
26th Ambient Ljubljana Furniture Fair, taking place from 17 to 22 November at the GR – Ljubljana Exhibition and Convention Centre, 158 companies from 17 countries exhibited interior equipment, home accessories, floorings, air-condition and heating technology, builders’ joinery, prefabricated houses, and more. At the ceremonial opening on the first day of the fair, awards and prizes were granted to exhibited items selected by special committees. Two novelties at the 26th Furniture Fair were free architectural consulting for visitors, Top architect, and Ambient Special Guest, a group of young people named Brands of Friends: friends of fresh and innovative designers’ stories from Slovenia. There were exhibitions of Italian design and industrial design from Poland. Accompanying programme brought panel discussion, lectures and consulting by ZRMK Building and Civil Engineering Institute. To promote the visit, the organizer offered special reduced tickets.
Awards and prizes
The GR – Ljubljana Exhibition and Convention Centre grants the awards for the Top 5 and the winner among them, Top of the Top, for products and systemic solutions which best combine functionality with technological and visual quality. There is also an award for the most innovative product at the exhibition and exchange of young creators, Top ideas. The Designers Society of Slovenia grants an award for achievements in design. A golden plaque of the magazine Naš dom (Večer) is awarded to a Slovenian manufacturer of furniture with which it is possible partly or entirely equip a home in a most beautiful way.
Top ideas and Top architect
Over 30 young architects and designers presented their work at the 6th Top ideas exchange and exhibition. Each year, the GR – Ljubljana Exhibition and Convention Centre enables young people to publicly present their work both for individual customers and representatives of furniture manufacturing businesses, thus opening possibilities of bringing design closer to public.
Top architect, a 30-minute free consulting for visitors, was an added value of the 26th Furniture Fair. The majority of consultants come from the Top ideas project: from TRIpike studio (Tadej Podakar, Luka Fabjan, Urša Križman), 3S design studio (Kaja in Lana Strle), Ropot creative group (Tina Semolič, Rok Avsec), M atellier (Matic Treven) and Celovito team (Jure Judež, Ajda Kolenbrand). Those interested in consulting booked their term in advance at the Furniture Fair web site. Some terms were available for the visitors who had not managed to book in advance.
Ambient Fair Special Guest
Young, innovative and fresh creative potential in Slovenia also marked the other novelty of the 26th Ambient Fair. The Special Guest was the store of Slovenian design Brands of Friends, uniting forces of designer studio Desnahemisfera (industrial designers Dejan Kos and Klemen Smrtnik, architect Damir Islamovič) and Wood Stock group (food technologist Jaka Jančič, economist Nejc Leskovar, optical technician Tamara Jančič). At their sales-exhibition space, more than 30 top Slovenian brands were on sale. They had a promotion of wooden spectacles Wood Stock, testing of longboards and a workshop where visitors could whet their own wood ring.
Exhibitions
At the art market sales exhibition ARTish, home accessories were presented by six creators. In Avla Hall, the Designers Society of Slovenia prepared the exhibition ‘Designer icon – REX armchair’ by the designer Niko Kralj. Apart from the exhibitions TOP 5 winners of Ambient Fair and Top ideas, there were two other important exhibitions to be seen. INDEX – Industrial Design Examples from Poland presented 30 items of contemporary industrial design from Poland after 2010. Italian agency for economic promotion from the Embassy of the Republic of Italy participated in panel discussion and the exhibition Made in Italy: in the foyer of Kupola Hall and in Kocka Hall Italian design with some renowned brands was presented.
Panel discussion on contemporary design and consulting for visitors
The exhibition Made in Italy was complemented by the panel discussion Design today: present and future trends in the light of sustainable development and migrations, about how design responds to global challenges and at the same time preserves cultural and aesthetic values. Participants were Rok Kuhar, architect and designer, Raketa d.o.o., Maurizio Molini, architect, architectural firm Studio Molini, Dimitri Waltritsch, architect, architectural and urban planning firm waltritsch a+u, and Lee Hunnisett De Beer, expert for retailing and visual strategies, Natuzzi S.p.A.
At the fair, consultants from the ZRMK Building and Civil Engineering Institute presented sustainable elements of living and working environments. All days of the fair there were independent and free lectures and individual consultations which addressed sustainable elements of living and working environments in renovation and new buildings, planning natural lighting, criteria of thermal comfort, microclimate parameters and energy renovations of buildings and architectural heritage, efficient use of energy in buildings and households, renewable sources of energy, sources of heating, heating of sanitary water, use of rainwater, evaluation of building environmental performance, indicators of annual energy cost for household appliance performance, and living in almost zero-energy houses.
Bonuses for visitors
30-minute free consulting
Exhibitors’ discounts at the fair
Reduced ticket, 4.5 EUR on Tuesday, 17 November, the first day of the fair
Happy Hour ticket, 5 EUR, every day from 12:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.
Opening times
From Tuesday to Saturday: from 10.00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m.
Sunday: od 10.00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m.