La historia detrás de X - Craft

The story behind X - Craft

As a designer, I had always dreamed of being able to work hand in hand with Colombian artisans, because I was attracted by their techniques, their particularities and above all by the way in which ancestral knowledge survived despite the vicissitudes of modernity, conquest, war and oblivion. However, I found it confusing what the starting point could be, since all the artisans, as diverse as our idiosyncrasy, were in such distant places, some remote, and spoke such different languages, some dialects, that deciding which was the appropriate technique, for the defined product and the most interesting community was an infinite chance. And although I have always liked the chance with which life moves you, I did not find any conclusive clue to choose the direction that would take me to a particular community. This was a concern and a curiosity that, however, despite other commissions I received as a designer, remained alive in me, stored somewhere in my creative mind and in my duty to be
as a Colombian (is there a duty to be Colombian?).

With curiosity as the first ingredient in most of my personal projects, and with the desire to see how in other geographies crafts evolved alongside designers to bring the traditional and most identifying aspects of ancestral communities to current daily life, constituting tremendous global design and lifestyle trends, as has occurred in the Nordic countries, Japan and England, to name just a few examples. This combination of ingredients and the idea that design occurs, as with other creative processes, hand in hand with catharsis, that is, putting all the things you have seen, smelled, lived, tasted, felt and perceived, almost unconsciously and through an almost spiritual manifestation, in a new form, a renewed idea, a mix of things from before and after, a mixture, in short, of things that are lived, that are dreamed and that are aspired to. As a designer I have always been interested in creating products that give people something to talk about. Bad or good, it doesn't matter, but that spark conversations around what is produced. I have never been interested in the right products, or in trendy shapes, or in fitting into parameters, or even trying to be part of a circle. I prefer to be outside the perimeters, to be subservient, to peel off the skin of the most orthodox, otherwise, why create?



Without it being a concrete plan, but clearly as an approach to craftsmanship, I had developed almost all my professional life in the midst of workshops and artisan cabinetmakers, who in our country represent a group of very talented people, but also a species in danger of extinction. After this journey, which was interspersed with some seasons living outside the country, learning other knowledge, I decided to create my own company, under the concept of an Atelier, which independently and without wanting to follow pre-established models, was established as a company dedicated to the design and production of special furniture. It is in the midst of this exciting exercise in entrepreneurship that I was surprised by a kind invitation from the Diseño Colombia program of Artesanías de Colombia, an initiative that fit perfectly with the dream of years ago, of being able to work hand in hand with the artisans of our country, in order to create design pieces with high functional, cultural and social value at the same time. A difficult thing to achieve from an individual point of view, but scaled by leaps and bounds, with the invitation of this program that already
It carried the impetus and trajectory of the largest promoter and protector of artisanal knowledge in Colombia, as a tangible and intangible culture.



As coincidences exist, Diseño Colombia's invitation found us working with Procolombia and the project of seeking commercial opportunities for L'Atelier Bogotá products in the global market. So we had the clearest objective: to design a collection with the risky and eclectic touch of L'Atelier in collaboration with various communities.
We have been working with the artisanal products of our country to achieve an identity product that will speak of a contemporary Colombia and at the same time will attract attention in international markets. This is how our X-Craft collection was born. From the beginning we had something clear, it would be a furniture collection, because it is what we know how to do, that would maintain the characteristic detail of cabinetmaking, but at the same time would be complemented with artisanal touches, that would take the craft out of a paternalistic and romantic vision, to rather bring the artisanal to play in the interstices of modern and hectic life, which we all live. Taking the artisanal out of the contemplative, to make it useful, harmonious and forceful. The most difficult task now was to decide which communities to work with. My dream as a designer had come true. The Colombian Crafts program offered me a
a firm bridge with the most remote communities, already catalogued, organized and documented. I couldn't believe it! In my hands, the largest catalogue of artisans in this country. I would like to work with all of them, I don't see a single one that is below the other, neither in quality, nor in form, nor in technique.



But we had to move forward and we began exploring and making contact with several of them. And what I suspected began to become a reality. It was not only exciting to hear their stories, but also a pleasure to meet real people, who were full of humility, wisdom and a desire to work as a team. Damaris Buelvas in San Jacinto, Bolívar, Alirio Liberato in the Amazon and John Chávez in Pasto, Nariño, to mention a few, became part of the design team, without a doubt, and I not only felt that I was working with them, but with what they represented, hundreds of years of tradition and knowledge expressed in what their hands know how to do. It couldn't be more exciting. I have never wanted to tell them in detail what to do, it would be uncomfortable and pretentious, rather to dialogue, converse, let ourselves go and create. That poetic process, in which craftsmanship and design unite without a doubt. Those I have had the opportunity to visit and meet in their own homes, which is where they create, have welcomed me with open arms and with a way of life and a world that makes us question all the modernity that the West sells us.

The first sketches began, the prototypes began to be part of everyday life, we wanted to put the techniques above, integrate the Amazon, with Bolívar and Bogotá, because that is what makes us unique and different in the world. In this process we have already created three versions of the X-Craft collection, an international presentation in the United States, a virtual participation in
Paris at the Maison & Object fair and many plans to continue working together, to create increasingly powerful and bold products, to strengthen our friendship with these wonderful people and show the world the indefinite nature that is Colombia and that makes us unique.

Back to blog

Leave a comment

Please note, comments need to be approved before they are published.

Create your project with us

Did you like this project?

Don't wait any longer and create the space of your dreams. Together we will make your project a reality.

You dream it, together we create it.