Each year the fair’s different areas showcase a variety of design disciplines from around the country including fashion, textiles, accessories, lightning, products and graphics. This year they also included food and packaging, as well as commercial stands, workshops, talks, presentations, prizes and business meetings with internationals like the buyer of NYC’s MoMA’s Store seeking to discover fresh unknown talents from this side of the world.
Puro Diseno Fair could honestly do with a bit of curation, more good quality design and a better communication regarding what’s really important: sustainable design. Unfortunately, every year we see more poorly crafted jewelry and less furniture and objects, reflecting the fair’s orientation towards a business of throwaway objects. It is a shame that as the years goes by, the fair seems to lean closer to an indoors artisans market and further away from good design, because there is a lot of amazing Argentine sustainable design out there.
Photo © Ana Lisa Alperovich for Inhabitat
Yes, that is right!
¨The Argentine version to American TOMS shoes, which are in fact a shoe design taken from Argentina’s gauchos, alpargatas, was also standing at Puro Diseno Fair under the name of Paez Shoes. This very basic footwear made from canvas and a jute sole are very comfortable, biodegradable and comes in a wide variety of designs.¨
Thank you for raising the point and adding value to it!
“The Argentine version to American TOMS shoes, Paez Shoes, sells very basic footwear made from canvas and a jute sole.” Sorry you got it wrong. Those shoes (alpargatas) have existed in Argentina for centuries now. It has been the preferred shoes in rural environment because they are cheap, durable and comfortable. TOMS’ founder is in fact Argentinian and he ‘export’ the model to the US as a fashionable shoe.