A curated view on Dutch Design Week 2025 through present, future, and possible
From 18 to 26 October, Eindhoven celebrated its 25th edition with more than 2,500 designers and 350,000 visitors. Eight projects turned “Past. Present. Possible.” into a living narrative — transforming ideas into matter, and imagination into experience.
After nine intense days, Dutch Design Week 2025 has once again proved that design in Eindhoven is more than exhibition: it’s an ecosystem in constant motion. Workshops, warehouses, and streets turned into a collective stage where ideas met materials, and imagination took physical form.
Marking its 25th edition, the festival expanded across the city with record-breaking participation and a mix of voices: emerging talents, established studios, and research collectives. Instead of celebrating its legacy, this edition looked forward: treating “Past. Present. Possible.” not as a theme, but as an active question about what design can still become.
Across disciplines and generations, the projects on show shared a common vocabulary: curiosity, empathy, and a relentless pursuit of meaning. Whether through material experimentation, digital intuition, or poetic restraint, each work demonstrated that innovation today is less about invention and more about connection, between designer and material, process and environment, present and future.
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Eindhoven remains one of the few places where design is not a product, but a living practice. Here, experimentation isn’t confined to the studio; it spills into the streets, the dialogue, the culture itself. And that’s perhaps the most enduring legacy of this edition: the understanding that the future of design isn’t about predicting what comes next: it’s about shaping what could be, together.
Among thousands of installations and experiments, a handful of projects captured that question perfectly, transforming the possible into something tangible. From light and movement to material regeneration and digital craft, these eight works tell the story of a design culture in constant evolution:
Dutch Design Week 2025 – Highlights:
Karlite & Mother of Pearl by Plasticiet – Design District
Among the clearest interpretations of this year’s theme, Plasticiet, the duo formed by Marten van Middelkoop and Joost Dingemans, presented Karlite and Mother of Pearl, two materials made entirely from recycled plastic. Yet, what makes them stand out is their tactile illusion: surfaces that look like marble or resin but are, in fact, born from waste.
The result is more than sustainable design, it’s sensorial storytelling. Every sheet carries traces of transformation, reminding us that the possible often hides in what we overlook. With a process that combines manual craft and industrial precision, Plasticiet’s work turns the language of waste into a new aesthetic of value.
Königswinter Light Sculpture by Heilig Objects – Sectie-C
In a quiet corner of Sectie-C, Heilig Objects unveiled Königswinter Light Sculpture: a vertical composition of glass, mirrors, and metal that captures and refracts light like a living entity. Inspired by the movement of the Rhine near Königswinter, the installation explores the dialogue between reflection and perception.
More than a visual experience, it felt like choreography, light folding into geometry, geometry dissolving into space. The work reframes technology as poetry, reminding visitors that innovation can illuminate rather than dominate.
The Staple by Filip Pista – Design Academy Eindhoven
At the Design Academy, Filip Pista redefined one of design’s most ordinary tools: the staple. His project transforms this tiny connector into an expressive structural element.
In The Staple, hundreds of steel staples link wooden components into complex yet flexible geometries. The result is a study in tension and connection, a design language where the invisible becomes visible. Pista’s gesture reclaims construction as ornament, inviting a rethink of how we define precision, structure, and imperfection.
Pavo by Jelmer Nijp – Kazerne
In the dim light of Kazerne, Jelmer Nijp’s Pavo came to life like a mechanical organism. The lamp unfolds gracefully, its stainless steel arms opening like a peacock’s feathers to reveal a delicate fabric diffuser.
The piece bridges engineering and emotion: movement becomes metaphor, light becomes breath. Nijp’s approach is a quiet reminder that design can be kinetic without being loud, that technology, when softened by rhythm, can express fragility and wonder.
Blooming Furniture by Aaron Preyer – Design Academy Eindhoven
Aaron Preyer’s Blooming Furniture explores the intersection between living systems and domestic design. His experimental pieces are conceived as organisms that grow and transform, blurring the line between nature and manufacture.
Instead of static forms, Preyer proposes evolving structures: furniture that blooms, reshapes, and adapts over time. It’s a manifesto for a more dynamic, symbiotic idea of design: one that coexists rather than controls.
Stone Drip by Tina Bobbe – Klokgebouw
In Stone Drip, Tina Bobbe reinvents a familiar ritual —making coffee — through an object that feels almost architectural. Crafted from stacked layers of natural stone and resin, her machine combines digital research with tactile craftsmanship.
The result is a sculptural appliance that channels postmodern playfulness and contemporary sensuality. Bobbe’s process, merging AI-generated imagery with handmade finishes, mirrors the tension of this year’s DDW: the coexistence of digital imagination and human care.
Soft Ply Lamp Series by Sheyang Li – Design District
Sheyang Li’s Soft Ply Lamp Series rethinks plywood — a material known for its stiffness — as something delicate and elastic. Using fine engineering, Li bends ultra-thin sheets into flowing curves that diffuse a warm, organic light.
The lamps feel almost like fabric, hovering between industrial design and emotional gesture. In their quiet simplicity lies a radical act: reimagining the familiar, revealing beauty in restraint.
Arc Collection by Sanghyeok Lee – Forward Furniture
Closing this selection, Sanghyeok Lee’s Arc Collection distills the relationship between craft, space, and serenity. His minimalist furniture, composed of wooden arcs and metallic frames, reflects a meditative precision — objects that seem to breathe with their surroundings.
Lee’s work embodies the “possible” as a state of balance: between mind and material, gesture and silence. It’s a fitting conclusion for this anniversary edition, where design becomes less about expression and more about awareness.
