KOCHI:
The three-day Kochi Design Week (KDW) beginning on Thursday will host a special session on ‘Surface Creativity’ on December 13, as two renowned architects will address delegates on designs inspired by free-spirited placement and colouring of floors.
Lijo Jos and his wife Reny Lijo will also give designers the liberty to explore their creativity at the three-hour session being organised on Friday evening (starting 4 pm) in association with Mumbai-based Tiles, Marble and Mosaico firm NITCO. The venue will be NITCO’s Le Studio in Edappally, 10 km northwest of the city’s Bolgatty Island that is hosting the December 12-14 KDW with the aim of making Kerala a major hub of the world’s design and architecture.
Lijo and Reny run the 2005-founded LIJO.RENY.architects in Thrissur, 80 km north of Kochi. The KDW session on Surface Creativity is being hosted in a place other than Bolgatty Palace for wider access to the message on the key role design enjoys in futuristic infrastructure, organisers said.
“We must spread ideas about design to all parts of the city and the state. We need to involve all sectors related to design,” said KDW special officer Arun Balachandran, who is the Kerala Chief Minister’s Fellow (IT). “More people ought to know the vitality of design in day-to-day life.”
Subrata Basu, Vice-President (Design) of 1953-established NITCO, said creativity has a “unique role” in promoting designs in the new age. Lijo hailed KDW, being organised chiefly by the Kerala government, as a “great platform” for architects and interior designers, while Reny noted that the Friday session will give designers a “free hand” to try their ways of placing tiles “in any interesting manner”.
The KDW, for which registrations can be made at https://kochidesignweek.org, aims to generate cutting-edge ideas about building sustainable infrastructure so as to chart a long-term development mission for the state.
