African design goes global via Ikea
Five African countries collaborate with Ikea for a fresh perspective on a collection of furniture pieces, textiles and tableware.
28/06/2019
Back in 2017, global leader, Ikea, collaborated with Design Indaba to discover more about African design. This meeting of minds has resulted in the launch of Överallt - a unique collection of furniture pieces, tableware and textiles. This collection includes some new and unique pieces as part of an entire indoor/outdoor collection.
Some of the pieces that form part of the collection focus on the concept of repurposing and reusing, from a textile point of view, and work around the concept of turning waste into new materials to work with.
Working with Design Indaba allowed Ikea to discover more about our unique design ethos, with a group of select African designers from all fields paring with Ikea designers on the overall range of products in the Överallt range. African designers can definitely bring a fresh perspective on furniture and accessories and this is a great opportunity for all to reach out and connect.
Launched earlier this year at Design Indaba 2019 held in Cape Town, the Ikea Överallt collection was given a global roll-out and Ikea says that this collection, "will encourage more people to share stories, spend time together and be creative."
Ravi Naidoo of Design Indaba explained that "Ikea were very interested in what was happening here in Africa and wanted to capture this in some way." A collaboration was definitely on the cards and who better to work with than designers in Africa. The concept behind the Överallt collection is not just about furniture, it went further than that and Ikea wanted to talk to great thinkers, designers willing to take rises to express themselves.
Wanting to design a proudly South African textiles, Sindiso Khumalo and Renee Rossouw worked with Ikea designers to create bold textiles for the Överallt collection. Based in Cape Town, these young designers proposed an artwork featuring their favourite animal, the African elephant. "It’s such a beautiful and intelligent animal that really knows how to care for its young ones," said architect and artist, Renee.
