the brands of 2023

In 2023, Material Matters will showcase a curated mix of exhibitors to celebrate the importance of materials and their ability to shape our lives. The selection included global brands, makers, designers, manufacturers, and artists working in materials that ranged from recycled aluminium, clay, wood and glass to orange peel, roots and sugar.


Make Relief

  • Room 13.11



Make Relief is a multidisciplinary art & design studio created by Will Atkins. It showcases unique objects and artwork that combine traditional and contemporary manufacturing techniques – all of which is the result of constant experimentation with materials, fabrication processes and collaboration with other creative practitioners.

At the fair, the studio will be showing a range of furniture and art pieces that are made primarily from cork, showcasing the possibilities of this underappreciated material.

The KERF collection is a series of furniture pieces made entirely from cork, as part of an ongoing experimentation with sustainable materials in furniture-making. The dimensions are dictated by stock sheets of agglomerated cork, itself a by-product from the corking Industry in Portugal. Using simple cylindrical structures, the pieces are finished by wrapping a fluted cork sheet around the outside. The top surface of each stool, side table & coffee table is fully removable, allowing the top to be easily swapped for an alternative size, material or to be repaired/resurfaced.

It will also be showing new experiential pieces using cork blocks intended for use in the Orthopedic industry. These form the building blocks for some larger scale furniture items, finished with linseed based pigments.

Finally it will be showing some relief artworks, including the ANYWAY interactive wall based series which use geometric cork blocks aligned to a magnetic grid, allowing the artwork to be rearranged by the viewer into a range of unique compositions.

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