Sourcing local materials, finishes and furniture has become de rigueur. But is it a priority? In today’s local design and manufacturing economy, what are the pros and cons of ‘keeping it local’? In this panel we ask Todd Hammond (Hammond Studio), Jean-Pierre Biasol (Biasol), Alice Nadja Sehovic (Architects EAT), Christian Hampson (Yerrabingin) and Djordje Dikic (Tint Paint) what is feeding growing consumer demand? And what are the opportunities and challenges that arise from building supply while keeping it local?
Speakers
Todd Hammond
Formerly the Practice Director of BVN Donavan Hill and Head of Interiors at Woods Bagot, Todd Hammond is one of Australia’s most highly regarded design leaders.
During his tenure at Woods Bagot, Hammond worked on the Paramount by The Office Space in Surry Hills which would later come to win the World Architecture Festival’s Best Commercial Office of 2016.
Hammond’s previous watershed projects also include Gilbert+Tobin at Barangaroo, Lobby design of The International Towers Barangaroo, as well as Herbert Smith Freehills, while at BVN Sydney.
Hammond’s design approach combines visionary practice, attention to detail and an ability to truly understand and deliver on each client’s brief, across a set of diverse sectors including workplace, hospitality, retail, education and health. This has lead him to launch his own practice, Hammond Studio, which will continue to bring high quality projects to the Australian market.
Jean-Pierre Biasol
Jean-Pierre Biasol is described as a natural to the language of design.
Founding multi-award winning Biasol Design Studio in 2012, the studio works locally and internationally across interiors, buildings, products and branded environments.
Driven by detail and quality, the studio works without divisions in a holistic and integrated mission for form and function.
Djordje (DJ) Dikic
Djordje (DJ) Dikic is an Australian entrepreneur, the Director and co-founder of colour technology company, Palette, and the CEO and co-founder of direct-to-consumer paint brand, Tint.
Palette is a design collective creating tools and technology that dissolve the barriers between real and digital color. Co-founded by DJ, along with Rocky Liang and Paul Peng in 2013, Palette are on a mission to develop, manufacture and evolve a variety of hardware devices across sectors, services and experiences.
Having spent almost ten years building technology to capture, visualise and digitise colour with Palette, DJ seized the chance to disrupt the paint market through technology, launching Tint in March 2020.
With a selection of 73 curated colours, Tint provides premium, vegan, eco-friendly and low toxicity paints directly to your door. Taking the pain out of buying paint, Tint are on a mission to make home renovations simple, rewarding and fun while providing a more sustainable, environmentally conscious product in captivating hues.
Tint are the creators of a custom colour-technology innovation, Pico. A portable colour-matching device, Pico allows consumers, designers and tradespeople to accurately scan any colour and capture it digitally via their smart device. They have also created the Tint app, which features an augmented reality colour visualisation tool and helps designers, brands and retailers analyse trends in colours based on scanned data.
With a background in product design and engineering, DJ’s extensive experience in hardware development, business growth, startups and consumer-led innovation make him an appealing speaker at Australian startup, business and technology events. He is passionate about colour and its emotional impact, product engineering, direct-to-consumer brands and disruptive business models.
Alice Nadja Sehovic
Alice Nadja is passionate about the design industry and the opportunities it presents to meet different people, and to create. An interior design graduate with Honours from RMIT, Alice is currently studying to become an architect.
Alice has always taken a holistic approach to design with architecture and interiors considered as one. Alice says, “I’m always thinking with an inside-out approach and I’ve been lucky enough to work with people who share the same values and have provided me with the opportunity to deliver projects across all stage.”
In her role at Architects EAT, Alice works all disciplines, but a large part of her experience lies in high-end residential design. It’s in this typology that her love for composition, materiality, lighting, custom furniture and joinery is pushed further. Going from the big picture to the details is also something that Alice is unafraid to get stuck into. “I love shifting scales, so working on a big build whilst simultaneously thinking about sofa legs and details,” she says.
A social and curious person, Alice is always keeping her eyes open and being an ambassador at Super Design is the perfect opportunity to be part of a wider conversation with the community.
Christian Hampson
Christian is a proud Woiwurrung and Maneroo Aboriginal man interweaving Indigenous tacit knowledge and collaborative design thinking to walk a new path, away from conventional approaches. Yerrabingin has launched the world’s first Indigenous rooftop farm in 2019, located high above Sydney on the roof of Yerrabingin House in South Eveleigh with over 2,500 Australian native plants.