Greek National Tourism Organization stand

This year's International Book Fair at Thessaloniki had Travel as a theme. The Greek National Tourism Organization of course was asked to participate. Having had a good background history with them this year, we were selected to design their stand - and I did keep the look of the stand in line with our previous work for them in Europe.



They had an island stand, all sides were open. The "back" side was looking over the hall cafeteria, not a pretty sight. So I decided to place the storage room there and use the rest of the space for the other functions. The concept of the raining postcards was used again with great effect:this time I decided to add paper boats on the floor, supposedly made from book pages, to signify the travels that one can make simply by reading a book.



Again the curtains of floss strings were used on the long sides of the stand, making a light divide between the lounge area and the hall aisles. By using them at opposite sides and on different points, I managed to create the illusion from afar that the stand had the curtains all around it.



The need of a reception at the front was a bit overwhelming for the size and position of the stand, but we framed it with the olive trees in their big planters combined with literature holders, so it looked a bit better. Have in mind that the budget was really low for this and the time from getting the green light to the show opening was 5 days. That had to incorporate all material orders, printing the graphics and the actual set up.



I will be posting photos from this stand too as soon as they come in.

Hellenic Chamber of Hotels stand

Since I have no photos yet of this project, I will post the renderings. I did this last April in Athens, at the Tourism Panorama Exhibition, for the Hellenic Chamber of Hotels.



The stand was a bit difficult as it was like a wide corridor, front and back open and sides closed. Plus, it had a hall column near the back open side. This immediately fixed the position of the storage room. This is a view from above:



Having solved that, the rest was pretty easy as layout was concerned:they needed a reception area and a lounge area, so that was achieved with placing a divider near the front of the stand. The problem was the concept - how to present the Chamber to the visitors?



Since the exhibition takes place in the spring and is mainly focused on Greek visitors getting info for their vacations in the approaching summer (Greek are notoriously late at booking their holidays), we decided that the concept would be the sea. How to achieve that in the corridor?
I used the length of the stand to my advantage:on the long side, a series of tall panels was raised, each having a small flat screen at the front, punctuated by a bubble light fixture above it. All screens would show the same clip on a loop, sea waves gently crashing on the beach, with the appropriate sound as a background soundtrack to the stand, to make people feel relaxed and welcome. The floor below enforced this with a special inlaid showcase of sand and pebbles for the whole length of this installation:



The divider was covered on both sides with excellent graphics designed by my talented colleague Zoi Gazilla, that enveloped it with the sea and its symbols:dolphins, sea horses, ships etc. The lounge area was particularly enhanced with this . You felt like you were sitting on an island terrace in the Aegean Sea.



The client loved it and did not make a single change. We incorporated some tourism photographs in the graphics at the back of the stand and also the logo of the client combined with the sea graphic in a sign on the storage room walls, as I wanted to keep things a bit minimal. It worked well at the show too - even competitors gave me compliments for the stand!



When I get real photos of this, I will post them for comparison - although the renderings do look almost exactly like the finished product.

Cut - a hair salon!

Today I am happy to post the photos of the Cut hair salon, a project done by two young Greek architects, Elina Karanastasi and Sofia Vyzoviti: the matrix_g.sea team. Although they both tend to work more with urban design and architecture, they do side projects like this - lucky for us! The hair salon is in Larissa, one of the biggest cities of Greece and birthplace of Elina.



The key word for the design process was the proposed name for the hair salon, "Cut". The narrow rectangular space was wrapped in a plasterboard envelope and eleven movable synthetic leather panels interspersed inside it to simultaneously create the areas needed for the salon to work and at the same time unite the space into one. Horizontal and vertical lighting cuts signal a succession of functional units. The synthetic leather panels were cut in eleven different patterns that work with gravity and combine designed and random optical filtering.



The whole feel is sci-fi meets Vogue - Peter Lindbergh must do one of his famous alien photo shoots here soon!



Check their blog for more photos of this space and to see their work - the ladies are very talented!

Ecology starts at home: Healthy Child Healthy World

Once upon a time there was a loving couple who had a wonderful child, their life's blessing. When they lost her at age 5, fro ma rare form of cancer, after trying to cope with their enormous loss, they started wondering if they could do something to help other children avoid this fate. This is the way CHEC (Children's Health environmental Coalition) was founded in 1991 by Jim & Nancy Chuda and Olivia Newton-John, their dear friend and Colette's godmother. Since then many years have passed and lots of things have happened regarding making home a safe and healthy environment for children. CHEC is now called Healthy Child Health World, and continuous to help parents understand the world they bring their child into and how to make it a safer place environmentally. With a special focus at home and the dangers lurking in it for children's health, it strikes a sensitive chord into every parent's heart.



Their website is a wealth of information and knowledge about many things regarding the environment and children. It is separated into six main categories:



1. Food and nutrition



2. Baby care



3. Prevention



4. Non-Toxic and Natural Products



5. Hazards and Threats



6. Sustainability and Lifestyle



They even have a blog, which is a very interesting read. You can donate for their cause and enlist in their mail list to receive periodical updates by normal mail or e-mail. Your children will thank you for it.

All photos courtesy of Healthy Child Healthy World

Frame your plants:Teracrea's TV

Teracrea is an Italian company, with the mission to produce plants and nature into interior architecture. Their alternative pots and planters are innovative and have great design. They have invited a number of various designers to come up with "greenery that organizes the space around it".



TV is a wall frame that comes with a U section to hold soil and plants. made from rotationally moulded polyethylene, it can come with an optional internal fluorescent tube, becoming a light fixture too. It is designed by Fabio Bortolani.



Photos courtesy of Teracrea

Dirk Winkel: a star in the making?

Dirk Winkel is a young designer who just graduated from the University of the Arts, Berlin. His homage to the great icons of 20th century design as stackable, cheap, plastic objects, makes them even more desirable. Somebody snap up the rights for manufacturing!



From Design Milk.

For Amalia...

This one is for Amalia…

"Every patient has the right to being respected and maintaining his dignity."

(Greek law, article 47, L.2071/1992)

"Quacks should be the exception, you guys, not the norm…"

(Amalia Kalyvinou , 1977-2007)


Since the age of 8, Amalia Kalyvinou started having pains. Despite her numerous visits to doctors and several admissions to hospitals, no-one managed to diagnose her in time with the benign neurinoma of her lower extremity, which was the actual diagnosis at that point. 17 years later, Amalia was told that the neurinoma had transformed by then into a malignant tumour.

For the next 5 years, Amalia not only had to fight with the cancerous disease and amputation, but also with a corrupt Greek National Health System: it ignores (by choice) the ongoing patient-to-doctor bribery and insists on time-consuming bureaucratic methods and practices. Besides radiotherapy and chemotherapy, Amalia had to face the financial exploitation by doctors that stood opposite to rather than by her side. On top of her pain, she had to endure the greediness of private clinics and the exhaustingly long waiting queues of the health insurance system, in order to get legal approval for some ridiculously low financial compensation.

Amalia passed away on Friday, May the 25th, 2007. She was just 30 years old.

Before dying, she managed to document her experience and share it with us in her blog http://fakellaki.blogspot.com/. The promising literature graduate named in there each and every one of the doctors she had to bribe, praising at the same time the ones that honoured the Hippocratic Oath. Her testimony moved thousands of people that stood by her side all the way to the end.

"Amalia's main aim was to tell her story, so that she could awaken as many people and as many consciences as possible. She mainly wanted to show that there are ways to resist not only the self-regulation and authority of dishonest and heartless doctors, but also the bureaucrats of the Health System."

(Dikaia Tsavari & Georgia Kalyvinou – Amalia's mother & sister)

According to the Greek law, it is considered a major disciplinary offence for the doctors of the Greek National Health System to:

"Accept bonus and especially any compensation or property grant, for any medical service provided.”

Amalia Kalyvinou fought for things that are taken for granted in a modern European country. Unfortunately, this is not the case for Greece. Continuing Amalia’s effort where she left off, we protest in public and we demand:

* THE STATE TO TAKE IMMEDIATE ACTION TO STOP BRIBERY AND THE INEQUALITY BROUGHT IN THE TREATMENT OF PATIENTS.

* THE NATIONAL HEALTH COMMITTEE TO BE MORE FLEXIBLE SO AS PATIENTS STOP FALLING VICTIMS TO TIME-CONSUMING BUREAUCRATIC PROCESSES.

* THE DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH TO ENSURE STRICTER CONTROL ON THE RELATION OF DRUG COMPANIES – MEDICAL SERVICE.

* FULL UTILISIZATION OF CURRENTLY ABANDONED HOSPITAL INFRASTRUCTURE. CONTINUOUS AND COMPLETE SCIENTIFIC TRAINING & DEVELOPMENT FOR DOCTORS AND NURSES.

* CREATION OF A NATION-WIDE ELECTRONIC MEDICAL RECORD SYSTEM, TO SPEED UP PROMPT DIAGNOSIS AND TREATMENT

LET’S END THE HYPOCRISY OF THE ONES THAT GOVERN, WHO PREFER TO ALLOW DOCTORS TO BE BRIBED BY THEIR PATIENTS, INSTEAD OF PROVIDING THEM WITH A DECENT SALARY.

* NO MORE BRIBERY

* NO MORE BUREAUCRACY

* NO MORE LIES

WE DEMAND FREE AND EFFICACIOUS HEALTHCARE SERVICES FOR ALL.

Next time you’ll have to bribe a doctor, just don’t. Choose instead to make a donation. Amalia’s last wish was to contribute to the -under construction- Oncological Centre for Children. (Elpida foundation, tel no 0030210-7757153, email: info@elpida.org,
Bank accounts: National bank of Greece, account no 080/480898-36, Alphabank account no 152-002-002-000-515. Please remember to quote that your donation is “for Amalia”)

INTERNET MOVEMENT OF AMALIA’S FRIENDS

Video: This one is for Amalia... (English version on YouTube) - Watch it - spread it!