Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: I'm Grant Pieris. I'm a co founder of Aven, which is a platform for the creative sector. I also run a marketing consulting agency called Pieris Agency and avid fan of the interior design sector.
[00:00:14] Speaker B: I'm Alex Dorley. I have run an interior design practice for the last 12 years. I am co founder of United in Design and co founder of Avon with Grant.
[00:00:31] Speaker A: The day after we launched, there was an email in our inbox at 8am from Sam saying, can you get involved? And we of course said, yes, we love decor X. We said to Sam, we have some ideas, but you can't clip our wings. You know, Alex and I came up with this concept where it was very much mimicking what we're doing at Avenue, which is about the community.
And so the concept is a seat at the table and essentially we have 70 different chairs in the bar around the table.
And the table represents the industry, the chairs represent all of us in the sector. We're all different, we all look at things differently and that's what all these different chairs represent.
I said to Alex, you know, this is a great concept we've landed on.
How are you going to turn this into a bar design?
[00:01:29] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. And the concept is so strong that we knew very early on that we wanted it to be a community space.
The design of the walls and the structure and all of that is set. And now we've set that. And the table itself, it's quite simple in its design. It's a huge table, one table, sort of in a.
Well, like a U shape, but with, you know, right angled corners.
Because often the tables in those spaces are individual tables or tables that seat, you know, four or six or what have you. And, you know, when you walk into those spaces and someone's at a table and you feel nervous to then go and join that table. So we said, no, one table, 70 chairs. The whole point is that it is different.
I've not wanted to put any kind of creative parameters on any of the makers that are working with us. We decided very early on as well that we weren't just going to use chairs from the brands that we know, suppliers that we know. We wanted to throw this out into the world, basically and say, this is our concept, this is what we're creating. If you are a maker, a brand, a supplier, a craftsperson, we would love you to submit a chair or a piece of art or a piece of sculpture that we would like to display in the space.
[00:02:59] Speaker A: And we partnered with London Craft Week and the Craft Council to get our Open call all the way across the country.
So we have people whose chairs are going to be in the room from Cornwall to the top of Scotland. It's very exciting, actually. And I think for interior designers who love to sit on a chair and test it out, we've got a lot of new makers, artisans, artists, fabric designers, marketer, sort of craftsmen, ceramicists who are making chairs. We've got weaving happening. There's all sorts of interesting things going on for you to come and have a look at.
Come and see, come and sit on, you know, for the whole week. And they sort of range from, you know, Mayfair gallery level to new Craftsman type type pieces. So it's going to be really exciting. That's really the heart of this is, is the discovery.
It's the discovery of something new and interesting. You know, we want you to come into that space and connect with other people and go and see these different chairs and talk to people about the chairs, sit on them, move around, you know, go and meet new people, have conversations with new people. But, but celebrate, celebrate those, those chairs and those designs. You know, when you design with concept first, it is a bit of a mind shift for a lot of people. A lot of people look at the aesthetics first and say, you know, this is, how does that work? How does this work? How does that work? But actually, design doesn't always have to be aesthetic. It could be intellectual, it can be conceptual, and that could be sometimes more interesting when you understand what's happening in the space and you start to understand the relationships between objects that actually shouldn't be together, but are together because of a reason, but a deeper reason, a more intellectual reason.
So it starts to challenge your thinking around design. And I'm hoping that it inspires some people to think differently about design and think actually there are other ways to hang a design together other than just aesthetic. You know, this is quite a challenge, obviously, because we've got 70 different chairs, lots of different makers, lots of artists, all in there, but set in a beautiful scheme, absolutely beautiful scheme. Alex has designed. You know, the point of this is to come in and look at those chairs, look at what those designers have done, those, those makers, those artists, some of which have commissioned and created those pieces bespoke for us. And when you walk into the room, I want you to think about community. I want you to think about the relationship between those chairs. What do you like? What don't you like? What's unexpected, what colors work together, what materials are working together, what feels good, what doesn't feel good, what do sharing with your friends. You know, I want you to think about design in a different way, but
[00:05:54] Speaker B: also just that the visual representation of difference, of collaboration, it underpins everything that AVEN is about. Because we set up this collective and platform, because we saw that these individuals within our sector were mainly operating within their verticals and silos and not coming together to interact or to network or to discuss challenging issues.
Not all come together to celebrate when things are going well.
And we are at that inflection point in our industry, I think at the moment where, you know, there's huge change. You know, if we look at AI and automation, it's sort of going like this. I mean, the curve is huge and we're already feeling that impact and people are craving human interaction. And we've had 18 months worth of conversations, actually, which is why we started aven.
So when you come into that space, you're going to see those beautiful pieces sitting next to one another, but you're also going to understand that without everybody that is involved in our industry coming together more, sitting next to the person that doesn't maybe do the same thing as them. But it's crucial that I know this person. It's crucial I have a relationship with them. Because across all of the interior design projects that we do, if you count up the amount of different disciplines that are involved to bring that together, it's huge.
But why are we not networking together? Why are we not talking together? Why are we not working out problems together? Why are we not, you know, interacting in that way? And so people will come in, they'll see the chairs and they'll say, I need to get out of this mindset of it's just us and it's just, you know, and I want. I want you people to sit next to. Oh, you're a contractor. Okay. What type of thing do you work on? Oh, you're a pm?
[00:08:01] Speaker A: Oh, God.
[00:08:01] Speaker B: You know, I have real issues with, like, getting a project manager on my project. Like, how can I potentially do that? You know, we want to encourage that and we want to encourage the people who maybe wouldn't necessarily come to Decorex, because they think it's very much for interior design to say, well, actually, there's a space here that is celebrating construction and is celebrating project management, is celebrating qss.
You are represented in these chairs as well.
[00:08:31] Speaker A: Media.
I mean, media, there's support companies, there's lawyers, bankers, insurance people.
All of these people. We can't do what we do without the breadth of these people. But there isn't a Space.
[00:08:45] Speaker B: We will be inviting all of those different types of people to that event.
[00:08:49] Speaker A: And we have the biggest gift, honestly, from a company called Williams and Yates, who are doing our logistics for us. And they're going to be collecting all our 70 chairs from across the country, storing those chairs, checking everything's okay, delivering them to decorex and taking them all back again as well afterwards. I mean, what an incredible company to do that. They do lots of work with interior design firms, sending things all around the world. And so I just think that, yeah, that was a real sort of gift, I think, from them, which we appreciate hugely, and I think everybody does as well, all the makers. But they also get an introduction to some wonderful people, which is super. So I think, yeah, I think there's a few people like that who are sort of stepping up and really helping us, which is amazing. Some still to be announced, but, yeah, it's really good.
[00:09:46] Speaker B: We don't have that very often. And so when you do have that opportunity, just embrace it and go for it.
[00:09:54] Speaker A: I would love them to buy a chair, because the chairs are going to be for sale, which is very exciting.
But also I want to see them speaking to people that they've not met before and making new connections. And I want to see on Instagram, in two weeks time, oh, I'm having a coffee meeting and tagging Aven, because we met at the Aven Bar. That's what I want to see. That's what we see from Aven events already. So we want to see that same camaraderie ship built over those four days.
[00:10:24] Speaker B: And we're also. We're signposting them to Avon as well, because the bar is a manifestation of everything that we are about and what the collective is about and about community and building. And we know that people visit decorex from not only all over this country, but from all over the world.
Now, for you to continue those conversations and for you to be able to continue working in a way that centers this new way of thinking.
This is the way the industry is moving forward, not just with Avon, but you can see it in language, you can see it in other events. You can see it in the way the people are showing up. The old model is absolutely dying out. And so if you want to continue those conversations and expand your network, we want you to join. We want you to be part of our membership. There will be opportunities for them to sign up to the membership in the space.
And that's important because then you're signposting that you are a business, a brand, a supplier, a maker, somebody that works in our industry that is committed to moving forward with our ethos, which is togetherness, kindness, progression, commercial thinking, because we need to make money. It's not a charity, but there's ways in which you can do that. And I think being a member of AVEN signals that you are a person that wants to progress in that way. So we would encourage everybody to come to the Avon Bar to meet really interesting people and to open your mind up to new collaborations and a wider community.
[00:12:07] Speaker A: Book your tickets now.
