The Surreal and Sustainable Delights of Iceland’s DesignMarch Fair

Iceland is a place of polar extremes—but with its long and particularly harsh winter finally thawing, the creative class came out of hibernation to showcase their latest works for DesignMarch. The country’s preeminent annual design festival takes place all around Reykjavik, providing a vibrant platform for new Nordic perspectives with an emphasis on sustainability and connecting with nature. Combining elements of fashion, furniture, product, material, and experiential design, the week-long event is akin to a mini Fashion Week, Ted Talk, Art Basel, and Salone del Mobile cleverly rolled into one. With over 100 exhibitions and events, here are all the Scandi-style highlights from this year’s festival.  

Design

Interior and lifestyle brand FÓLK Reykjavik commissioned Studio Flétta to design a piece using materials from a local car part sale. Flétta co-founders Birta Ros Brynjolfsdottir and Hrefna Sigurdardottir were up to the challenge, zeroing in on airbags—which led to some fruitful pillow talk. The resulting upcycled pastel-colored poufs, filled with material waste from both outdoor brand 66 North and a mattress factory, are finished with zippy embroidery. Both durable and plush, the floor pillows are ideal for a children’s room, outdoor space, or yoga studio. 

Since going viral for her expressive masks, trippy textile designer Ýrúrarí now exhibits her surrealist mended knitwear works internationally. At DesignMarch this year, she partnered with Studio Flétta on a performance art “Pizza Time” pop-up, featuring pies made of leftovers from the Icelandic wool industry. A vertical felting machine plays the role of a pizza oven, while the trio of creatives decorated their one-of-a-kind wool delicacies with all the toppings. 

Elsewhere, Studio Hanna Whitehead exhibited Gentle Glow, a new collection of home objects made from materials sourced from the acclaimed multi-media artist’s own backyard in the southern Icelandic countryside. Ergo, grain straw was painstakingly tessellated to resemble a parquet pattern, while rainbow wool was boiled and shaped into wall tapestries and light fixtures. Whitehead also showed her signature interwoven clay vessels and candelabras in Scandi candy hues. 

Erla Dögg and Tryggvi, the Icelandic co-founders of award-winning Santa Monica-based design firm Minarc, held a swinging homecoming soiree. Quite literally: It was in honor of their new modernist co-creation, DROPi, a hand-crafted hanging chair that takes its form from a water droplet. A molded seat lends support, while a curtain of cascading textile softens ambient noise and provides a quiet nook to gently sway.

Finnish duo Marko Svart and Jarkko Kinnunen’s ceramics, wooden items, and clothing explore the transformational power of fire and boiling water, in what has become an ongoing experimental series. Entitled Yomigæri II, meaning “to rise from the dead” in Japanese, the nine works explore nine bygone techniques, using nine Icelandic natural materials such as mud, ash, and seashells—all inspired by the nine rooms of hell in Dante’s Inferno. A less fun fact: Hekla, one of Iceland's most active volcanoes, was considered to be the gateway to hell in medieval times. “We strongly reject modern consumerism, manufacturing, and material choices,” says Svart. “Our work strives to re-modernize ancient techniques into contemporary design.”

Fashion

Designer Hildur Yeoman may count Björk, Ashley Graham, Kehlani, and frequent wearer Amelia Dimoldenberg (of Chicken Shop Date) as fans, but her main muses will always be Icelandic party-hoppers who wear her painterly dresses and photo-real printed sets to get their groove on. She describes her spring 2023 collection, entitled Breeze, as “a journey to secret beaches and the endless summer nights here,” Yeoman said at her presentation, as models and clients alike danced in the rain to live music outside her flagship store. “We all get a little bit crazy over the summer in Iceland. With sunshine all night long, you never feel like going to bed.” 

Magnea Reykjavik knitwear designer and Central Saint Martins alumna Magnea Einarsdottir transformed the Exeter Hotel’s courtyard greenhouse into a colorful terrarium blooming with models clad in day-glo cardigans, peekaboo jumpers, and cozy Icelandic wool trench coats from her fall 2023 collection.

Icelandic menswear stalwart Kormákur og Skjöldur and contemporary label Farmer’s Market combined forces for a fashion show at the Listasafn national gallery space. Their latest complementary collections featured first-of-its-kind natty Icelandic tweeds and updated spins on outdoorsy Nordic knits.

Wellness and Beauty

It’s been well-documented that Icelanders take swim culture seriously. And for Erna Bergmann, founder of beloved local swimwear label Swimslow, it’s not enough to just be the Nordic answer to Eres with her refined suits. The designer, stylist, and avid sauna-to-sea swimmer debuted a new printed magazine The Swimslow Wellness Guide, filled with inspiration and intel on how to live one’s best life aquatic.

Cult-favorite fragrance founder and artist Andrea Maack released her latest scent just in time for the upcoming Midsomer festivities. Entitled Solstice, the extrait de parfum was made in collaboration with noted perfumer Julien Rasquinet. The scent evokes summer in a bottle, combining the juicy sweetness of watermelon with the refreshing notes of jasmine and violet flowers. Solstice is housed in Maack’s signature black custom bottle, printed with her original drawing in a limited-edition run of just four hundred.

Family-run perfumery and art collective Fischersund comes courtesy of Sigur Rós frontman Jónsi and his sisters Lilja, lngibjörg, and Sigurrós. At their moody downtown apothecary, they unveiled a new springtime scent composition Quarter To Five, which the musician likens to a song in fragrance form. “[It’s] something all Icelanders connect with,” Jónsi says. “Walking out of a loud, dark bar in the middle of the night, drunk, and the pure bright daylight blinds you. And as you stumble home in the peace and the quietness, you realize the beauty of it all.” 

The perfume’s hand painted vessels channel this lively spirit. And in order to capture authentic night-out notes, they actually distilled an old wooden barstool from Reykjavik nightlife institution Kaffibarinn.