‘Back in April 2010, a version of BLITZ SPIRIT took over with everyone coming together. Now, as then, the focus is on COMMUNITY’
Ten years ago, along with most of the design world, I was at the annual industry festival that is Milan’s Salone del Mobile, seeing the latest launches, chatting with clients, discovering new trends. Then a pesky volcano in the wilds of Iceland belched a massive cloud of ash into the atmosphere; all air travel was cancelled, we were stranded and everything took a turn for the rather odd. Naively, I always thought that would be the strangest thing to wreak havoc around the furniture fair – that was until this year…
We now find ourselves blighted by a global pandemic with Covid-19 taking lives and sending the world into shutdown. This year’s Salone has been postponed and our friends in Italy are bearing the brunt of the worst outbreak of the virus outside China. And here in the UK, we’re starting to see restrictions enforced as the situation in this country worsens.
Back in April 2010, a version of Blitz spirit took over with everyone coming together to help each other in any way they could. Now, as then, the focus on a sense of community and solidarity is the only way forward. For better or worse, we are quite literally, for the first time in recent years, all in this together. At a time when borders are closing and we’re being told to isolate, we need to be more open and unified than ever. Reach out with loving words, offer strength and courage. Don’t let the fear take over.
Given all that’s going on, it seems slightly trivial to point out the highlights of this issue, but I hope it gives you some relief from the sadness and anxiety billowing around us like another cloud of ash. Stay safe and I’ll leave you with a tweet I’ve just read by the great Stephen Fry:‘Until this thing is over, we’ve all got to be helpful, friendly and kind to each other, understood? Hatchets buried. Grievances forgotten. Disputes resolved. Feuds ended. Strangers smiled at. When the final whistle is blown, we can go back to being mean and beastly. Agreed?’