DIGITAL DAYS DESIGN BY - Florian Dach and Dimitri Zephir's favorite products

Graduates of the National School of Decorative Arts of Paris, Dimitri Zephir and Florian Dach founded their creative studio dach&zephir in 2016. Mixing fervour and poetry, their projects echo the thinking of Martinican poet Édouard Glissant and celebrate the urgent and necessary diversity of the world. For the duo, stories and History are starting points in design, acknowledging that objects are mediums for our minds, he believes in the statement that we can’t move forward without acknowledging the past and the History. The historic and cultural specificities of the territories which they explore are the ones that they suggest revealing and passing on trough the creation of objects. Since 2016, as a part of the studio research work, their project Éloj Kréyol that focuses on the lost histories of Martinica and Guadaloupe (French West Indies) through product design, visual essays and education programs, was featured at Operae independent design festival 2016 in Torino (Italy) and at Onomatopee Project Space in 2018 (The Netherlands). In 2018 the research is awarded the Création en cours grant issued by the French ministries of culture and education. In 2019, The second chapter of the research is published Éloj Kréyol—Field Essays 55.3 edited by Sophie Krier and channeled by Onomatopee. In 2020, Éloj Kréyol received the label « Fondation Mémoire pour l’Esclavage » opening a new step for this work about a decolonial vision of the creole history though a design process. In the French design area, the studio dach&zephir has received the followed distinctions: in 2014, dach&zephir won the emerging talent award by the brand Cinna and is selected as a Rising Talents by M&O. In 2017, the duo was selected by Lidewij Edelkoort and the Carpenters workshop Gallery in London as one of the fifteen emerging talents of European design with their work « La Gargoulette ». In 2019, he is selected by an international jury for Le French Design by VIA as one of the 100 designers who are sharing French design around the world. In 2020, dach&zephir is awarded the Prix special du Jury of the 35th Hyères fashion festival (cat. fashion accessories) with « Bijoux de tête » collection in collaboration with the textile researcher and designer Antonin Mongin. Their work has been exhibited at Maison&Objet Paris, VIA, MAD Paris and Grand Palais [FR], Carpenters Workshop Gallery [UK], Salon Satellite in Milan [IT], mudac – musée de design et d’arts appliqués contemporains [CH], Onomatopee gallery in Eindhoven [NL], Mémorial ACTe in Guadeloupe [FR], Reciprocity Design Liège [BE], CID au Grand-Hornu [BE], Operae design Festival Torino [IT], Shenzhen Museum of Contemporary Art [CH], Karimoku gallery [JP] and Gangju design Biennale [KR]. Today, faithful to their desire to promote history (and histories) and cultures, dach&zephir collaborate with various public and private institutions on design projects (commissions or research projects). They lead conferences and workshops where they share their vision of the profession with students in art and design schools.