CONTEMPORARY CERAMICS STARTS FROM MEMORY

From 17 to 19 November at CRAFT LAB at interihotel MAD26, eight proposals curated by Tachy Mora reinterpret ceramic tradition through design, experimentation and territory, for hotels and restaurants with an identity of their own

Contemporary ceramics is going through a moment of renewal in which tradition and modernity meet. Ancestral techniques, materials tied to place and knowledge handed down over generations are reread through design, technology and experimentation, producing languages that hold past and present together. This is the theme of Craft Lab, the space devoted to contemporary craft at interihotel MAD26, taking place from 17 to 19 November at IFEMA Madrid.

Under the title Desde la memoria: tradición y modernidad en la cerámica actual (From Memory: Tradition and Cutting Hedge in Contemporary Ceramics), and curated by journalist and independent curator Tachy Mora, Craft Lab explores how ceramics today finds new forms of expression starting from its cultural heritage and local context.

A laboratory for hospitality

Craft Lab is part of Interiors Living Lab, the AMBIT Living Spaces Cluster project that brings together several spaces for experimentation around hotel and restaurant design, spanning interior design, materials, craft and emerging technologies. AMBIT is the non-profit organisation, based in La Sénia (Tarragona) with offices in Barcelona and Madrid, that brings together more than 300 companies and institutions across the home and contract value chain, and it is also the organiser of interihotel. The fair, this year under the concept Creative Rebellion, expects more than 14,000 professionals, 350 exhibiting brands and over 200 speakers.

With this edition of Craft Lab, interihotel puts the spotlight on the role of craft in creating spaces able to convey identity and culture. Tradition is seen not as a static element of the past, but as a source of inspiration for new creative solutions and meaningful experiences. This matters particularly in hospitality, where craft materials, forms and techniques give spaces their uniqueness and create emotional bonds through shared references that speak to memory and the senses.

A hotel lobby, told through ceramics

Craft Lab symbolically recreates the lobby and lounge area of a hotel, with wall compositions, large-format pieces, lighting and tableware. The selected works combine different approaches: some stand out for their decorative and expressive character, others explore functional applications linked to lighting, cladding and gastronomy. All start from a knowledge of the craft to open up new possibilities.

Eight proposals between tradition and the contemporary

Tachy Mora, who specialises in the connections between design and craft, has chosen eight projects showing different ways of reinterpreting ceramic heritage, with a focus on a generation of makers who find in memory and craft knowledge a starting point for innovation.

From the Valencian ceramic tradition, buit. Valencia, a brand driven by designer Xavier Lledó, presents a large mural with the Yperfectas collection by CUAL Estudio. The installation combines art, architecture and craft in a three-dimensional composition that seems to dissolve gradually across the surface.

Artesania no prato, an initiative of the Fundación Pública Artesanía de Galicia, has explored since 2013 the collaboration between Galician craftspeople and gastronomy professionals. The project, awarded the Premio Nacional de Artesanía 2025 in the Promociona category for public bodies, has produced unique pieces and collections for the hospitality sector. Craft Lab shows a selection of work by Susana Anta, Barreiros Artesanía, Laura Delgado, Alberto Lista, Paula Ojea and Witchneeds, made for different chefs and restaurants.

Artist Nuria Blanco presents Banquete, a mural made of 36 hand-painted ceramic plates. Together they form a single image, but they can be taken down and used as tableware, blurring the line between everyday object and work of art.

Ceramica A Mano Alzada, led by Miguel Bartolomé and Cristina Serrano, offers a reinterpretation of the traditional ceramic lattice. A pattern historically built brick by brick becomes a pre-assembled stoneware module, easier to install and highly resistant for outdoor architectural use.

Ceramist Aniana Heras works on the relationship between sculpture, design and traditional craft techniques. Her creations, graphic and architectural in character, use the wheel, coil building and ceramic slabs to create structures with a futuristic look. At Craft Lab she presents a coil-built mural in dialogue with some of her decorative pieces.

Light is the focus of Pott Project, founded by Miguel Ángel García Belmonte and tied to the pottery tradition of Totana, in Murcia. Its lamps combine craft techniques and contemporary design, and light several areas of Craft Lab with the Caló, Conic, Nais, Okina and Totana models.

Risco Estudio, the project of ceramist and industrial designer Pablo Rodríguez, recovers the memory of traditional pottery from Buño, in Galicia, for creations that fuse art, design and craft and fit into interior design projects. The space includes one of its wall sculptures, lamps and large-format pieces.

The selection closes with todobarro, a Málaga-based brand founded by Pedro Rosa that combines craft production in Nasrid kilns with contemporary design collections inspired by the cultural heritage of its surroundings. For Craft Lab, the studio Leblume has created a large three-dimensional mural with the Vélez collection, inspired by the geometry of traditional architecture in the Axarquía -the easternmost region of the province of Málaga (Andalusia, Spain), with its capital in Vélez-Málaga- showing its compositional possibilities beyond its usual use in flooring and cladding.

The curator

Tachy Mora is a cultural journalist and independent curator specialising in design, architecture and craft. She has been writing since 1998 and contributes regularly to El País’s Sunday supplement and to Icon Design. In 2011, she published Artesanía Española de Vanguardia (Lunwerg), which led to an international touring exhibition. Her curatorial projects include Escenarios de un Futuro Cercano for the Centre del Carme in Valencia and the retrospective Héctor Serrano: El viaje entremedias, presented in 2025 at the Central de Diseño of Matadero Madrid and at Feria Hábitat Valencia.

Craft Lab, interihotel MAD26, IFEMA Madrid, 17-19 November 2026.