|I just visited the graduation show at the Dutch Design Week and was surprised to see a lot of design for design’s sake, like tea sets or stools by Asiatic students, and lots of lamps, drawn by children and translated into modern design or clever like the Eclipse made from a single sheet of metal (Sanne Schuurman). The project that I found most interesting was ‘Embrace Melancholy’. The story goes like this: Nowadays it’s as if constant happiness is what we should all aspire to. This leaves no room for other, more reflective states of being. In times gone by, those feelings were accepted as natural emotions, inherent to who we are. The designer did extensive research into past rituals and created objects that embrace feelings of melancholy. Graduation Cum Laude > Man and Leisure, Design Academy Eindhoven Design Nel Verbeke (with golden hair)