We are all quite accustomed to digital filters outnumbering facts and noise drowning nuance in our everyday lives. To keep it real almost feels like a rebellion. Honesty, creative or personal, is as refreshing as it is essential. As contemporary design continues to shape and respond to a world in flux, this year's edition of 3daysofdesign, taking place from June 18 – 20, 2025, calls for a return to soul, substance and sincerity. The theme, Keep It Real, is less a slogan and more a state of being: an invitation to unmask, untangle and speak the truth, one authentic gesture at a time.
In an increasingly saturated design landscape, brands and makers alike are seeking ways to stand apart, more often not through spectacle, but through clarity, vulnerability and vision. "Keep It Real honours individual expression and experiences," says Signe Byrdal Terenziani, managing director of 3daysofdesign. "It's a call to action. A celebration of one-of-a-kind originals."
STIR shares a selection of global design brands choosing to 'keep it real' at 3daysofdesign, which opens today. Over these three days, whether through a renewed commitment to sustainability or a reverence for time-honoured craft or observing their creative journeys, these showcases are offering more than surface appeal, proffering responsible, honest design narratives in material, form and feeling.
Fredericia | Intersections
At the ongoing design event, mid-century icons meet future-minded forms in a three-part 'exploratory' exhibition exploring purposeful design's place in our personal and shared lives at the Fredericia showroom. For Intersections, The Everyday Gallery honours the intimacy of daily rituals, The Solutions Lab examines sustainable, collective futures, while The Rooftop becomes a space for community. Some key launches include the MK Bookcase System by Mogens Koch, Bench for Two by Nanna Ditzel, Complements by Tadaima x Fredericia, BM80 Mogensen Shaker Table Series by Børge Mogensen and Plan Wood Series by Barber Osgerby. The B Corp-certified brand reinforces its values with tactility, soul and longevity. "Clarity, good materials and humanity—as my grandfather envisioned—still shape everything we do," says Rasmus Graversen, CEO and third generation of the Graversen family that established the company in 1911.
Savo | Sit. Dot. Move.
Celebrating 80 years of movement-led design, Scandinavian brand Savo presents Sit. Dot. Move., a sensory journey through its legacy and future, staged at Framing, one of the festival's prime venues, and designed in collaboration with Copenhagen architecture studio Archival Studies. The design exhibition includes a tactile testing zone, product timeline spanning 80 years of innovation, an interactive Dot Hub and tactile chair-testing zone, apart from bold environmental pledges: among them, the 100-Year Chair (a flagship concept designed for long-term use, repairability and timeless appeal) and a roadmap to 100 per cent circularity by 2030 along with material transparency by 2027. It's the first time Savo's entire product range is shown at a design fair. "This isn't just a look back—it's a reset... It's a statement of intent," says Savo's CEO Craig Howarth. Equal parts retrospective and ambition, the showcase champions sustainable office seating that evolves with the way we live and work.
Agape hosted by File Under Pop
Agape's poetic mastery of space meets the vibrant material language of File Under Pop in a layered installation that redefines the bathroom as an architectural experience. At Frederiksgade, curated interiors highlight icons such as Patricia Urquiola's Cenote washbasin and the DR bathtub by Marcio Kogan, reimagined with hand-laid ceramic tiles. A dialogue unfolds between Agape and Agapecasa, anchored by Angelo Mangiarotti's timeless designs. Visitors are also invited to the Papirøen neighbourhood, where Agape's presence inside a townhouse-turned-sensory lab reveals how intimacy, form and function converge. The debut of Framing the Project, a visual homage to Mangiarotti, adds depth to Agape's enduring design narrative.
Garde Hvalsøe | Deltag
With Deltag (Danish for 'participate'), Garde Hvalsøe transforms its showroom into a living, breathing space where design is not just seen but felt. Curated by stylist Pernille Vest, the design installation channels the tactility of cafés and boutique hotels to honour presence, rhythm and connection. Featuring work by De La Espada, Neri & Hu and Manuel Aires Mateus, Deltag also unveils the Koshi-do Armoire, a Japanese-Nordic meditation on shadow, slats and stillness. "True craftsmanship is a universal language," notes the Danish company's CEO Søren Lundh Aagaard. Here, every gesture, from sitting to sipping tea, becomes part of the narrative presented. "For me, Deltag is about creating quiet moments of connection. A space where light, texture and materiality invite you to slow down, be present and become part of the space," relays Vest.
cc-tapis | Design / Dialogue and Other Circle
cc-tapis returns to Copenhagen with a dual presentation that stretches the boundary between rug and art. Exhibited at Design / Dialogue by Ark Journal, the Monograph collection by Destroyers/Builders founded by Linde Freya Tangelde debuts new tactile furniture designs inspired by paper collage, stitched together with sculptural rhythm in raw jute. Alongside, research-based and process-oriented studio Roberto Sironi's Hypercode collection weaves visual mythologies into jacquard. Meanwhile, Other Circle hosts two Grandma Patterns rugs by designer and illustrator Rop van Mierlo, blending woolly nostalgia with wild abstraction. "This is where design becomes dialogue," says cc-tapis art director Daniele Lora. Together, the showcases honour material storytelling—quiet, textural and defiantly analogue.
Bocci / 22 System | Smiley by India Mahdavi
What if even an electrical outlet could spark joy? With Smiley, Iranian-French architect and designer India Mahdavi and Omer Arbel (co-founder of Bocci and creator of 22 System), reimagine utility as delight, a playful reimagining of the humble electrical outlet, debuting their collaboration at Le Petit Voyeur, Copenhagen's most poetic bookshop. Anchored by a reinterpretation of Mahdavi's Oliver armchair with a fluorescent yellow faceplate designed to add a jolt of optimism and colour to any interior, the multisocket object at the annual design festival transforms the ordinary into an emotional artefact. "Smiley is about levity in the everyday," Mahdavi says. Set against shelves of rare books, it's a gentle disruption—a flash of optimism framed in domesticity. Hosted by Bocci's 22 System, the product design reminds us that even the smallest details can carry the heaviest dose of wonder.
Hem | Palma Pouf by Kusheda Mensah
For Hem's 10th anniversary, the independent brand introduces the Palma Pouf, a modular, paw-like seating series by British-born Ghanaian designer Kusheda Mensah, who makes her 3daysofdesign debut. First conceived as sculptural provocations for connection, Mensah's organically shaped ottomans are now reimagined for production, encouraging intimacy, informality and togetherness. "This is my vision board brought to life," Mensah explains. Configurable and expressive, each form nods to the body, inviting relaxed proximity and playful interaction. With finishes ranging from boucle to leather, Palma turns any space into a soft social stage, celebrating communal moments with tactile generosity and bold presence.
Potocco | Crafting New Design Narratives
Making its 3daysofdesign debut, Italian brand Potocco joins the White Label Project's Crafting New Design Narratives at Amaliegade 6. The installation is a symphony of sculptural softness and refined structure, led by Hanne Willmann's Jade series, which features curvaceous sofas, chair designs and a coffee table topped with orange fused glass. The display weaves together tactile elegance with thoughtful Italian craftsmanship, punctuated by standout pieces from Chiara Andreatti, Mario Ferrarini and Studio Omi Tahara. Indoors and out, from ash-framed lounges to mirror-shelved bookshelves, Potocco's presence at 3daysofdesign 2025 celebrates a language of harmony, materiality and movement between cultures.
USM | Reflecting Realities
For its first solo showcase at 3daysofdesign, Swiss brand USM unveils a mirrored installation that poetically reframes its modular design icons within the grand interiors of Frederiksgade 1. The immersive composition bridges the chrome precision of 1960s design with the building's 1880s elegance, blurring reflections of furniture, architecture and visitors alike. Marking the 60th anniversary of its Haller system, USM offers a preview of its Soft Panel innovation, adding tactility, pattern and playful reconfigurability to its timeless modules. A quiet spectacle that celebrates shifting lives, enduring design and the beauty of adaptable form.
AOT STUDIO | Homey
AOT, a small family–run design company, opens the doors to their private Copenhagen home for Homey, a tactile, personal showcase of new hand-crafted lamps including a table lamp, pendant light and a chandelier, made from recycled medical plastic. Born from a quiet, familial instinct to create, the studio merges sustainability with softness: organic forms shaped in-house using a self-invented casting method. Shimmering between translucence and opacity, each lamp design (made in Denmark) holds the memory of what it once was and the possibility of what it could become. Homey is a lived-in reflection of AOT's ethos: curious, imperfect and deeply human.
Moroso | New launches
At Paustian's storied showroom, the Italian furniture company stages 'a living, breathing journey' with craft, colour and conversation, where design is not an object, but an encounter. From Garcia Cumini's cocoon-like Me-Time seating system in striking floral Anemone upholstery to the vibrant, handwoven Shadowy seating sculpture by Tord Boontje in a new purple variant, each piece is underscored by introspection, ritual and reverie. Zanellato/Bortotto's Mangiafuoco glows with alchemical surprise, while Front Design's Lakelet table series shimmers like still water.
Molteni&C | Lia and Tibeau by GamFratesi
At 3daysofdesign 2025, Molteni&C debuts its first collaboration with Danish-Italian studio GamFratesi (of Stine Gam and Enrico Fratesi), at its Copenhagen Flagship Store, operated by INTERSTUDIO. Melding Scandinavian clarity with Mediterranean soul, the duo unveiled two pieces: the Lia armchair and Tibeau bed, both in elegant black oak and light fabric. Lia, with sabre-shaped armrests and a suspended seat, is "a fusion of tradition and modernity… a celebration of craftsmanship," says GamFratesi. Tibeau, defined by a bold, T-shaped headboard and brutalist lines or 'hints of a nearly tribal charm', embraces the tactile richness of wood and fabric. Both designs, first unveiled during Milan Design Week 2025, express GamFratesi's signature balance of conceptual depth and quiet elegance, connecting to "the historical legacy and strong craftsmanship of Molteni&C," as the brand relays.
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