Macedonian ‘Ministry’ Sees Pleasure in Business of Design

The "Ministry" was promoted at Skopje Desigh Week | Photo by: SDW

A new body called the Ministry of Pleasure has been set up to unite creative designers with the business world.
 
Just as real ministries pledge to serve the people, the Ministry of Pleasure aims to help arts professionals bridge the gap between their world and the business community, which can finance and profit from their innovations.

If all goes well, the “Ministry”, first promoted at Skopje Design Week in late September, should get its own offices and start working within a few months.

The core idea is for it to be an international platform, showcasing the work of emerging and established artists, designers and architects.

The key organizations behind it are bodies already active in the field of culture, such as Public room, Plakart, parK and Poliplan.

The chosen “minister” has been named as Jasna Soptrajanova Vrteva.
 
“We asked ourselves: what value do foreigners instinctively recognize when they are here? We concluded it is pleasure,” Vrteva said, explaining that the custom in Macedonia is to hold business meetings in restaurants, in that way marrying pleasure and work.

The Ministry is continuing to search for new people and partner organizations.
 
“We are an open platform, conceptually and structurally. People have understood our idea and are getting involved,” Vrteva said.

The aim is to unite creative designers with the business world | Photo by: SDW

The focus now is on the design sector but will incorporate theatre, music and other fields of creativity in future.

Vrteva says they have already found one space to stage different cultural events and workshops, in Skopje’s Karposh district.

With a space donated by the municipality and financial aid from the Dutch embassy, they plan to make it a real cultural hub.

“The most remarkable and most useful technological solutions are created in centres like this, and then developed in the technological laboratories of the big companies,” she said.
 
Aleksandar Velinovski of Public Room, the lead organizer of SDW says that is one of the reasons why the focus was on Dutch design in the first edition of Skopje Design Week.

“Especially in Netherlands, where they have big brands such as Philips, the ideas that they’re developing have their root in these kinds of cores of creativeness”, he explains.

“That is why Dutch municipalities started to set up more such centres, not only as places for entertainment but as drivers of economic progress, he continued.

Vrteva said that in linking up with companies, they are not looking for sponsors in a classical way “to give money”.
 
The goal is to create products and designs that companies need, and which may benefit both sides.

"We can take an idea, reform it with creativity and bring it to a better level" | Photo by: SDW

“We can take an idea, reform it with creativity and bring it to a better level,” she said.

“Our artistic works can present the corporate ideas of companies in a better way, more creatively and more interestingly,” she added.
She hopes the ideas of the designers will then have the chance to become export products.

One interested entrepreneur is Mikle Spasovski, owner of the company Mondrian Europorc, an importer and wholesaler of household and hospitality industry kitchenware and home accessories.
 
His company is branching out into producing its own designs and marketing them across the region and beyond.

At a workshop he held in Skopje Design Week with young designers, he says some of them came up some excellent solutions that are ready to go straight onto the market.

“At events like this our country is presenting itself as big potential for design,” he said. “We have huge potential in this field. The platform is giving results, and I expect long term cooperation.”

Milos Curcin from SIEPA, Serbia’s Investment and Export Promotion Agency, was also in Skopje during the event, presenting his agency’s decision to support design as a strategic industry with the potential to promote their country as a brand.
 
As a result of his visit, Vrteva and her colleagues from Macedonia were invited by SIEPA to further cooperation.

Macedonian design students are also part of the project | Photo: by SDW

She says Macedonia’s government must now do its part. “We expect the government to understand that this is important as an economic opportunity, not just as cultural one,” she said.
 
Professor Tatjana Kandikjan, head of industrial design at the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering in Skopje, was coordinating the Creative Strategy workshop during Skopje Design Week. Her students also staged an exhibition during the event.

“We haven’t had this kind of attendance at our exhibitions so far. A lot of people from different professions saw the works of our students,” she recalled.

Kandikjan says her students learned a lot from the guests and from the foreign designers presenting their own works.

“Design is becoming popularized as a perspective business and as a field of creativity. This is a big motivation for future projects,” Kandikjan said.

Vanja Donceva, manager of Biro proekt, a company among the visitors at the design event, says all the exhibitors took original approaches.
 
“It is a big advantage for me as a visitor to find creativity, innovation and aesthetics in design all in one place,” she said.

“I’m especially impressed with the work of our colleagues from the Faculty of Mechanical engineering,” Donceva added.

She adds that as an architect, she recognizes the potential of cooperation with designers and sees the benefits as mutual.

The idea is to unlock domestic potential | Photo by: SDW

“With this kind of cooperation, together we can help boost both aesthetics and functionality. All that, packed in a product from Macedonia, will find great usage in our projects,” Donceva said.

She says that one of the Ministry of Pleasure’s goals should be to persuade local companies to abandon their current skepticism about domestic potential.

“If the interest in our companies grew to a higher level, the possibilities of development and cooperation through this kind of events could be important segment in the puzzle of creation and action,” Donceva said.

Marija Milosevska, a filigree design artist and member of the Macedonian artisan trade association, who was one of the artists to exhibit and make a craft presentation at the event, also feels inspired.

“I drew a lot of inspiration for new works. The workshops with big designer companies were a great opportunity to compare good and bad, and learn how to focus on how to express oneself through design,” Milosevska said.

For now she has to find buyers on the internet and through friends, but if the “ministry” takes off, she may be able to find new business partners more easily in future.

“I expect more of these kind of events to be organized soon, with more and more young designers and ideas,” she said.