Designers including Marti Guixé, Alfredo Häberli and Sebastian Bergne have created interpretations of the pencil as part of the Lápis - Drawing Experience project.

Top image: Take a Line for a Walk by Alfredo Häberli - 3D sketch of a chair designed for Moroso, Italy. Above: Häberli's prototype as it arrived in the post. Below: Kitchen Pencil by Sebastian Bergne

Over 30 designers were asked to rethink the most basic creative tool – the wooden pencil - at the invitation of Portuguese designer Miguel Vieira Baptista.

These photos show the first pencils as they arrived at Baptista’s office. Above: pencil with a cigar-like label by Pierre Charpin. Below: Eat and Think by Marti Guixe - an edible pencil made of sweet wood and liquorice.

The first completed designs went on show at Loja da Atalaia, Santa Apolónia, Lisbon last month and the full collection will be the subject of an exhibition and catalogue later this year. Below: Breakable Pencil by Fabio Bortolani

A statement about the project follows:

--

Lápis - Drawing Experience
Lápis - Drawing Experience is a multi-author collection that aims to rethink the wooden pencil as an object and sign, by promoting a creative reflection on its universe and its connection to contemporary design.

Several designers from around the world were invited by the designer Miguel Vieira Baptista to contribute to this reflection on the wooden pencil’s form, matter and function. Through the prototypes created by the over 30 participating designers, the pencil arises as a multifunctional, tactile, rigorous, poetic, valuable, communicative or informative object, among other characteristics, showing to be a privileged vehicle for each designer to communicate his or her particular way of thinking and developing a project.

Alongside these prototypes, each designer was also invited to contribute with a hand drawing, revealing the importance of drawing for product design as a project-based discipline, both as a thinking tool and as a medium of communication.

First Arrivals is the first public showing of Lápis - Drawing Experience, assuming itself as an “in development" presentation of the collection. It will show around 20 of the first executed pencils, in an exhibition-installation at Loja da Atalaia, Santa Apolónia.

Participating Designers
Alfredo Häberli (CH)
Barber&Osgerby (UK)
Björn Dahlström (SE)
Daniel Caramelo (PT)
Ed Annink (NL)
Elder Monteiro (PT)
Fabio Bortolani (IT)
Fernando Brízio (PT)
Filipe Alarcão (PT)
Front (SE)
Harri Koskinen (FI)
Henrique Ralheta (PT)
James Irvine (UK)
Jasper Morrison (UK)
Joana Morais (PT)
Konstantin Grcic (DE)
Marco Sousa Santos (PT)
Marti Guixé (ES)
Martin Azúa (ES)
Miguel Vieira Baptista (PT)
Sebastian Bergne (UK)
Shin Azumi (JP)
Stefan Diez (DE)
Pedrita (PT)
Pedro Silva Dias (PT)
Pierre Charpin (FR)
Ronan & Erwan Bourollec (FR)
Tetê Knecht (BR)
Timo Salli (FI)
Tobias Wong (US)
Toni Grilo (PT)
Vogt+Weizenegger (DE)
Yves Béhar (US)

Partners
Ministério da Cultura - Instituto das Artes
Viarco - Indústria de Lápis
Loja da Atalaia