10 Years of Architonic: Part I
Scritto da Simon Keane-Cowell
Zürich, Svizzera
03.07.13
Architonic isn't just a virtual showcase of products and materials. It's an international community, made up of real people. This year sees ten years of Architonic, so we asked some of our valued members, partners and friends to say a few words about us and the role we've played in helping shape what they do and how they do it.
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We live in virtual times.
So heavily populated are our day-to-day lives with digital interactions and encounters, it’s easy to forget that behind it all lies something fundamentally analogue: people.
Serving 44,000 visitors daily, Architonic may have established itself as the leading curated online resource for architecture and design internationally, but it’s still people-powered, comprising a vast, passionate community of creative professionals, manufacturers, retailers and journalists, with a common belief in the value of quality products, projects and materials.
It’s ten years since Architonic first launched its innovative internet showcase of the best design and architecture has to offer – admittedly, a touch smaller than it is today – and, in all honesty, despite all the new products and services we’ve developed in the interim, one key thing hasn’t changed. Back then, as now, it’s all about relationships. In 2003, we relied on our personal networks and friends to get things started. Nowadays, even though that initial group of professionals has turned into a global community, we still believe it’s vital to meet up with our members and partners in person, spending time exchanging ideas, obtaining valuable feedback, and furthering business and creative relations.
That’s why you find an Architonic presence at almost every major design and building fair internationally, in addition to us organising numerous events, such as inspiring dinners and, of course, legendary parties, where we invite members and friends to get together and connect. It’s not unusual for us to hear how partners in a collaboration first met at one of our events.
So, Architonic’s tenth anniversary isn’t just our story. It really is your story, too.
To reflect this, Architonic’s Editor-in-Chief, Simon Keane-Cowell, has been roving with a cameraman, interviewing dozens of Architonic’s specially invited guests to its tenth-anniversary celebrations in Cologne, Milan, New York, Stockholm and Frankfurt, giving them the opportunity to talk about what Architonic means to them and what they’d like to wish us for the future.
Don’t just take our word for it. Literally.
