Hosting a Guest

“Hosting a Guest“ is a situation which has so far received little attention in product and furniture design, in spite of the fact that planned or unplanned visits from guests are a frequent event in people’s lives. We all know the problem of having to put up guests on the living room sofa or on a camping mat because we don’t have the facilities for setting up an extra bed. This very hospitality problem was the theme of a joint project between the Industrial Design department of the Hochschule für Gestaltung und Kunst, Zurich and Napier University, Design Futures in Edinburgh.
Under the guidance of lecturers Susanne Marti, Robert Wettstein (Zurich) and Tara Sze-Pei Lee and Ian Lambert (Edinburgh) solutions were devised which not only work in normal everyday circumstances, but can also be offered to guests as a gesture of hospitality and appreciation and will at the same time help them to feel at home.