For 30 years SUN, the International Exhibition of Outdoor Products. Design, Furnishing, Accessories – www.sungiosun. it – has been the world reference show for the outdoor pipeline, from the idea to the prototype, from the project to the product, from universities to companies, from design to the market. 2011 edition: 12 halls, a 90,000 sq. m. exhibiting surface, 700 exhibitors, 25,000 professional visitors from 56 Countries, 10 shows/events, 120 journalists, and more than 1,000 press articles. SUN. in co-operation with CarusoD’AngeliStudio, presents “SUN. LAB for a creative outdoor,” an international competition for young designers, a stepping stone for design talents (5th edition).

SUN.LAB is a free platform for research and experimentation that SUN organizes to encourage the emerging of new proposals, innovative design approaches, and new ways to conceive outdoor living. SUN.LAB 2012 will gather the best production of Italian and foreign designers under 35 years of age and of the students of the main international universities, capable to create experimental scenarios, brand new concepts, and projects not yet in production.
A showcase of prototypes and concepts expressing the growing wish to rediscover the pleasure of living in the open, the renewed approach to nature and to respect for the environment, the strong will to regain control of one’s time and spaces. The competition is aimed at displaying, during the days of the Show, product prototypes and concepts conceived by young outdoor design talents. An event that enjoys great media coverage and is intended to establish a link between creative minds and companies in the sector.

THE THEME
The theme for this edition is NATURE INSIDE. The suggested theme is aimed at inspiring a fertilization, cultivation, and hybridization between design and organic-inspired disciplines. This “translation” activity is offered as an opportunity to meditate about the relation between nature and artefacts.
The purpose is to provide to the public and to companies a key for interpretation inspired by nature (vegetal, mineral, animal) to create innovation and experimentation providing technical change, as well as new aesthetic concepts, lifestyles, needs, languages, and consumption models. The study of nature through the lens of design should then stimulate solutions to such crucial issues as defining the relation between form and function, morphological evolution, and sustainability. This kind of design is intended to create permanent or temporary, public (hotels, bathing establishments, parks and roads, shopping malls, etc.) or private (gardens, balconies, terraces, etc.) outdoor furnishing and accessories integrating nature or taking inspiration from nature at the different stages of the product’s life – conception, production, and/or use. The requested artefact should then be inspired by a natural element/principle in its look and/or function, or should contain a natural element in its structure or in the performance of its function.