The bustling halls of Maison&Objet, France’s leading trade fair dedicated to furniture and decoration, are as lively as ever. During these cold January days, the fair’s pavilions feel particularly welcoming. Small brands are enjoying their moment in the spotlight, while the big furniture players remain anchored in their showrooms in the city centre—a now well-established commercial strategy in both Paris and Milan. Ergo, it’s the smaller, independent ventures that invite visitors to discover what is often hard to find in stores, magazines and advertisements.

Maison&Objet, for its part, continues to excel in what many consider a distinctly French talent: combining marketing and promotion with flair. In the crowded forum hosting a succession of talks, experts from diverse backgrounds place emphasis on strategy, impact and results. There is also a strong focus on trends this year, inspired by Surrealism, recently celebrated at the Centre Pompidou in Paris with a monumental exhibition of the same name. The fair’s trend forecasters are on the same wavelength, inviting designers to use bold, dreamlike ideas as a vehicle to refresh both design and the market with imagination under the umbrella theme, Sur/Reality.

Appealing to a sense of wonder, and in some cases using harmless subversion of the status quo as a commercial lever, proves particularly effective for many companies specialising in home accessories, which are often free from the stricter functional requirements of furniture. The French studio Uchronia’s installation, showcased by Maison&Objet in the What’s New? In Hospitality section, reinterprets the surrealism of Breton and Dalí with a playful ‘flower power’ twist, channelling 1960s aesthetics through rounded forms and floral morphological references. Among the exhibitors, Seletti fully embraces this dynamic, pioneering the use of whimsical citations and grotesque synaesthesia to attract an audience seeking humorous statement pieces for their homes.

Taking a more philological approach to surrealism is the collection Les Objets Mouleversants by the brand Wouters & Hendrix, which includes a ceramic piece quoting iconic works such as Salvador Dalí's Mae West Lips Sofa. In the field of ceramics, the Italian brand Bosa explores animistic presence with Jaime Hayon’s new Fantasmiko clock, inspired by the shape of a friendly ghost, while Luca Nichetto’s Soft Blown porcelain lamp collection for the Spanish brand Lladró transforms air balloons into a playful and decorative motif.

Surrealism—understood as a subversion of the formal prerogatives established by furniture typologies—is also a defining element of the language that British designer Faye Toogood has cultivated over the years. Named Designer of the Year for this edition of the Maison&Objet, she presents Womanifesto!, an installation that serves as a thoughtfully curated meta-reflection on her professional and personal journey. Here, Toogood presents four interpretative keys—drawing, materiality, sculpture, and landscape—to delve into her body of work. At the same time, the title Womanifesto! boldly asserts the roles and attitudes women designers should confidently claim without hesitation.

In a conversation with STIR, Toogood herself expresses a gendered perspective on her work: a shift reflecting not only the evolution of her personal outlook but also a broader paradigm change which reflects a growing awareness of the role and potential of female designers in the industry. This shift—ironically at odds with the 'culturally neutered’ mindset recently championed by Zuckerberg, who has recently emphasised the role of masculine energy in business competitiveness—touches on the collective dimension of women's contributions to design.

Giulia Zappa: Your installation is titled Womanifesto! When did you first embrace and assert your identity as a female designer? How has this awareness contributed to the creation of a manifesto, and how do you envision it shaping your practice in the future?

Faye Toogood: Womanifesto! represents me opening up inside my unconscious brain. The reason I am doing that is because, after 20 years of working in design, I finally see a point in it. We’ve reached a moment where what women contribute as designers is being acknowledged and openly discussed in a way that wasn’t possible before. Twenty years ago, I wouldn’t have participated in any interviews about being a woman in design. I didn’t want gender to be part of the conversation or taken into account at all. Many designers I worked with at the time felt the same way. We sought an equal playing field, where gender simply wasn’t a factor. Now, I realise there were significant parts of my creativity that I held back. I avoided working in areas often labelled as ‘female disciplines’, such as decoration, textiles and ceramics. I deliberately hid this side of myself because I wanted to be taken seriously, which, at the time, meant focusing on heavy furniture and strong, geometric forms. I'm pleased to say that the world has evolved since then. While we haven’t reached full equality yet, there’s undeniable progress. However, I believe that unless we really shout and beat the drum for what women can do in design, we won’t reach a place where women can fully express themselves in the field.

Giulia: We often acknowledge that we stand on the shoulders of those who came before us. Which female designers from the past have had the greatest influence on you?

Faye: When I started working, some female architects were also creating furniture, but they weren’t solely furniture designers—they were recognised primarily as architects who also worked on furniture as part of their broader practice. Zaha Hadid, Patricia Urquiola, Amanda Levete and Paola Navone were some of the incredibly strong women I looked up to, creating amazing work. But, for them, furniture design was often a secondary or complementary aspect of what they were doing. Seeing their success gave me the courage to leap into furniture design myself. However, I soon realised there weren’t many women solely focused on furniture design. There were a few, but not many, which made the landscape feel quite different from what it is now. Beyond design, I also drew inspiration from the art world, as my background is in fine art rather than design. I looked to figures like Rachel Whiteread, Barbara Hepworth and even Richard Deacon—primarily British sculptors and British artists whose perspectives and ways of expressing themselves deeply inspired me. Their ability to see and shape the world through their work gave me the confidence to develop my voice and approach in furniture design.

Giulia: In your installation, you highlight that drawing, sculpture, materials and landscape form the essence of your design approach. Is there one of these elements that takes the lead or plays a more decisive role in your creative process?

Faye: These elements are completely integrated. While I’ve separated them in this installation to explain what they mean to me, in reality, they all work together seamlessly. Every space I design has a connection to sculpture, to the landscape and materials. And drawing, I mean the mark of my hand—my fingerprint, my expression, my signature, my paintbrush—is becoming increasingly important, also as a reaction to artificial intelligence—a sort of antidote to it. In the design world, we’ve moved beyond simply looking for solutions or the most industrial way to get from A to B. We've reached a point where AI could probably design a better chair than any of us. So, the question becomes: What can I offer? What does the design world truly need from me? I believe I can contribute by fostering a sense of connection to humanity—through expression, the handmade, the tactile, and the context of the landscape. It’s about creating designs that bring people closer to the natural world and connect them to the essence of place and materiality. We’re in the middle of a shift right now, and that excites me. It’s an opportunity to reimagine what design can be and what it should stand for in a rapidly changing world.

Giulia: You appear to have a deeply physical approach to craftsmanship while maintaining a seamless dialogue with the industry. How do you view the potential of this interplay between industry and craftsmanship in design today?

Faye: For me, it's absolutely essential to balance both sides of my creative process—what I think of as left brain and right brain, or art on one side and production on the other. The production side is all about research, rigour, discipline and constraint. I find it rewarding because it teaches me so much and exercises a structured part of my mind that I genuinely enjoy. On the other hand, the art side is about freedom, pushing boundaries and pure expression. For me, these two aspects—freedom and structure—are like light and dark; I need both to fully understand and appreciate each one.

I’m particularly excited about my recent work in production because I’ve achieved things I didn’t think were possible, especially with brands like Poltrona Frau. I’ve been able to push their boundaries in ways I doubt they would have embraced a few years ago. For example, I introduced softer, less rigid geometries—like leather that’s not perfectly tight but instead has a natural, almost ‘squidgy’ feel. With designs like that chair, it’s not just about aesthetics; it’s about how it makes you feel. This, for me, ties back to a distinctly feminine perspective. As women, we often feel deeply, care deeply and want to nurture—not just people but society and our environment. Improving the world isn’t always about solving engineering problems, fighting wars or creating disruption. It can also be about showing care, fostering connection and bringing a sense of humanity into our work. We need to embrace and showcase this side of ourselves because, as humans, we are capable of so much more than we often allow ourselves to express.

Giulia: You’ve been named Designer of the Year by Maison&Objet. How do you perceive the role of design fairs today in shaping visibility and fostering meaningful conversations within the industry?

Faye: The role of design fairs likely needs to change. Too often, people attend fairs passively, without fully seeking to understand what is being presented. Take this installation, for example—it’s not a set; it’s a statement, a point of view. Historically, fairs have held great value as cultural and creative barometers, providing context and insight into the world we inhabit. They helped the design community understand where we stand and how we might respond to it. I believe fairs could reclaim some of that relevance by offering more opportunities for reflection and critical engagement. This could be achieved through curated exhibitions or platforms that allow creatives to share their perspectives—what they envision for the future and what they believe is important now. The design world, I feel, is at risk of oversaturation. High-street home collections, while accessible, contribute to an unsustainable cycle where everyone believes they can have everything, all the time. This mindset is not sustainable—neither for the environment nor for the industry. We need to shift our focus back to creating pieces that endure, designed to last a lifetime rather than a fleeting season.

While Faye Toogood invites us to rethink consumption with restraint and conviction, other designers at Maison&Objet echo this ethos. The Berlin-based collective Matter of Course, founded in 2021 by 11 female designers, presents “long-lasting objects that blend passion, artistry, and uncompromising design ethics”. Similarly, the Japanese brand Before Vintage seeks to extend the lifecycle of products, offering items designed to become even more beautiful after a decade of use while pledging to reclaim them if no longer needed. Meanwhile, the Belgian brand When Objects Work unveils collections of tableware and home objects created by architects who share “a preoccupation with simple forms, usefulness and a timeless idiom”. These efforts towards object responsibility, in terms of materials, durability and relevance, are still far from representing the vast majority of exhibitors, who seem to channel their creative efforts into adapting ephemeral, trickle-down trends regardless of their long-lasting significance and impact in the market. Yet, they are indicative of an emerging plurality: a way of being, even before designing or selling, regarded by some as essential not only for achieving sustainability but also for attaining significance.