Dreams are important. Perhaps the world of dreams is the most enigmatic when it is woven in its inception years, which we call, teenage years. Time spent feeling all the freedom of the world, in its glaring recklessness and profuse promise of offering some of our greatest memories and worst heartbreaks. The teenage room, particularly, is that one space that we disrupt as much as we cherish it as sacred. An exhibition at the Danish Architecture Center (DAC) in Copenhagen captures the drama that unfolds within teenage rooms. Through vignettes that peek into the stories that unfold within these spaces to installations illustrating a teenage space crafted using new technologies, the showcase puts forth light on the power of ideas rather than practical solutions. Selfie backdrops, a bed of bio-based foam, a cosy setting made of reused fabric of festival tents, and a nostalgic offering of photographs documenting a series of teenage rooms, the exhibition is part experiential and part reflective.

Inaugurated on June 12, 2024, and coinciding with the ongoing 3daysofdesign, the exhibition has been developed by the Danish Architecture Center in collaboration with Barbara Marstrand, Our Shift, Natural Material Studio, and Krøyer-Sætter-Lassen. STIR connected with Pernille Stockmarr, Senior Curator of DAC, to find out more about the ensuing curation and the vision of the showcase.

The interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Zohra Khan: What inspired the choice of subject, which is a ‘teenage bedroom' in this case?

Pernille Stockmarr: Long before '3daysofdesign' launched their theme, 'Dare to Dream,' we were working on a curatorial idea around the teenage room and dreaming. Dreams are important because when we dream, we can reject all traditions and conventions, and we are open-minded. And who is better at doing that, than teenagers? They are in a transition state between childhood and adulthood where they push their boundaries and often enclose themselves to find their own identity. But they are also resources to find out how to deal with the world because they are early adapters. They look at things differently. And instead of seeing that there's a phase they have to pass, we can actually learn from them. So, the background is that we wanted to use dreams, and we wanted to use teenagers as a resource for innovative thinking.

Zohra: How would you say a typical Danish teenage room looks like?

Pernille: I don't think one can find a typical Danish teenage room because all teenagers create their rooms according to the way they want to be seen regarding their own identity. I think it's more globalised right now. Of course, there are preferences around the world but I think in terms of becoming a teenager, there are always different traditions. In Denmark, we have design everywhere, but looking at teenagers hasn't been something we have dealt with. We have done a lot about everyday life for families and for kids, especially how they can be playful or what they can learn better through good furniture design, but teenagers somehow have been in between. And I think for that reason, a typical Danish teenage room might look exactly like a lot of different teenage rooms around the world. So it's probably more into what kind of context you are living in more than it's typical Danish.

Zohra: Could you look back to your growing-up years and tell us what your room looked like? If you could compare it to some of the observations that you have gathered in the exhibition, how would you distinguish the two—your room to the current trends prevailing in teenage rooms today?

Pernille: I was just having a great talk with somebody who also reflected upon how the way we act as teenagers has changed during the last 50 years. I think one thing they have in common is grabbing things from around what interests you. But of course, if I look at how my teenage room looked, it was quite simple, compared to my friends’ which had a lot of posters, which I think was quite more normal.

On the other hand, what I had in my room was of course a bed, but I also had a table to do our homework and other work which is where I see the change today for teenagers. It's much more about having a bed, for example, that's a survey we did. Teenagers today don't think about furniture. Of course, they need it, but that's not the core. And I think the whole idea of this exhibition that is important to underscore is not to do a one-to-one about the teenage room in the future. It is actually to find out how we can get inspired by the way teenagers behave and find features which could be adapted into the way we create spaces in the future.

For example, it is to look at their open-mindedness towards eco-friendliness, reusability and upcycling. Instead of looking at how they have changed and how they are situated, it's the features of the teenage room that are at the centre of this exhibition. It's to create debates and discussions about if we could see teenagers as innovators and resources to get inspired by, we can change the way we inhabit or design or use spaces in the future.

Zohra: Ideas explored within the exhibition include the use of bio-textiles, experimentation around themes of fluidity and the intersection of the physical and the digital world. The presentation by Our Shift is particularly intriguing and draws from the preconception that teenage rooms are generally very messy. During the curatorial ideation, were there any specific cues given to the designers to build from?

Pernille: When we worked with them, we didn't say, ‘make a room which fulfils the theme and the features,' but it was more in dialogue. But before even going into a dialogue, we of course picked the designers because we could see that they might be able to come up with something radical or because they have been working with ideas that were quite related to what runs in the minds of teenagers today. Our Shift is a good example because they directly work with the reuse of leftover tents from festivals. Their whole activist agenda is to transform the fabric to create accessories, especially fashion, so the young become aware that the material can actually be recycled. When we gave them an open call to explore upcycling in a room, they came up with this idea about piling and using leftovers where they used duvets from, maybe, hotels, hospitals and of course tents to a lot extent.

So this cluttering that you are talking about is also visible in another part of the exhibition where we have photography that looks at the present teenage rooms through the lens of the theme ‘Recharge’. It resonates in many ways, i.e., recharge, both in terms of material and mental well-being, and of course, the digital aspect, because that's the base of the needs for many young teenagers today. So essentially we talked to the designers about what they were working with, what occupied their interests, and then created, in dialogue, the theme which they developed at the location.

Zohra: The opening essay for Barbara’s photo book by Mette Sandbye mentions, “We go hunting for signs in the pictures; we sense, feel and construct stories about the rooms’ inhabitants.” Could you perhaps elaborate on the signs she has mentioned here, and what role does the installation play in contributing to the exhibition?

Pernille: We have three installations and Barbara’s is her photo project, which is called Still Life of Teenagers. The whole idea of showing her work is to imagine and actually grasp the spirit of teenage rooms as we think of them or as we see them in private spaces enclosed for most of us, but that it also hides so many stories and narratives. Even though it's curated, the teenage room also looks much different than that, but she represents some kind of present, whereas the installations further down are features for the future. She saw a point of departure that opened up the teenage room and gave us insight that you can find narratives and stories about behaviours and preferences for teenagers, whereas other works go out in different directions and see them in a more radical, innovative way.

Zohra: Where do you see the larger value of this exhibition flowing into?

Pernille: Our mission with this exhibition is not to arrive at an answer that, ‘this is how it's going to be.’ The intention is rather actually to create rooms which will spark, inspire, and start reflections about how the future could be. It's much more an invitation to discuss and to debate.

Zohra: What do you anticipate would be the key takeaways for a teenager and an adult from Teenage Dreams? How do you think their experiences would differ?

Pernille: I think it's very interesting because we haven't seen it yet, so it's just my guess. I can tell you much more about that in two weeks. But learning from experience, I know that grownups and young people react very differently towards themes in our time. Somehow young people don't see the way others see things, say if something’s scary, or is to be distanced from, or if it is too new. They just adapt to it. So our hope and whole purpose is that we invite the young ones to become a part of this discussion. The whole purpose of this show is to create dialogues between grownups and creators and also to increase awareness for the young ones that it's important for them to take the lead. They are the creators of the future. So it's also some kind of reaching out, seeing them as a resource and not just a phase of life.

‘Teenage Dreams’ is on view from June 12, 2024 to January 05, 2025.

STIR navigates through key design districts, highlights and events of 3daysofdesign 2024. Tap here to know more.