Babled : La Main Des Autres

A French designer now based in Lisbon, Emmanuel Babled (1967-) studied industrial design before realising that his vocation was not the mass production of plastic objects, but the creation of rare and precious functional objects, in close collaboration with master craftsmen practising their trade in clearly identified territories, where ancestral traditions and technical virtuosity continue to work miracles by escaping the iron law of standardisation.

Babled's creations draw on both his own talent as a designer and his rare ability to work with master craftsmen from all over the world, custodians of this collective knowledge that constitutes an intangible heritage of humanity. The convergence between conceptual originality and the use of cutting-edge technology, between local tradition and revolutionary innovation, reaches its peak in his 'limited editions', which breathe new life into ancient skills and precious materials such as marble.

This book offers a glimpse into the mind of the designer, into his thirty-year career, and behind-the-scenes, inaccessible to the public, where age-old manufacturing secrets are passed down from generation to generation.