HIX 2025

He not busy being born is busy dying.

Inspired by Dylan’s lyrics, our installation at HIX 2025 celebrates transformation, the fusion of ideas and the value of the creative process.

Here is a rallying cry for progress over stagnation, learning and developing, pushing forward and constantly innovating to challenge what’s possible. 

The fusion of ideas and different perspectives results in something stronger, richer, new and unified. There’s a value in pushing boundaries, embracing the tension of different approaches to creativity and artistic expression and leaning into a culture clash - there’s always a sense in trying. 

It’s energy from opposition, collaboration from contradiction and invention born from tension. Rebelling against sterile purity, revealing potential and celebrating possibility - what else can you show me?

HIX2025: Culture clash

We’ve written before about our creative inspirations, and how collaboration is key to what we do. That’s still true, and is a mainstay of how we work, but the culture clash is just as important. We love a challenge, looking at things from a different perspective and bringing new energy to the creative conversation.

Our installation is inspired by the lyrics of one of Bob Dylan’s most important songs - It’s Alright Ma (I’m Only Bleeding). Dylan wasn’t afraid to challenge the status quo and to do his own thing. This song appeared on the 1965 album, Bringing It All Back Home, his first to feature electric instruments. The album marked Dylan’s transition from folk music to rock’n’roll - a huge creative change for the musician and one that was provocative, controversial and divisive.

One of the lines that stood out immediately to Sam is “He not busy being born is busy dying”. It’s also a call for progress over stagnation, learning and developing, pushing forward and constantly innovating to challenge what’s possible.

Over the years artists, musicians, writers and designers have shown the value in unexpected collaborations, juxtaposition and innovation. It’s about taking risks, being prepared to make mistakes and accepting that it won’t always be a comfortable or easy process.

"We are not here to do what has already been done.” - Robert Henri

When we recognise this culture clash as a positive, it allows us to do something different, and better - a dynamic, open and innovative approach to hospitality design is something to celebrate.

While music is the inspiration, furniture and hospitality design are at the heart of this project, drawing on our experience of working with hotel, bar and restaurant operators over two decades.

Design inspiration and furniture selection

The monochrome theme of the installation relates to the opposing positions in a culture clash - each side a reflection of the other. We draw inspiration and energy from this opposition - it’s the challenge to create something different and new.

One side of the installation uses finished pieces of furniture, selected for HIX 2025 in collaboration with design studio Bell & Swift, while the other side features unfinished bespoke pieces which were designed and created for the event. They are deliberately unsettling, provocative, uncomfortable - glue oozing from the joints of a chair, brash neon paint on raw foam cut to create an angular chair. The unfinished sofa reveals the unseen structure below a polished piece. There are possibilities in each, with the opportunity to create something different and better

Furniture selected:

- Celeste lounge - upholstered in Agua Mystique Titan Emerald
- Bombo with Rope pouf - upholstered in Agua Mystique Titan Honey
- Tube table - black base, porcelain top
- Woody lounge - upholstered in Agua Mystique Pegasus Pewter
- Kronos table - black base & Palladio Moro top

Conform / Disrupt

The centre of the installation features screens which project pairs of opposing words - chosen to represent the Culture Clash theme, and as prompts to provoke discussion and creative thought.

Each of the pairs is relevant to the creative process and invites discussion, debate and prompt conversation. A set of custom playing cards was created, using the same set of opposing words, along with a line for each designed to promote creative thought, challenge a conventional way of thinking and stimulate discussion. Reflecting the Dylan lyric, these cards help show ‘there’s always a sense in trying’.

From Render to Reality

As the concept for What Else Can You Show Me? took shape, the rendering process became an essential part of turning the installation from an idea into a fully resolved experience. Working closely with Bell & Swift, we developed a series of visual studies that explored the tension between the two sides of the installation, finished versus unfinished, refined versus raw. Early renders allowed us to test the monochrome palette, experiment with spatial layout and refine how the two opposing worlds would sit in deliberate friction with one another. As the visuals evolved, so did the narrative: the glue-seeping chair, the neon-cut foam, the exposed sofa structure all emerged through rounds of iterative sketching, 3D modelling and collaborative critique.

This back-and-forth, mirroring the very culture clash the installation celebrates, helped us distil the final design into something bold, provocative and cohesive. By the time the final renders were complete, we weren’t just illustrating a concept; we were defining the atmosphere, attitude and energy that visitors now encounter in the installation itself.