From 26 July to 24 November, the waterfront city of Geelong will play host to an exhibition that celebrates the best of Australian design. Within the storied walls of the National Wool Museum, ‘Ten Years of Dowel Jones‘ will take visitors through a journey of the Dowel Jones story, paying homage to their penchant for the local with installations and collaborations that explore the magic of modern day craftsmanship.

Founded by university classmates Adam Lynch and Dale Hardiman, Dowel Jones is a collaboration that has grown from a small furniture studio to an international design house. Over the last decade, the duo have built a reputation for design that is defiantly democratic, and their staunchly unique pieces have swept awards and built a cult-like following across the globe.

On Australian shores, Dowel Jones are recognised for their commitment to local design and their proclivity for collaboration, where the creative process is just as integral as the end result. Their upcoming exhibition will put these collaborations centre stage, with the Museum Gallery set to be transformed into a house that places 10 of these pieces in-situ, elevating (as is the Dowel Jones way) the makers and collaborators alongside the Dowel Jones name.

One such collaboration is with GH Commercial, who are supporting the exhibition with custom flooring and a unique suspended carpet-art piece. As a house of market-leading brands distributing Godfrey Hirst, Feltex, and Mohawk Group flooring products, GH Commercial shares Dowel Jones’ commitment to local design and manufacturing, and sits alongside them as a champion of “Australian Made”.

Their collaboration across the exhibition will reach its crescendo with the hanging carpet, which is a continuation of the Dowel Jones’ ‘Never Grow Up’ bench, which is in the  National Gallery of Victoria permanent collection. In creating the work, Dowel Jones partnered with MoPA (Museum of Play and Art) over the month of January, 648 children drew self-portraits, which GH Commercial will bring to life with their world-class custom carpet technology, Designer Jet®.

Designer Jet® uses precision engineering to inject any pattern, drawing, or image into carpet, bringing even the most extraordinary designs to life. Offering unprecedented design flexibility, Designer Jet® allows designers and creators to embed purpose into a space, using carpet to evoke emotion, build a narrative, and create an evocative and moving experience for the end user. With virtually limitless colour and design capability, GH Commercial has enabled the Dowel Jones team to achieve their vision and create a piece that not only has artistic purpose, but will support a local charity once it is auctioned off at the exhibition’s conclusion.

“The use of the carpet within the space originated from producing the MoPA Portrait work,” says Dowel Jones co-founder Dale Hardiman. “GH Commercial offered an amazing process to print the 600+ hand drawn portraits from the kids of MoPA directly onto the 10 metre long roll of carpet. This collaboration also inspired us to print custom carpet for the flooring to really enhance and encapsulate the Dowel Jones experience and identity… and thankfully working with the GH Commercial team we’ve been able to bring that vision to life.”

From the colourful and dynamic to the thought-provoking and conceptual, the Dowel Jones name has become synonymous with authentic design that is ‘anything but ordinary’. Over the years, their pieces and creative process have been produced alongside local brands and makers that share this commitment to the unique and the extraordinary, creating a network of like-minded brands who together elevate Australian design onto a global stage.

At ‘Ten Years of Dowel Jones’, this ethos is put up in lights, where collaborative pieces and partnerships, like that with GH Commercial, are exhibited as an ode to design that pushes boundaries and expectations to redefine purpose, process, and craftsmanship for decades to come.

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‘Ten Years of Dowel Jones’ will be shown at the National Wool Museum in Geelong, Victoria from 26 July 2024 to 24 November 2024.