Fiona Abicare: Nuts and Berries

Part of Melbourne Design Week 2025: Design the world you want

Fiona Abicare: Nuts and Berries spans tableware, furniture, and sculpture, taking its inspiration from the Sydney School-an influential group of architects celebrated for their deep connection to the Australian landscape and a raw, minimalist approach to materials. With her signature multidisciplinary approach, Abicare reimagines everyday domestic forms through exceptional craftsmanship and collaborative partnerships. In Nuts and Berries, she pushes the boundaries of sculpture, fashion, and functional design, weaving together materiality, history, and desire in a way that speaks to contemporary life while honoring past legacies.

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Working through the expanded practice of sculpture, Abicare's projects are distinguished by their engagement with a range of fields such as fashion, interior design, and art history. From these various fields, different material histories, stylistic periods, influences and ideas are folded together in order to draw out correspondences. Operating at the intersection of art and design, the interdisciplinary approach in Abicare's practice allows for an expansive vision and examination of social environments, transposing meaning and effect to the psychological understanding and subject of sculpture.

Based on extensive material research and conceptual framing, Abicare's practice draws specific attention to the material qualities of objects and how an audience encounters their placement in space. She has developed an interest in artisanal craftsmanship both as a form of historical research within her practice and as a maker. This project, and its methodologies, continues Abicare's interest in the crafting of objects in order to  traverse  conventional contexts and boundaries of visual arts practice.

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Melbourne Design Week is Australia's largest and leading annual design festival and takes place from 15-25 May 2025.

Melbourne Design Week  is an initiative of the Victorian Government through Creative Victoria.