The R.E Edit

Casablanca’s first Morocco Design edition took place on 5–7 October 2026. Its programme gives us a set of names to follow: Hamza Kadiri’s L’Axe Invisible, Othmane Bengebara’s Irtah!, Hicham Lahlou’s SIGNATURES, and a presentation at Villa Sahrai including Sana Benzaitar and Verneo Studio.

For our coverage, the best starting point is one work and the decisions behind it: how a material is shaped, where a technique comes from, and what changes when a designer rethinks it.

Every February, 1-54 Contemporary African Art Fair takes over La Mamounia. Founded by Touria El Glaoui in 2013 and named for the 54 countries of Africa, the fair began in London and has held a Marrakech edition since 2018.

Laurence Leenaert arrived in Marrakech in 2013 with a sewing machine and started with leather bags. Today LRNCE, which she runs with Ayoub Boualam, works with a network of more than forty artisans on ceramics in Safi terracotta, woven textiles, furniture and art, and was named Decorex Africa’s Designer of the Year for 2026.

El Fenn means art, and the hotel lives up to the name: a cluster of restored riads near Djemaa el-Fna, painted in saturated colour and hung with a serious collection of contemporary work.

Climb to the roof for the Atlas at sunset, then go downstairs to the boutique, one of the best-edited shops in the city.

Rooms are each different, layered with tadelakt, vintage rugs and bold colour, and the courtyards are planted thickly enough to forget the medina outside. Non-guests can book the rooftop for lunch or a drink at sunset.

The name is a useful instruction. Before thinking about the finished plate, think about the ground, the growing season and the people tending it. Farmers brings that conversation into Guéliz through its partnership with Sanctuary Slimane, a permaculture farm outside Marrakech.

A glass of tea can look like a small thing. At 1112, it opens onto a much larger geography: regional habits, plants, vessels, family knowledge and the rituals through which people welcome one another.

There is a different kind of understanding that comes from making a dish yourself. Ingredients acquire a weight and a smell; a technique becomes a movement you can remember. At Lalla Zehra, the setting for that lesson is a farmhouse outside Marrakech, with a garden, an outdoor kitchen and a table waiting for the meal.

I went to PAD and Frieze in October with materials and making at the front of my mind. I was looking for the pieces that reward a closer look: a surface that changes with the light, an unexpected construction, or an object whose character is difficult to understand from a photograph.

A Mediterranean-influenced neighbourhood restaurant and listening bar. Vinyl plays through dinner, and at the weekend the evening turns into dancing.

What makes us want to go: the room is meant to change over a night, from the table to the late session.

I went to Field Study this July, on one of those heavy New York summer mornings when the city feels like it is holding its breath. From Grand Street there is almost nothing to see. The door belongs to Car Part Time, a collector car showroom, and the plain front gives very little away. Then you step inside and the temperature, the light and the pace all change at once.

Invisible Collection shows its designers in New York the way they are meant to be lived with: in rooms rather than on plinths. There are two addresses, and they could hardly be more different.