Industry and design: more than 20 companies and creatives will transform national furniture in the Argentine Furniture Laboratory 2026
The ecosystem of national wood design and production accelerates its progress. After a federal call that mobilized applicants from various parts of the country, the Argentine Federation of the Wood and Related Industries (FAIMA) and the Argentine Furniture Institute (IMA) made official the list of companies, workshops and studios selected to star in the 2026 edition of the Argentine Furniture Laboratory. Over the next few months, this strategic conglomerate of actors will work collaboratively on the conceptualization, development and materialization of new pieces, commercial lines and corporate and residential equipment systems.
The program places its axis on technological innovation, functional optimization, commercial competitiveness and the consolidation of an aesthetic identity with an Argentine seal. The initiative is positioned as the most dynamic articulation space in the sector, linking in an unprecedented way family SMEs, serial scale industries, artisan workshops and work cooperatives. A space for experimentation with diversity of scales The 2026 edition of the Laboratory reflects the heterogeneity of the furniture value chain in the country. The program manages to bring companies with more than half a century of industrial experience and young designer design studios to the same experimental table; as well as firms with an export profile and cooperatives of the popular economy led by women carpenters, using wood as a common language and vector of development. The most valuable thing about the Laboratory is precisely this ability to bring together completely different perspectives, experiences and scales under the same objective: to develop products that represent the enormous creative and industrial potential that Argentine furniture has today, highlighted Pablo Bercovich, FAIMA advisor at the IMA and general coordinator of the laboratory. The training and production path includes a rigorous schedule that covers stages of technical diagnosis, conceptualization of lines, industrial design, development of plans and final prototyping. Throughout this process, those selected will have the support of specialized mentoring and will participate in rounds of technical and commercial exchange to validate their projects. The material result of this process of applied innovation will have its international showcase from September 24 to 27 at the Argentine Wood and Furniture Fair, the summit event of the wood industry that this year will move to the La Rural de Palermo fairgrounds, in the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires. Aires.In this framework, the finished prototypes will be exclusively exhibited in front of wholesale buyers, architects, real estate developers and the general public.The Laboratory seeks to promote a new generation of products and brands capable of combining design, innovation, competitiveness and added value. But it also seeks to strengthen its own identity for Argentine furniture, connecting industry, creativity and federal production, Bercovich concluded. The richness of this years list combines large-scale firms such as Blangino, a Córdoba firm with six decades of experience in the market, along with expressions of the social economy such as the CO.NU.CA cooperative of the San Fernando district (Buenos Aires), made up mostly of women carpenters, in addition to consolidated studios in interior design, custom furniture and commercial architecture.
