Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Salvador Compañ. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Salvador, appreciate you joining us today. Learning the craft is often a unique journey from every creative – we’d love to hear about your journey and if knowing what you know now, you would have done anything differently to speed up the learning process.

Learning how to work with an artisan is also learning about their culture. The history of their craft often reveals a chapter of the history of our country.

An example of this is something that ironically happened to us in Campeche, the state we are from. We went to vist an artisan and her family in Becal, a small town dedicated to the making of various goods using jipi-japa palm fiber. Our fans are woven there.
During dinner they told us about the history of this palm tree (Carludovica palmata). It turns out is originally from Ecuador and arrived to Mexico from Guatemala. Since the XIXth century, the people of Becal, descendants of the ancient maya, have been using it to make “Panama” style hats.

It was a very unexpected finding because we assumed jipi-japa was a native plant. This story sounded like an example of an “early latin american globalization”.

So, purchasing artisanal goods is not simply buying a physical product, it is acquiring an object loaded with stories and also History.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

Lørdag & Søndag is a design studio based in Mexico City that works closely with master artisans from different regions of the country. For our pieces we mostly use a variety of natural fibers, but also other materials such as volcanic rock, wood, marble and leather.

What can society do to ensure an environment that’s helpful to artists and creatives?

People should become more aware of how mass produced semi-disposable goods affects the planet and the economy of some communities.
They are not used to paying for the real value of handmade items. This sadly also happens in our country, where there is such a rich artisan tradition.
Overall, society should really learn to take a “slow fashion” approach to other kinds of objects.

What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?

Having one of our designs unexpectedly become a local handicraft: Our BECAL Cero Fan began to be reproduced by other workshops in town and sold along many other more-traditional products.

Now tourists buy them without necessarily knowing about us and our original design, but thats just the organic way in which culture works. It is actually very flattering.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://lordagsondag.com
• Instagram: @lordagsondag

Image Credits

Alex Raduan