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Home> Surface Design Show <Surface Design Show returns for 2025

Surface Design Show returns for 2025

Returning to London’s Business Design Centre next month, this year’s Surface Design Show will take place from the 4-6 February, with 180 exhibitors and thousands of visitors set to attend.

The show is somewhat unusual in the industry calendar in that unlike the major European tiling exhibitions, SDS plays host to a full range of surface materials, including concrete, wood, and many more. In this way, the show offers a valuable insight into how both ceramic tile and natural stone are performing as categories against their direct competitors in the surfaces market, particularly among architects and designers, who comprise the majority of the show’s attendees.

This year’s Surface Design Show has been organised around the theme of Creative Conscience, which show director Nickie West describes as: “The intersection of design trends, technological advancements, and sustainability will be celebrated in our 2025 edition. The theme focuses on the future of materials for the built environment driven by developments in technology, a heightened focus on sustainability, and a deeper understanding of human needs.”

The main event
As always, SDS 2025 has attracted a range of high-profile exhibitors from across both the tile and stone industries, including long-time fixtures at the show such as the Stone Federation, Tile of Spain and the Italian Trade Agency. Last year, Stone Federation brought the incredibly impressive Stone Tapestry installation to the show, which was designed to showcase “the beauty, sustainability and versatility of natural stone found in the United Kingdom,” and particularly focused on the use of stone in structural roles.

Tile of Spain, on the other hand, represents a range of Spanish tile manufacturers to the British market, showcasing the breadth and beauty of options available. Likewise, the Italian Trade Agency brings to the show a bevy of Italian stone producers, whose stunning marbles and granites are difficult to ignore as they tower over showgoers.

Beyond these larger industry bodies, many individual UK companies also exhibit, from suppliers like Grestec and Ionic Stone, to more niche players, such as Marmox, with its flexible Slicedstone product, and bespoke producer DC Custom Tiles.

Charity partner
Partnering once again with SDS, Furnishing Futures is a charity that creates fully furnished healing homes for women and children who have escaped domestic abuse and been given empty social housing, often even without flooring or white goods. According to the charity, “Furnishing Futures partner with the interiors industry to provide a sustainable solution to waste, enabling them to repurpose good quality ex-display, returns, props or donated furnishings to create beautiful, trauma-informed, fully furnished homes for women who are experiencing multiple disadvantages.”

SDS Awards 2025
Now in its 13th year, the Surface Design Awards will return for the 2025 show and are designed to “shine a spotlight on the industry’s most talented architects and designers and their use of materiality”. Last year’s awards saw over 160 entries hailing from 20 countries, with the Supreme Award Winner, Tarang, utilising a “terracotta brick tile arched vault structure”.

This year’s head judges are Jorge Mendez-Caceres, founding director of For Everyday Life and Tony Chambers, founder of TC & Friends for Interiors and ex editor in chief of Wallpaper. Mendez-Caceres will be heading up the exterior categories while Chambers will lead the interior selections. Once the shortlisted entries are selected from both the interior and exterior categories, the judges will come together to choose the Supreme Winner.

Added for 2025 is the Outstanding Contribution Award. According to the show’s organisers, this award is not judged but presented to a person who Surface Design Show recognises as having made an outstanding contribution to the design industry.

Join us!
If any of the above sounds interesting or enticing (and it ought to!) we highly recommend you register for free and attend the show any day from 4-6 February. As always, the teams behind TSJ and our sister magazine Contract Flooring Journal will be in attendance, and we may even have some news of our own at the show!
www.surfacedesignshow.com

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