‘The secret garden’, Tile of Spain’s installation at Clerkenwell Design Week this year in London, designed by the architecture studio LA ERRERÍA, was conceived as a space where materials transcend their surface appearance to reveal their architectural dimension. Beyond the visible, Spanish ceramics find their true meaning in their ‘secret ingredient’: a craft grounded in respect – for origin, environment, people, ideas, and the client.
In the heart of London, within the hidden garden of the Order of St. John, this secret began to take shape. Ceramics, born and crafted in Spain, travelled like a germinated seed: assembled and ready to be transplanted, taking root once again at their destination, as if the garden itself extended its growth in the United Kingdom.
A contemporary vision of the garden as a space for contemplation
The space drew inspiration from ‘The Importance of Being Earnest’ by Oscar Wilde, one of the most iconic works of Victorian theatre. In Wilde’s play, the garden becomes a symbol of the 19th-century society: a stage of representation, status and artifice, where the natural and the apparent intertwine in a play of contradictions.
LA ERRERÍA challenges this reading by reverting its meaning, proposing a garden stripped of theatricality and turned into a place for observation, pause, and reflection – inviting visitors to look again, to slow down, and to uncover what remains hidden beneath the surface.
The intervention unfolded across four densely planted parterres evoking the four seasons. Within them, small pieces of sculptural furniture emerged as islands within the vegetation in the form of totems, tables, seats, and ceramic miniatures. Scattered like fragments throughout the garden, the pieces explored finishes, colours, and textures, creating a journey where material entered into dialogue with vegetation and light.
‘The secret garden’ presented itself as an invitation to look beyond the surface and uncover the intrinsic value of the material. More than an installation, it was a space for reflection on the ceramic process, understood not only as an aesthetic expression, but as a system of relationships where respect is always present – for the material, the place, and knowledge.
Jointly organised by IVACE International, Castellón’s Chamber of Commerce, and ASCER, the initiative featured the participation of 12 Tile of Spain brands: Adex, Cevica, Cifre Cerámica, Cristacer, Decocer, El Barco, Harmony, La Platera, Porcelanosa, STN Cerámica, UNDEFASA and WOW Design.
About LA ERRERÍA architecture studio
LA ERRERÍA is an architecture studio based in Alicante, founded in 2012 by Carlos Sánchez García and Luis Navarro Jover. Since its inception, the practice has developed a recognised trajectory through its sensitive architectural approach, deeply connected to territory, material memory and new ways of inhabiting space. Through residential, interior design and public space projects, the studio explores a Mediterranean architectural language defined by material honesty and the creation of open, light-filled spaces conceived as settings for environment, innovation and experience.
The studio was responsible for the Tile of Spain Installation at Milan’s Fuorisalone 2024 under the concept ‘House of Mirrors’ and has received several awards and honourable mentions at Tile of Spain Architecture and Interior Design Awards (organised annually by ASCER), as well as at the CRU Awards promoted by Castellón’s Provincial Council.
Photographs by Antonia Peña
