Its point of departure is the immediate present and the need to find an answer to the question of how refugees can become a more active and cohesive part of a collective society. Interaction between craftsmanship and design, intercultural expertise and shared knowledge enriches; it creates new working processes, new collaborations and new products. It is a driver of change. Cosmo has no permanent premises and instead creates synergies at various locations and workshops, providing refugees with opportunities to join the workforce as employees, entrepreneurs and business partners. It produces and markets its own objects and serves as a platform for sharing new possibilities, knowledge and experience. Its focus is on collaboration informed and inspired by personal histories and cultural origins. The aim is that this intercultural dialogue will contribute to a new sense of identity.

Cosmo’s first collection, Edition No.1 “Time to relight”, is a collaboration between the craftsman Bakary Darboe and the designers Lupo & Burtscher. The collaboration began by experimenting with potential woodworking techniques and by studying forms and colours typical of the Gambian craft tradition. The objects in the collection highlight the search for surface geometries obtained by clean cuts, chiselled cavities or with the woodworker’s plane. This first collection has been produced in collaboration with the workshop of carpenter Christian Mittendorfer and the wood turners Drechslerei Fritz and Benno Vinatzer.