Paradiso fest: four days that redefined the way creatives come together and get inspired

What truly made Paradiso stand out was the retreat aspect of the event. There’s no denying that attending a design event can often be as much about seeing the talks as speaking and networking with fellow creatives – those you’ve followed the work of online for ages, but never had a chance to meet in real life. But with the tight schedules of such events, it can often be hard to find the time, without sacrificing a talk you were looking forward to. But, each day at Paradiso was an event for attendees, ranging from a breathtaking trip to a collection of cenotes (bodies of natural crystal blue water that are of ancient and cultural significance in Yucatán), a culinary tour of the local area of Mérida, and a QR code treasure hunt organised by the Costa Rican creative powerhouse Pupila, in which you had the chance to win a Craig Black artwork or a weeks spa retreat to Costa Rica (!). Side note: the latter was an enjoyable, yet stark reminder of the fact that British people, 40 degree heat, and non-stop running do not go hand in hand. Each morning, if you so wished, you could also join a run club round the local area before the sun got too scorching. That is, if you hadn’t had one too many margaritas the night before...

These activities provided a moment to chat, outside of the ‘work’ environment, a chance to connect on a level that wasn’t dictated by your professional title, or latest project. They were also a welcome reminder of childhood memories of organised fun, with coaches, life-jackets and group-lunches (but not a soggy sandwich in sight). This overarching sentiment was only confirmed by the festival’s founder Héctor Ayuso. In a short but sweet speech on the opening night (following a traditional Mayan ceremony and experimental laser show from Blit Studio) he professed that Paradiso is “like a big school trip”, before opening the floodgates to a seemingly never-ending flow of delicious tacos and cocktails – a proper introduction to the beautiful stone-walled, ex-oat mill event space, Salon Gallos.

You might wonder, if Paradiso really is so different, why does it still have talks? Well, they’re not your typical talk. The chairs that surrounded the ‘stage’ kind of felt more like a cafe or a bar, with people able to move seats and sit as they pleased. Some were even placed behind the speakers, allowing people to take in the talk while still soaking up the buzzing Sallon Gallos atmosphere. And, rather than running through a project, or talking about the technicalities of creative work, more often than not, speakers focused more on a broader idea, ethos or theory relevant to the speaker’s personal practice and relationship to creativity.

Take the Emmy award-winning director and designer Karin Fong’s talk, for example. Like many film-adjacent design lovers, Karin kicked things off by professing her love for openings; specifically, title sequences. But, Karin wanted to talk about its lesser appreciated sibling – the end crawl (more commonly known in the UK as end credits). What other industry, Karin asked, has a specific moment to celebrate every single person, from the main star to the driver? Then, turning things to the audience, Karin asked who would be featured on our end credits? The person who – although they may not know it – had an impact on your life. In doing so, Karin posited that even the most unassuming formats of creativity can be a useful tool for reflecting on and reevaluating our own lives, and those we encounter.

The artist, illustrator and children’s book author Oliver Jeffers, also drew upon how the personal and the creative intersect. He touched on his personal experiences growing up in Northern Ireland during the Troubles, mused on the present day with the Trump administration, and “slow erosion of community”, eventually suggesting that “we have a story problem”. Living in a society that “prioritises being right over being better”, Oliver powerfully proposed that it’s the role of artists to imagine and translate new ways of living and appreciating one another – one that puts community and togetherness first.

Some talks got interactive. Artist and filmmaker Ivan Cash explained how silent retreats have helped him to remove himself from the “noise” of the online world and how sitting with the “discomfort” that comes from them can help you grow creatively. Then, he gave the audience the chance to give it a try themselves. It was certainly the quietest Salon Gallos was over the whole four days…

Another thing Paradiso did brilliantly was getting people together on stage, but, rather than the formal panel talk, it was all about having a chat. The designer founder of Special Offer Brent David Freaney and designer Zipeng Zhu’s conversation felt more like watching a first date, with topics flying from what the other thought about the dating scene as a gay person in New York, to if Brent was tired of talking about Brat yet. His candid answer? No. In fact, he was actually grateful that he still gets to talk about it. Was there any colour theory involved in the making of that iconic green cover? Again, no – it “wasn’t ever really that serious”. But, interestingly, it was a conscious attempt to take green away from its “bastardisation” as a colour that simply denotes ‘organic’.

Things also got suitably personal during Ben Tallon, Timothy Goodman and Jessica Hische’s conversation about making personal work in a commercial work. They dug right back to the very thing that got them creating, with Jessica Hische’s humorous anecdote about being “the most oppressive friend you had” in middle school, resulting in friendships that were intense and fleeting. Eventually, she got people on side and became “more socially acceptable” in the way she knew best: “by drawing cool stuff”.

If there was one Paradiso didn’t do, it was to be restrictive, refusing to confine itself solely to the world of design and illustration. The writer, photography specialist and host of The Messy Truth podcast Gem Fletcher held two conversations with participants in the festival focused on one key question: What are the ten photographs that define your life? A photographic riff, as Gem described it, on the long-running radio programme, Desert Island Discs.

In the venue’s intimate cinema space, Gem first sat down with Karin Fong, whose ten images ranged from Robert Doisneau’s The Kiss, (the poster that was hanging on her college dorm wall) to Man Ray’s Le Violon d’Ingres (a homage to her love of puns both visual and written), and Gregory Crewdon’s Untitled Man in Car With Shed (the exaggerated lighting and dramatic staging of which Karin said reminded her of a film set).Later in the festival, Gem sat down with the designer, coder and educator Talia Cotton, who took a markedly different route to Karin. Rather than having any images from practising photographers, nearly all of Talia’s were taken by loved ones or herself – like an image of her pianist father, included to mark their shared love of music. This one opened up an interesting tangent: is coding and its many rules like music, with its many rules? But perhaps the most interesting was discovering Talia’s obsession with taking pictures out of her aeroplane window. Not of sunsets, or cloud formations, but the big metal beasts themselves. Gem’s conversations were an insightful take on the creative conversation – taking practitioners out of their ‘comfort zone’ and getting to hear in real-time how their brains appreciate other artforms.

Feeling suitably inspired, attendees could also sign up for workshops at Paradiso. The design studio Codea (who also created the festival’s brilliant identity) began theirs with a small debate about a big topic: copying and creative theft. They tasked attendees with choosing a name of someone at the festival at random, and creating a Paradiso festival poster in their ‘style’ using pens, card, paper, glue and scissors. Spending time with your chosen creative’s work and trying to break it down into ‘stealable’ parts raised interesting questions by the very act of doing: What really defines someone’s style? Can you ever truly ‘steal’ a style? Where does the line between inspiration end and theft begin?

At another workshop, Talia Cotton asked us to get into her mindset and to think like a coder. But, there were no computers allowed. Rather, Talia provided pens, paper and even dice in the second half, asking the attendees to think outside of the digital realm and to consider the human constructs of rules, restrictions and randomness and how they manifest in creative coding. The visual artist Anthony Burrill also took Paradiso into his personal practice, presenting each participant with a large set of contrasting words, asking us to come up with our own version of one of his iconic slogans, offering a helping hand along the way.

On the final day of the festival, the artist and animator Tala Schlossberg took us on a creative (and somewhat emotional) journey. Each member was tasked with taking a 30-minute walk around the block, creating something – anything – on their way. The results varied from stone rubbings, pylon lines being turned into typefaces, and even short pieces of creative writing, but what really struck was the stories behind each creation, and how differently everyone had approached the act of creation. In sum, if there were ever a better promotion for getting offline, returning to the analogue and expanding our mind beyond the screen, it was Paradiso’s selection of workshops.

As you can probably already tell, feeling spoiled for choice was something you had to come to accept over the four days, and if you simply felt like giving in to a wander around the venue, you also couldn’t escape some incredible displays of creativity. As Salon Gallos’ large steel door opened, you were met by a walkway lined with a collection of flags, part of Burn & Broad’s One World Flag, a rethinking of the national flag, as something instead a universal symbol of unity. Vivid and even more striking when tousled by the wind, the flags were a fitting starter of what lay ahead. The video and sound artist Yoshi Sodeoka’s screen-based exhibit The Swarm, r=θ was a transfixing depiction of flight paths versus bird paths versus graphic grids which proved hard to pull yourself away from; and Tina Touli’s wall-to-floor installation Voices in My Head, paired with the meditative soundscape of Lidia Scarlet felt like being immersed in the middle of an ever-changing lava lamp, providing a moment of calm, colourful captivation.

Some exhibitions needed further inspection, like Blit Studio’s interactive installation that by some incredible means turned photosynthesising plants into visuals – the beanbags nearby offered a good chance to sit while you marveled. While Vallée Duhamel’s purple-soaked exhibition was a mind-boggling exploration of the balance between perception, and reality. In true Mexican style, on the final night the massive, colourful cube piñata created by the artist and designer Timothy Goodman took centre stage, providing attendees a chance to let out their frustrations that the brilliant, inaugural year of Paradiso was now coming to an end.

Tickets for Paradiso 2026 are now available, you can purchase them here.