The Release Project initiative aimed for the development and implementation of a new production and distribution model using open source Creative Commons licences and the relationships that the user establishes with the product manufacturer. Its starting point were the items stored at The National Museum of Ethnography in Warsaw which inspired the designer – craftsman tandems. The design team approached the objects, normally kept in storage, with the intention of reviving and recalling them. As it turned out, the idea made the method deeply contemplative and expanded it by history, traditional technology and technique of sharing the developed visual values. Additional inspiration came from the attitude towards items demonstrated by the late curator and museologist, Piotr Szacki, who always accounted for the context of human touch – both of the artist and the user. The project became a story of how contemporary inspirations can be found in ethnography and tradition rather than suggested by trendsetters. Folk patterns, which used to be circulated in the form of folders, atlases and stencils, provided an impulse to use open source licences, while the transnational character of the folk style inclined the authors to seek the possibilities to apply their idea abroad. The promotion of the new production and distribution model took many years. In the hindsight the authors realise that setting the idea of locality and sustainable development had little chances of success in the years 2013–2016, when the concepts were not as popular as they are today. Maybe now, with the triumph of trends such as locality and social economy, the project stands a chance of recognition in the social space.
Keywords: creative commons, open source, craft, public domain, locality
