A dynamic design scene is bringing a fresh energy to this Canary Island

"Heading from the coast inland in Fuerteventura (a Canary Island) means traversing a landscape so arid it could be in southern Morocco. Withered stalks of agave rattle in the wind. The collapsed-soufflé shapes of long-exhausted volcanoes dominate the field of vision, their slopes coloured not the rich Bournville brown of Lanzarote 's hills, but speckled and stained in a painterly spectrum from ochre and orange to sandy brown and ashen grey."

"For centuries after its conquest by the Spanish in 1405, this Canary Island was poor in the harshest sense of the word. When, in 1924, writer and academic Miguel de Unamuno fell foul of the fascist regime of General Primo de Rivera, he was exiled to Fuerteventura, 62 miles off the coast of northwest Africa - a European outpost then considered miserable and remote, a cruel punishment."

Fuerteventura's interior features an arid, Morocco-like landscape of withered agave, wind-tattered palms, camel corrals and low volcanic walls. Long-exhausted volcanoes present collapsed-soufflé shapes in ochre, orange, sandy brown and ashen grey, while Betancuria appears as a modest oasis amid austere mountains. After the 1405 Spanish conquest the island endured centuries of poverty and population loss; in 1924 Miguel de Unamuno was exiled there and praised its climate. Twentieth-century developments — tourism, an airport and desalination plants — improved living standards and have made the island attractive to new waves of creative arrivals.

Read at CN Traveller