London Design Festival 2013 - 2/4

Kirsty Whyte_LDF13_Heals_DesignJunction_Design Museum (57)

Two days in to LONDON DESIGN FESTIVAL (LDF) 2013 and this year I wasn't exhibiting anything personally at 100% Design; but that didn't mean I escaped the stress setting up a display and covering myself in paint!

Made.com was representing at 100% Design; with a small selection of products from Simon Denzel's Lichen shelves to Steuart Padwicks Fonteyn Dresser.

A dab hand at designing the stand and painting it..not bad for a 7 day turnaround from being offered the space to set up!

100% Design 13–Setting up

LDF was firmly underway and so we're the evening events. Celebrating the newly refurbished Heals flagship store was event 1; and what a transformation. With a new layout and high end feel; it's lighter brighter and encourages you to discover all the floors.

All the items from the acclaimed Heals Discovers 2013 were on display. As well as Sebastian Cox, Matthew Elton and Ian Archer, Heals have collaborated with CASS and their third year graduates selecting their top three for customers to vote for.

There were also showcases in the window for their existing designers; its great to see Heals optimizing on their current design talent, they certainly know how to treat them as their Designer Dinner shows!

Plenty of Prosecco and designers to rub shoulders with; also some unusual musical drama from Silent Opera, David Irwin, certainly seems moved!

Tuesday was already here; next job taking French and Italian journalists around LDF pointing out trends, products and designers to promote the Brits abroad. First stop the Design Museums "The Future is Here" exhibition. Where the crowd sourced Love bird sofa for Made.com was featured alongside, 3D printers, modular housing and personalised lemon squeezers.

Up on the 3rd floor was a display from the Designers in Residence,below Objects – Identity parade.

Then onto the ever expanding DesignJunction at the old sorting office on New Oxford street; with a huge queue for entry despite the poring rain I knew it would be good!

Designjuntion was the most superior show of all LDF for me; especially at its size (competing with 100%, Tent and Decorex). With just a good mixture of established brand, small independents and new creative talent.

Farrow and Ball had a little instillation of their new 2014 colours, there was also a talk on Pattern & Colour in the Home; very informative, although my skirting board now needs painting!

Lighting |

Foldability’s new The Sonobe CollectionOrigami lights which creates complex and beautiful layering of tones of lights, emanating from the centre.

The modular lampshades of Apollo by International. Designed by Marc Bell and Robin Grasby, each piece is independent and can be mixed and matched to create a multitude of shapes. The instillation looked great.

Blown SW3 by & Tradition explores the shadows created by patterned glass.

Looming above this mini room set of carefully crafted maquettes is the Turned and Spun lamp by Magnus Long Studio.

Some modernised retro lampshades by Shepherd Wheel.

Homeware and Accessories |

Absolutely love these dinky anodized letter tidies by Gavin Coyle.

From VW+BS comes the Stilt collection, created from purple clay; a traditional Japanese teapot material.

The textured and faceted wood trend continues; I have my eye on one of these highly crafted vessels from the Experimenta range by The Andes House.

Wood and polished copper also runs though many projects, Studio Brava based in Chili use local resources of both materials. The design concept is so the inner and outer can either be used as one piece to save space or separated into to two.

Ali Miller had some of her new customised pieces on display, displayed by some eye-catching wallpaper in her signature style.

One of my highlights of all of LDF was the Patternity stand (I been an avid follower of the blog and Instagram for a few years now). Which had some beautiful striped ceramics, created in collaboration with Richard Brendon. one for the Christmas list.

Furniture |

Dare studio was out in force with a large stand and furniture for every room. New to the Stand was the Katakana dresser, with cleaver little mirror with hidden storage.

Barnard debuted with 4 brand new pieces.

Midcentury Modern has its own zone at the show, with multiple companies , I have blogged about before – lovely stuff indeed.

Modus Furniture presented the strongly named Norse Chair by Simon Pengelly, following the trend of wooden curved back feature chairs, they come in a selection of colours but I favour the wooden finish.

They also extended the successful Noughts and Crosses range by Michael Sodeau into completing tables.

Simon Pengelly was also busy with his own collection.

I liked the colours used on these funny little units by Dean Brown, Callum Brown and Namyoung An.

Another Country; have successfully moved away from their signature rounded leg furniture. Creating another original collection in the form of their new ‘Dining Table Three’ the tables trestle base is influenced from industrial furniture; so it can be used in commercial or domestic interiors.

The interactive Poke Stool by Kyuhyung Cho for Innermost, adds a nice bit of fun and colour, to a simple product.

And other things that caught my eye |

Brilliant courier backpack made from English Oak Bark Tanned Leather by Amble; tangible quality.

The Sorting office itself is a great space with some of them remnants from its past life still present.

Joy of Design exhibition featured photos by Barbara Chandler a best selling photographer and design and interiors journalist. The photos were for sale and the money raised will go towards Out of the Dark a furniture restoration workshop for disadvantaged young people.

Hi-tec 3D printing and crowd sourced design; you can’t escape it!

Not as hi-tech but highly skilled and made by hand, Brooks, the saddles are a piece of art, which could be mounted on a wall as well as sat on!

I originally spotted the Lovely Pigeon notepads in the Design museum, and I was pleased to discover the rest of the design collection was just as fantastic!

I had to make a little purchase of some Copper Triangles earrings – lush!