Tent London 2013

I'm really looking forward to showing my chandeliers at Tent during London design week. I've never done a trade fair before but I thought Tent London really exciting last year so I applied and happily got accepted. If I'd known my mum would have a stroke and my local council would launch aggressive eviction action against our 30 year old housing co-op this year I probably wouldn't have applied! But the show must go on as they say. I like to work flexibly making things up as I go along and changing them but with rigging the stand there wont be time so I've made a mock up of it in my studio to test everything out and save time on the day.

Tent doesn't have the corporate feel of 100% design, it's worth going to if you love great objects as there is a good cross section there so you're bound to find something that interests you. As you may have gathered from previous posts I'm not always enamoured with new design as I find so much of it gratuitous (I wish I felt more generous but some things don't need redesigning) but I spent most of the day there last year and really got into it. My 5 sq metres will be home from 19th-22nd September - come and say hello. Our co-op goes to court (again) before then, so fingers crossed our creative community survives Brixton's gentrification a while longer.

Tent

This one is almost finished - it was in progress here and going a bit Jules Verne..... you can see how it turns out if you come to Tent during Design week in September. Hall T1 Stand DO9. I thought this was possibly a change from slick product shots. I tend to like things a bit rough around the edges, think branding is overrated and get disappointed when people re-do their blogs so they look like a magazine. I'm not sure why this is; perhaps it's like preferring drawing to a finished painting - you can feel all the workings, the journey and struggle.

Cavaliero Finn Sale

I'll have 2 chandeliers in this showcase next weekend amongst a great selection of contemporary artists and designers. Have a look at all the designers on the Cavaliero Finn website.

Design Festival

Every year when it’s London Design week I develop an anti-design attitude and feel reluctant to go and see anything. I feel overwhelmed by the amount of products out there that we don’t need. Obviously my middle age has something to do with this, some things I see are not new and I’ve seen them done better before.

 Even though sustainability is a big aspect of design now, it’s often not so integral and seems stuck on somehow.
Who needs something to hang their mugs on really? And how can you beat the classic kitchen chair. Then there’s the rise of the ‘concept’, e.g. useless objects that are supposed to “question our perception of…” whatever – this presumes none of us do this already!
So, I forced myself to go to one design event – staying south of the river I went to Designers Block at the Bargehouse. I did like this chair and table by Hendzel & Hunt from their Made in Peckham collection. Piecing together salvaged items is a style I’ve heard Oliver Heath refer to as Patchwork Chic. Look up Andrew Holmes on Craft Councils Photostore to see how he has been doing it since the early 1980’s.
Re using objects really usefully really excites me. Shannon Denny’s blog; Give Me One Good Raisin often picks out the best of these.
Very soon I’ll do a post on a really inspiring young designer who I think you’ll find really impressive.