London Design Festival

London Design Festival, now in its fifteenth year, celebrates London as the design hub of the world

London Design Festival, now in its fifteenth year, celebrates London as the design hub of the world. With hundreds of events across the city that promote local and international talent there is plenty to see. Some of the team managed to visit some of the exciting exhibitions, events and installations that were on offer over this jam-packed period in the creative calendar. Here are our highlights:

Firstly, we headed down to see the stylish interiors, furnishings and lighting at Design Junction in Kings Cross. Before entering the exhibition, we were met with a beautiful pathway of grand-scale geometric gates. The installation, created by Adam Nathaniel Furman, is made of individual contemporary Turkish ceramic tiles, and its presence dominated Granary Square.

Next up, we headed down to South Kensington to the amazing Victoria and Albert museum. A labyrinth of innovate installations, performances, talks, tours and exhibitions; we could have easily spent 24 hours exploring the six floors and it’s winding corridors.

Our first destination was the contemporary dance piece, Slave/Master which merged cutting-edge robotics and interactive projection graphics alongside two dancers. The piece encourages us to think positively about the increasing role of robotics in our world and how we, as humans can coexist harmoniously with them.

Up on the third floor, passing through two blackout curtains, you find yourself immersed in The Reflection Room, a coloured light experience. We entered on the electric blue side of the room, and exited on the red through to a spectacular 21.3-metre-long free-standing three-dimensional tapestry.

Transmissions by Ross Lovegrove was inspired by the medieval tapestry that hangs permanently in the same room. Lovegrove’s work encourages the voyeur to look through the holes of the installation and view the old tapestry with a new perspective.

See images for other things we loved and our highlights from the V&A museum including Evocations, Metropolis and High Tide for Carmen.

We ended the week by visiting Burberry’s We Are Here: an exhibition of British photography – curated by Christopher Bailey in celebration of the September 2017 collection. The exhibition occupies rooms in the Palladian-style Old Sessions House in Clerkenwell and takes you on a journey of fashion, photography and installation. The distressed interiors of the building make the perfect backdrop for Burberry’s textural and bold trans-seasonal collection.