“Perfectly Imperfect”: London Design Week at Brompton Quarter
Studio Iron
Founded by make-up artist and designer Isamaya Ffrench (owner of the eponymous beauty brand, Ffrench), Studio Iron is a collective of artists, designers and makers bringing together some incredible talent. Wretched Flowers, the design studio founded by Loney Abrams and Johnny Stanish juxtaposes industrial materials with delicate detailing resulting in pieces such as its chainmail curtain, metal mesh lighting and spiky furniture. New York-based designer Kouros Maghsoudi is known for playful, sustainable postmodernist furniture inspired by Persian culture and New York hedonism. Designer Marten Herma Anderson creates avant-garde furniture and sculptural pieces. Panorammma is a furniture design studio renowned for experimental, industrial pieces like their signature chainmail chairs. CJ Aslan is an independent designer contributing raw, post-industrial metal chairs and functional art. Artisan Paul Coenen explores the limits of sheet metal processing and fabrication. Cruda is an experimental design laboratory transforming industrial scrap and rubber into highly tactile collectible objects. The iconic American interior designer Kelly Wearstler is also involved via her collaborative collection with stone experts ARCA (Kelly Wearstler x ARCA). As is RA Workshop – the furniture and sculpture practice of Dominican-American artist Rich Aybar, widely known for his subversive, witty rubber furniture. Other notable designers in the ecosystem include Andu Masebo, Completedworks, Gary Card, Jesse Butterfield, and Buchanan Studio.
Toast New Makers
The British fashion and lifestyle retailer presents five emerging international creatives working across ceramics, wood, natural materials and jewellery. London-based Jacob Marks crafts vessels and objects hand-cast from pine resin, a natural substance sourced from Portuguese pine, fir and cedar trees. Yuichi Romita, the Malmö-based ceramicist produces wheel-thrown tableware, left unglazed to honour the clay's natural character. Estonia-based jewellery maker Egle Silko creates distinctive sterling-silver pieces. Ceramicist Hannah Watts of Silo Studio uses the sgraffito technique to decorate her stoneware platters, forming striking geometric patterns across their surfaces and Linnan Ye, the San Francisco-based ceramic artist, illustrator and designer crafts distinctive, experiential tableware under her studio Neko.Co.Neko.
Homenkà: Our Parlour
An absolutely captivating immersive space that transports visitors into a home hosted by Ncheta Collective: four Igbo women whose practices span design, art direction, photography and food. The women have drawn on very personal references from their childhood in Nigeria to create this magical space. On the wall is a piece of art which turns out to be Nchọ, a contemporary version of a traditional Igbo strategy board game designed by Zoë Chinonso Ene. Curtains wafting in the breeze are printed with images of photographer Christina Nwabugo's own family, materialising as memories and hinting at the idea of one's ancestors watching over the family. The space also reveals the scents and sounds of creative director Chinasa Chukwu and plays host to a culinary programme by chef Ogochukwu Igwilo.
The Reading Room
Gallerist, designer and Brompton Design District curator Alex Tieghi-Walker (who has worked wonders at the Brompton Quarter and is largely credited for putting it on the design map) presents The Reading Room, an exhibition of furniture and objects by twelve queer artists and designers, presented in partnership with Tenderbooks.
The RCA Design Products Graduates: InResponse Exhibition
Graduates from the Royal College of Art's MA Design Products programme explore design as a response to the world around us. There's some mind-blowing innovations amongst the works here: including A Piece of Leather by Anisa Yelek: an adaptable carrying system of leather and straps that morphs from a handbag to a briefcase to poster carrier just by reconfigurating the straps.
A Veiled Boundary
London-based designer Jesse Butterfield, creates sculptural furniture and lighting exploring the relationship between materials. He is showcasing a new range of hammered steel stools alongside an exploration of paper lamps created in collaboration with the Paper Foundation, several of which were hand-sewn by the designer in-situ.
Byron Pritchard
The British designer, specialist joinery, and bespoke handcrafted furniture maker has transformed a garage in Cromwell Mews into a working studio with his team. Using only hand tools – axes, wedges, saws and chisels – they are making furniture from a single slab of wood without a preconceived concept of what they might be in an exploration of the design process.
On the Sunset, Which Is Only One by Rafael Prieto
Prieto is a multidisciplinary Mexican creator whose work blurs the lines between design, taste and hospitality. He is the creative director and co-founder of the branding, architecture and graphic design practice Savvy Studio, but is also a chocolatier and founder of Casa Bosques Chocolate: an experimental, small-batch artisanal chocolate brand. He's also somehow found the time to become hotelier and host at Casa Bosques Pensión, a private guest house located above his art-forward bookstore, Casa Bosques Books, in Mexico City. Here, the designer collaborates closely with the conceptual food artist and chef Laila Gohar for its onsite restaurant and bar, IDEAL. Gohar also makes an appearance in his private dining room at The Lavery (she made the bean sculpture in the room), which is a meditation on light, perception and perspective and, amongst the discoveries, features edible chocolate art of the walls.
"There's No Place Like It"
Designer and ceramicist Henry Holland curates the Royal Society of Sculptors' Summer Show titled There's No Place Like It at Dora House, which is a short walk from The Lavery on the Old Brompton Road. The show runs from 19th September to 28th November.
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