Clerkenwell Design Week 2013

22/5/12 Pictures by Ashley Bingham. Pictures taken at The Clerkenwell Design Week.

Now in its third highly successful year, Clerkenwell Design Week’s three-day annual festival has quickly become an eagerly anticipated event in the design industry calendar.

Architecture and Interiors photography by Jim Stephenson / clickclickjim

Founded in 2010, the event gathers Clerkenwell’s long-established design community together, celebrating the creative richness, social impact and its power for change within this unique part of London.

23/5/12 Picture by Ashley Bingham. Picture taken at the Clerkenwell Design Week 2012

After reaching record size in 2012, Clerkenwell Design Week  returns from 21-23 May showcasing over 239 brands from the UK and across the globe.

Architecture and Interiors photography by Jim Stephenson / clickclickjim

The resounding success of CDW 2012 was evident at the UK Event Awards, organised by The Drum, where CDW was recognised as being one of the best in Britain’s events industry – winning both Best Cultural Event and Best Festival for 2012.

Photo courtesy of Philip Vile

The name Clerkenwell comes from the Clerks’ Well in Farringdon Lane, where London parish clerks performed the famous Medieval Mystery Plays throughout the Middle Ages. Since the Industrial Revolution, the area has housed craft workshops, printers, clockmakers and jewellers.

Architecture and Interiors photography by Jim Stephenson / clickclickjim

Traditional crafts, such as printing and bookbinding still flourish, as do graphic designers. In the last two decades, Clerkenwell’s unique variety buildings have been transformed into central studio and workshop spaces, attracting an unprecedented concentration of architectural, design and creative practices.

23/5/12 Picture by Ashley Bingham. Picture taken at the Clerkenwell Design Week 2012

The global businesses that have made Clerkenwell their home have shaped the borough into the UK’s most important generator of creativity and innovation.

Photo courtesy of Philip Vile

Serving an infinite variety of other industries easily accessible from across London, Clerkenwell has become home to a plethora of new media agencies, graphic and interactive design studios and more than 200 architectural practices – more per square mile than anywhere else on the planet. In addition, Clerkenwell houses over 60 design showrooms including world leaders Vitra, Poltrona Frau, Flos and Moroso.

Architecture and Interiors photography by Jim Stephenson / clickclickjim

Next week, the festival will return to its familiar venues, with exhibitors at the Farmiloe Building including Pinch Design, Bark Furniture, Young and Norgate, Jennifer Newman Ltd, DeadGood Trading Ltd, Amtico and Material Lab.

Farmiloe Shed CDW 2012

The House of Detention and the Order of St John have also been confirmed with additional sites at key points across Clerkenwell.

Photo courtesy of Philip Vile

Last year over 35 showrooms successfully participated and are involved again this year, these include  Domus, Knoll, Moroso, The Poltrona Frau Group, Vitra and Porcelanosa, along with a number of showrooms new to the event including Kinnarps, Camira, .it and Connections.

CDW House of Detention. Photo courtesy of Philip Vile

There will also be a number of designers specialising in sustainable, recycled and salvaged furniture and design – who I will of course endeavour to single out in the coming week.

Photo courtesy of Philip Vile

‘Evolve or die’: Hendzel + Hunt at Green Week

Back in March of this year, Hendzel + Hunt hosted a spin off 24HR Design Challenge, open to students at London College of Communication, during the University’s Green Week. The range of events sought to champion intelligent and ethical creativity with a selection of workshops, exhibitions, screenings, lectures and design challenges taking place throughout the week.

The University’s annual Green Week is full of interesting ideas and innovative designs.

“A platform for showcasing current good practice, Green Week will see students, staff and guests collaborators utilize design and media thinking to unpick this year’s themes of waste, transport, consumption, biodiversity and water”.

This years theme was ‘evolve or die’ and the video shows the diverse results of the challenge. The video featured on Hendzel + Hunt’s website was created by Netta Peltola.

Reinventing Oriental Carpets: Golran at Milan’s Design Week

Golran reinterprets oriental carpets with a perfect mix between expert technique skills and sensitivity. It has taken a new contemporary turn with this new Kilim collection designed by BertJan Pot under the direction of Francesca Avossa Studio.

The new generation at Golran is driven by a contemporary approach that began several years ago. This approach aims to promote research, while also conveying a new company spirit.

A collaboration with the Francesca Avossa Studio two years ago allowed for a redesign of the brand. This led to the development of a new identity that would unite the various activities of the brand, and create a cohesive message in both publicity and collections.

After the revolutionary Carpet Reloaded collection, whose innovation has been the engine of the company’s repositioning, Golran decided to invest further in contemporary collections.

The first two collections designed by Isabella Sodi – “Memories” and “Shadows” – preceded the collaboration with the studio of Francesca Avossa; a former consultant for several companies, including as artistic director of the brand’s collections at Ligne Roset.

The new editorial line has been designed in harmony with the spirit of Golran: reminiscent of the East, with traditional and artisanal know-how, using a contemporary approach to décor and a particular style of transgression.

Around the World in 80 Chairs: Metal Pipe Chair, San Francisco CA

A chair made from old metal pipes and radiators in a shop in downtown San Francisco, California.

The Wingin’ It Floor Lamp: Pianos, Nuts and Bulbs

BRC Designs features modern studio built furniture by Benjamin Rollins Caldwell made from sustainable materials. Their latest pieces include the Wingin’ It Floor Lamp .

Wingin’ It Floor Lamp

Inspired by the numerous defunct pianos collecting dust at second hand stores and charity shops, Caldwell sought to use these piano parts as a material for his furniture.

Wingin’ It Floor Lamp close up

After creating the Korobeinski Chair and the Hammer Chair from the piano keys and the hammers, the Wingin’ It Collection incorporates the wood planks on the back end of the piano keys.

Wingin’ It Floor Lamp close up

The Wingin’ It Floor Lamp shows how versatile lighting structures can be, instead of a conventional single bulb and lampshade, several bulbs are wrapped around the wooden structure to emit a unique lighting effect. The lamp also uses 15 energy efficient LED bulbs, altogether consuming less energy than one 70 watt incandescent bulb.

Wingin’ It Floor Lamp

Each plank is attached to the other using wing nuts and bolts, and dubbed the Wingin’ It Collection which refers to not only the wing nuts used in the structure of the piece, but also the haphazard manner in which the whole collection is pieced together.

Wingin’ It Floor Lamp close up

Joost Gehem’s Transformation & Distribution Centre for Abandoned Household Items

The Eindhoven based designer, Joost Gehem, stumbled upon an eco-friendly design process almost by accident. While he had a long standing interest in recycling and sustainable life styles, he came across re-purposing materials from an unusual angle.

Joost Gehem stools

His research into recycling waste brought his attention to statistics affecting our society, such as the number of deaths, divorces, bankruptcies and the amount of elderly people needing to move to retirement homes. When he considered what may link these statistics, he came to an interesting conclusion – household items. These often tragic and life changing events often result in discarded or unwanted objects, as houses are sold or cleared out.

The original and end product

Joost started to wonder what happened to these objects and where they ended up. After searching the internet he realised he could obtain the entire contents of a house that people no longer wanted. Many of these unwanted objects were the result of deaths and divorce, but he was also interested in the people who simply wanted to change or update the interior of their homes.

He says:

“I could hardly believe how cheap a complete interior could be and how much of it you could obtain in this way. I began to see it as a material and I envisioned a little factory in my mind. What if I could create products out of this unwanted material. “

Close up bottom of the stool

He saw this material as almost a raw material that would be re-purposed and remoulded into a different form, changing its appearance and consistency to give it a new life cycle.

The upper mould

Pressing the stool

At first he was a little concerned about what the grieving friends or family think. Whether they would welcome the possibility that objects once belonging to their deceased friend or family member would be broken down into a pulp and be reused as a material to create a new product.

The mould

Tool

However after presenting his idea to the son of an elderly widower from whom he was buying the entire 1960s interior of a house, he realised that many people would welcome the reuse of these objects. Reshaping and transforming these old pieces of furniture and household items, gives them a new meaning and a new purpose when they have become obsolete.

Taking the top of stool out of the mould

Joost working on one of his stools, spinning it around.

Joost explains:

“So some people think it’s about recycling or up-cycling etc. I can’t disagree with that, but I did not start this process as an engineer, I’m not qualified to do that. I looked at the process from a different perspective, I focused on the powerful life events like death, divorce, etc. these things happen a lot all over the world. Most importantly I can relieve the ‘owner’ of the product in a considerate/air/appropriate way and create a new usable product ‘life cycle’. That’s my first priority.”

Joost believes in the importance of improving our lifestyle in general, changing the way we live and consume. His products not only provide a solution for unwanted objects resulting from a change of circumstances, but they also provide a way to gain value from something that has possibly been deemed to be worthless. By creating a new product he can change the aesthetics and the purpose of the product itself giving it an completely new lease of life. For more information visit the Transformation & Distribution Centre for Abandoned Household Items.