Iford Opera Festival material, by So Design and Charles Emerson

So Design Consultants has teamed up with fine art photographer Charles Emerson to create a selection of images for this year’s Ilford Opera Festival.

As the event is set in the Peto Garden at Ilford Manor, the focus of every image is flowers. Each chosen to symbolise the musical performance they represent, the flowers were plunged into water tanks and then mixed with inks, paints and other props to create mesmerising sets of images.

In one, hyacinths are shrouded in clouds of chalky pink; in another, the water tank is smashed to show cracked glass across the image. The work injects the traditional romantic notion of flowers with a strange and intriguing sense of eerie.