Architect lands V&A craft work

The Victoria & Albert Museum is unveiling its spring show, International Arts and Crafts, with exhibition design by architect Allies and Morrison.

The exhibition will be the UK’s most comprehensive look at the Arts and Crafts movement, with more than 300 objects on display, including textiles, stained glass, furniture, ceramics, metalwork, jewellery, books, architecture, photography, paintings and sculpture.

Allies and Morrison was appointed to design the exhibition space in February following a competitive pitch. It was tasked with creating display areas, elevations for the galleries and designs for showcases. The architectural practice is also producing all exhibition graphics that will feature on labels, panels and gallery guides.

A spokeswoman for the V&A says, ‘Allies and Morrison was issued with a design brief summarising the exhibition sections, objects and usual rules regarding the safe display of objects and work on the V&A site.’

The museum claims a highlight of the exhibition will be four specially created room sets, designed to show the importance of the Arts and Crafts home and interiors. There will be a Japanese room constructed through recently discovered objects displaying the work of Yanagi, Hamada and Kawai, leaders of the Japanese Mingei folk craft movement.

Other designers featured in the exhibition will include Charles Voysey, Charles Rennie Mackintosh and William Morris. The show opens on 17 March next year.