London Design Festival Preview – The Southbank

The seemingly pervasive London Design Festival will be setting up another of its hotspots on the Southbank next week. 

Dense and populous, the area is expected to cram in some of the festival highlights.

The annually anticipated Size and Matter commission which pits a designer with a material or process has this year gone to David Chipperfield Architects for its Two Lines proposal.

Working with engineers and glass specialists from Arup, the architect is using a metal-coated fabric mesh layered between two pieces of glass to form an installation which will demonstrate the translucent and reflective properties of the material.

This will be explored through what organisers are calling ‘a sculptural dialogue between two identical forms.’

The installation will be on display from 17 September at the Royal Festival Hall.

Much of the LDF Southbank activity will take place at the Oxo Tower Wharf, where exhibition Creative Connections will launch Wagumi, a new collaborative product brand.

One of the exhibits brings together Tanei – makers of ancient Japanese sashiko fabric, used in Japanese martial arts clothing – with Liberty, to produce a tote bag featuring a Liberty designed lining and sashiko outer material. Other Wagumi colaborations are expected after the exhibition

Another exhibition, Choices, hosted in the Wharf’s Bargehouse, will look at black creativity across all design disciplines. Curated by the African-Caribbean Design Diaspora, more than 100 submissions are promised from the UK, Africa, the Caribbean, USA, Canada, Japan, and Europe. 

 The Oxo Tower Wharf is home to 26 designers, outside of the festival season and many of them will use the opportunity next week to showcase new collections, take commissions and sell wares.

Look out for Miranda Watkins’ collection of barware tabletop products and lighting designs at studio 2.11, and Teresa Collins’ in studio 2.10, showing drawings and paintings which have inspired her Little and Collins rug range.

For more information see http://www.londondesignfestival.com/

The London Design Festival runs from 17-25 September. See the Design Week blog for our previews of Brompton, Pimlico, 100% Design, Covent Garden and Fitzrovia Now. We will be previewing Clerkenwell tomorrow.