London hosts Craft Week from September 30 to October 10

London Craft Week 2020 takes place from September 30 to October 10 to celebrate makers and materials, from the traditional to innovative for everyone to enjoy, physically and digitally.

There are more than 250 influential brands, independent makers, artists and designers all coming together for a packed programme of exhibitions, workshops, demonstrations and talks in 150 locations across the capital and online, set up in various hubs, from Chelsea to Coal Drops Yard in King’s Cross, to Mount Street and North Mayfair, St James and Pimlico Road. 

All details can be found on the London Craft Week website. 

One of our favourite hubs is the shopping destination and foodie hotspot of Coal Drops Yard just a stone’s throw from King’s Cross St Pancras stations.  During London Craft Week, one can discover design and craftsmanship within some of the world’s most exciting fashion, lifestyle and homeware brands, including Paul Smith and Tom Dixon, in an extraordinary canal-side setting.  

In the Paul Smith shop is a selection of small sculptures by Vic Wright from North West England who studied Fine Art in the University of Humberside and now works in her studio in Manchester.  She typically has an explorative approach to her work, taking the form of casts.  

Using a base of fine casting cement different materials such as metal powders and pigments are added.  When drying this results in different textures, colours and surfaces.

Photos by Lucia Carpio.

In Tom Dixon Studio at their Coal Office headquarters, one can explore the craftsmanship involved in their collections and discover the brand’s latest launches and early designs, including the internationally recognised S chair, celebrating 3 decades of an aesthetic that’s intrinsically inspired by the brand’s British roots, along with knitwear designer Peju Obasa and leather artisans Bill Amberg Studio who upholster the iconic frame in their signature styles.

FAT: humorous silhouettes with a reductionist aesthetic, from TOM DIXON

Tom Dixon's FAT chair range is designed to hug
the body.  It's round and cuddly shape allows
for multiple sitting positions. 

Of course we need to keep our social distancing in place to help avoid the spread of Covid-19, but in doing so we are missing much needed human contact, like not being able to hug our friends, dear ones and peers when we see them.  

Tom Dixon's upholstered FAT chair range on show at Coal Office, the designer's headquarters
in Coal Drops Yard, King's Cross, London.  Photo by Lucia Carpio.

So it is intriguing to learn that British designer Tom Dixon’s new upholstered chair range – FAT – is designed with rounded shapes to hug the body and allows for multiple sitting positions as we are spending more time indoors (for work and for rest) and comfort is of prime importance.

Photo by Lucia Carpio.

FAT is available as a three and two-seater sofa, dining chair, counter and bar stool, lounge chair and chaise longue.  They are made from moulded foam with a metal leg available in high gloss black lacquer and made-to-order upholstery. Manufactured in Europe, hand-finished and upholstered by experienced crafts people.

FAT chairs are available for viewing in Tom Dixon’s Coal Office headquarters in London King’s Cross, as well as in his new Beijing shop in China, in the Lounge snf Dining Hall at the Manzoni hub in Milan.

FAT Dining Chairs and FAT Lounge Chairs
in the new Beijing hub in China.  

Tom says: 'For a while, I’ve been wanting to reclaim the word FAT and make it positive again. It’s particularly appropriate for upholstery because what you really want is supreme comfort. The fatness of the curved backrests and the thickness of the upholstery makes FAT a really comfortable series of furniture.'

Tom continues: 'We wanted to make a chair that used the most elementary components to try and reduce the complexity and elements down to the absolute minimum. FAT really has the simplest of legs, but even the legs are fatter than most chairs. This creates a very solid base for the plump cushion, which is completely round. The backrest, which is half round, also allows you to make love chair configurations which are modular, in a way that very few furniture ranges are.'

Premiere Vision Paris announces winners of its first "digital" NextGen Awards.

For more than 10 years, the September edition of Première Vision Paris has traditionally hosted the PV Awards, a yearly event to honor creative and innovative new developments submitted by the exhibitors of the trade fair.  While this year 's physical fair could not take place due to Covid-19 restrictions,  the PV Awards will return in 2021.

However the organisers have been able to host the first edition of the Première Vision NextGen Awards which succeeds the British TexSelect competition (formerly known as Texprint) and was taken over by Première Vision in 2019.  The NextGen Awards aim to reward the textile creativity of students not only from British schools and colleges, but also from design institutes all over the world.  

Disciplines accepted for the Competition are: Prints – Knit – Weaving – Embellishment /Mix Media for either Fashion and/or Interiors.

This first, entirely digital, September 2020 edition was produced in collaboration with the Arts Thread platform which, as organizers of the competition, has announced the winners of the 4 following prizes:

• The Grand Jury Prize: Annika KIIDRON – .Estonian Academy of Arts, Estonia

• The Imagination Prize: Jifang ZHANG – Nottingham Trent University, UK

• The Interiors Prize: Netta GETTA – Shenkar, Israël

• The Materials Innovation Prize : Elisa DEFOSSEZ – Aalto University, Finland

For full details of the NextGen Awards 2020 and winners, click HERE.

Premiere Vision Paris' first Digital Show deemed a success . London's Textile Forum is postponed to 2021.

Just when you think it’s safe to go back into the water, the UK Government announces new Covid restrictions which means all exhibitions in the country have been "paused" again probably until next spring at the earliest.  Thus it is not surprising to learn that London’s Textile Forum cannot take place this October, the first time in 18 years that it is postponed.

Meanwhile Première Vision Paris which was held September 15 and 16 as a Digital Show is deemed a success by its organisers, saying the global creative fashion industry were able to come together on its online Marketplace to develop their trading activities, exchange ideas, get inspired and create their autumn/winter 2021-22 collections.  In total some 43,000 products from 1,675 suppliers representing 43 countries were featured online, attracting  19,500 unique visitors from nearly 120 countries, according to the organisers, testifying to the accelerating pace of digitization in the fashion industry.

"This digitization has been strengthening in recent months, a development Première Vision has supported since the launch of its Marketplace in September 2018, and now further contributes to with the DIGITAL SHOW and its dedicated tools and services," they stated.

Organisers said they have been expanding their services and added features on Marketplace since mid-March, allowing "exhibitors" to freely integrate their collections into their e-shops with no limit on the number of products presented, and no obligations in terms of commitment or duration.

Première Vision had the foresight to launch its Marketplace in September 2018 as an additional digital platform to the physical show, which has proven now to be a valuable initiative for the international trading community in these challenging times.  

The Digital Show has featured an interactive catalog, with activated client/supplier contact tools,; an enhanced content to decode seasonal trends to help professionals build collections; as well as a series of digital talks under the banne "The Futures of Fashion" which was participated by 3,635 international professionals sharing ideas and information regarding the industry’s coming challenges.

While the DIGITAL SHOW will remain active on the Première Vision Marketplace throughout the season, the traffic and activity seen on its opening two days demonstrate how clearly this event meets the industry’s new and evolving needs, enabling international fashion industry professionals to continue interacting and developing their business despite the reigning economic and health uncertainty. 

Gilles Lasbordes, Première Vision General Manager, said: 

“The performance of this first digital event are very encouraging and highly instructive. We salute the commitment and reactivity of the industry, which mobilized around the virtual show while reminding us of the importance of the physical experience. See you next February for a spring-summer 22 edition which is already shaping up to be a hybrid show.”

Première Vision reaffirms its omni-channel strategy, strengthening the synergies between its physical and digital events, as the way forward.  The physical event, Première Vision Paris is a lively, inspiring event vital to the creative process and to engaging professionals with each other in understand the season’s new material.  It also acts as a catalyst for the in-person meetings essential to developing and solidifying client/supplier relationships.  Coexisting is the online event on its Marketplace, the DIGITAL SHOW, regarded as an indispensable way to promote the visibility of the exhibitors’ offer to a broader target of international buyers during and beyond the actual show dates.

Gareth Pugh's fashion fantasia: The Reconstruction

While catwalk shows are traditionally part of fashion weeks, often due to the tight schedule, as soon as one show is over, the audience quickly gather their things to go off to the next one, and so on.  During this London Fashion Week, running from Thursday 17th - Tuesday 22nd September 2020, we don’t have that issue and the excitement is much more contained though not lacking in enthusiasm. The schedule has been split into three sections and includes brands showing digitally, physically or both, due to Covid-19 restrictions from government guidelines.  This arrangement has allowed audiences not just in London but from around the world to view the collections online in the comfort of their own sofas or desks, repeatedly as often as they want to see them.

Some designers opt to showcase their creations in a physical space that allows visitors to get a feel for their work in a focused environment.  Such is the case with visionary British fashion designer Gareth Pugh who has launched a major new creative project titled “The Reconstruction,” presented as a ‘visual concept album’, at Christie’s London, opened to paid visitors across London Fashion Week. This marks Pugh’s return to fashion week, built around the designer’s first collection since buying back his trademark in March 2020.

Ticket sales to Gareth Pugh's "The Reconstruction" exhibition at Christie's London is a fund-raising exercise for Refuge – featuring key looks from the designer's collection, accompanied by Knight’s imagery – taking place at Christie’s London across London Fashion Week. Photos of exhibition at Christie's by Lucia Carpio

The installation celebrates the eternal interplay between fashion, music and film, featuring 13 iconic looks inspired by 13 iconic songs.  The collection has been captured in 13 stills and 13 explosive fashion film shorts - shot by globally renowned fashion image-maker Nick Knight. An accompanying series of breathtaking virtual landscapes comes courtesy of pioneering digital artist Jon Emmony.

The body of work features a selection of dramatic sculptural ensembles on display in the dedicated room at Christie’s along with digital slide shows of dramatic images; the result of a series of photo shoots that features an amazing cast of artists, activists and change-makers from across the UK as models for his designs, including Musicians Rina Sawayama and IAMDDB; Artist and activist Sakeema Crook; The Royal Ballet’s principal dancer Matthew Ball; Artist and Performer Jenny Bastet; Dancers Travis Clausen-Knight and James Pett; Model and muse Maggie Maurer; Performers and nightlife icons Finn Love and Georgie Bee; Model Jade o’Belle; And finally, fiercely vocal model-of-the-moment, Georgia Moot.

The whole creative process from producing the fabrics and preparing the materials to the resulting fashion shoots is captured in a feature-length documentary (available to view on YouTube) mixing fashion and entertainment, allowing the audience to view the inspiration behind the collection – fashion’s new “frontierland” , written by Pugh’s husband and Creative Co-Director Carson McColl.

None of the looks will be for sale though. Instead they have been re-imagined via a jersey capsule collection featuring a series of prints designed by Pugh in collaboration with emerging designer Melissa Mehrtens. The limited-edition collection which will launch alongside the art project’s release; sold online (RRP £75) in an exclusive partnership with HIT + RUN - a new online retail platform promoting a zero-waste model.

In support of The Reconstruction, Pugh’s long-standing collaborators M·A·C Cosmetics also has launched a supporting virtual beauty campaign. The project amplifies the artistry within the visual album, as well as the two brands’ shared ideals of culture and community. As part of M·A·C’s commitment to communicating the power of fashion in inspiring everyday beauty, the brand invited five emerging talent and taste-makers, including Ana Takahashi (lead make-up artist) herself, to take inspiration from the original makeup designs and recreate them on themselves, translating them into everyday wear. 

London Fashion Week - September 17th – 22nd: A hybrid gender neutral showcase.

London Fashion Week September 2020 takes place from Thursday 17th to Tuesday 22nd September 2020 as a gender neutral show and includes both digital activations on londonfashionweek.co.uk and physical events, following Government guidelines on social distancing.  

The LFW digital platform, launched in June, continues to serve as the Official Digital Hub and will be freely accessible to everyone, industry professionals and global fashion consumers alike. This platform will host exclusive multimedia content from designers and brand partners, enabling collaboration and bringing together fashion, culture and technology.

This season, the schedule has been split into three sections and includes brands showing digitally, physically or both. 

More than 80 designers including 40 womenswear, 15 menswear, 20 menswear & womenswear and 5 accessories brands are showcased. There will be a total of 50 digital only activations, 21 physical and digital, 7 physical only and 3 designers who will activate through a physical evening event only. 

Now more than ever, the British Fashion Council acknowledges the necessity to look at the future of LFW and the opportunity to drive change, collaborate and innovate in ways that will establish long-term benefits, develop new sustainable business models and boost the industry’s economic and social power. The British Fashion Industry faces enormous challenges due to the impact of COVID-19 and the BFC keeps on calling on Government to support a sector which in 2019 contributed £35 billion to the UK economy and employs over 890,000 people (Oxford Economics, 2020).

Designers, partners and brands come together to share their stories in various forms through collections launches, films, podcasts, conversations, articles galleries. They embrace the cultural commentary and creativity for which London Fashion Week and British fashion are known.

Explore the Digital Schedule HERE.

Photos from London Fashion Week website.

Rest in Peace Sir Terence Conran 1931- 2020

Sir Terence Conran 1931-2020 from Design Museum website.

Here in the UK, the design and creative world would remember Sir Terence Conran  as founder of “the way we live now”.  

Terence Conran, founder of the Design Museum, designer, philanthropist and businessman, passed away on Saturday 12 September 2020. He was 88 years old.

Through a series of parallel careers, Sir Terence Conran had a greater impact than any other designer of his generation, revolutionising everyday life in contemporary Britain.  Alongside design, food was also one of Terence’s great passions and he became a renowned restaurateur.

The London Design Museum has posted on its website a fitting tribute to Sir Terence who was the subject of a monographic exhibition The Way We Live Now at the Design Museum in 2011 to coincide with his 80th birthday.