You may have heard that it is the London Design Festival this week! The Kings Cross development are a leading LDF Design District for the second year running, which means between the 12th-20th of September, they are hosting some really exciting exhibitions and installations within the Coal Drops and Kings Cross space.
Our Coal Drops Yard retail team highlight just a few of the great artworks that are going on in the area this week.
Photo credit: John Sturrock/King’s Cross
Outsiders Store presents Heimplanet
First up, our neighbours the Outsiders Store are hosting an installation of German brand Hemiplanet’s inflatable geodesic tents. This futuristic tent can be erected in a matter of minutes and without a tent pole in sight. Genius!
Find out more here.
Photo Credit: Living Promenade by Blue Affleck, part of the Space collection
Central Saint Martins Offsite: Designing at a Distance
Imagine trying to finish your degree whilst in a pandemic! That is exactly what the graduating students from Central Saint Martins 2020 had to do. With the doors of Central Saint Martins closed during lockdown, the students were challenged like never before. Off-site: Designing at a Distance brings together a selection of work from the graduates, in three themed online exhibitions.
"This digital show celebrates their ability to adapt in an uncertain, dislocated world and design new ways of living. Explore the three collections curated for London Design Festival: Space, Material and Social/self." Shown here is Living Promenade by Blue Affleck, part of the Space collection.
Unity by Marlène Huissoud
French designer Marlene Huissoud has created a headline Festival Commission at Coal Drops Yard which emphasises the notion of unity and the importance of working together to repurpose and reconsider our shared environments as we emerge from the pandemic. Only when physically-distanced visitors pump together as a group will the artwork and shape begin to transform: rippling, breathing and growing.
Designer Marlene Huissoud says, “We completely changed the original project concept planned - as the pandemic urged us as humans to make a ‘last’ call for action. More than ever, artists and designers need to redefine their roles and use their skills to shake society. This installation is more than an interactive piece, it is for society to wake up and realise how vital it is for us to be united and act as a whole.”
Photocredit: Artists own, Liang-Jung Chen
The Misused presents The Hardware
Industrial designer Liang-Jung Chen turns Kiosk N1C into a pop-up hardware concept store – offering up ideas of ‘misusing’ everyday hardware. The exhibition celebrates the overlooked charm of common objects and invites the audience to reimagine hardware in an alternative context. The project is inspired by the ways in which older generations in the Taiwanese countryside found creative ways of improvising with common objects to complete everyday tasks.
