Its that time of year when a fresh batch of graduates leap out into the real world. After years of focusing on the final degree show; that’s it. Its over.  Done. Time to figure out what the heck to do next. Do you set up on your own or will you be plucked from the thousands of other graduates for a dream job. New Designers held at the Business Design Centre in Islington North London is a showcase for this years graduates from colleges across the UK. Its great opportunity for this years batch of graduates to showcase their work; make new contacts and find out from last years graduates, over in the One Year On section, just how hard it is out there in the big wide world.

Week 1 focuses on Textiles, Fashion & Accessories, Ceramics & Glass Contemporary Applied Arts. 

Week 2 its over to Product & Furniture Design Visual Communications ans Spatial Design.

I can’t honestly say I looked at every aspect – its just too vast; but here is a taste of what caught my eye.

 Eva Joly’s Textile designs transform mundane household items into amusing contemporary patterns (1st image and below).  Using a dolls house scale to present the images of domesticity added to the sense of fun her design have. But aside from the fun;  its a commercially viable design and I’d love to see her work in various textile and paper forms.

Another textile designer whose work I admired was Anna Jensen from Bath Spa University. I’m afraid I can’t show you any images of her work they’ve been bought up- she’s done so well she won the Harlequin award which means they now own her work. A version of her work shown at New Designers will be produced but….  Well, hopefully it will see the light of day and not get chewed up and spat out in some watered down version.  That is the thing about graduate shows you just worry for them – or I do.  

Bulrushi Ercol Marita Szkutnik is a rather happy result of a project set between Ercol and Bucks New University. Marita’s wooden bench has wood dowels with flocked “bulrush” tops that can act as a coat stand. They don’t look sturdy but are surprisingly strong and when you brush your hand across them they wave about in a very pleasing natural way.  I think ; actually I know this was my favourite of the two shows. The picture doesn’t do it justice, but then it is a tactile piece. Marita is off to Rotterdam next, on a work placement – which is fantastic, shame I can’t remember with whom!  

The stand (pictured above) for the Northumbria University 3 Dimensional Design was incredibly impressive. I guess I was stuck by the graphic on the back wall and overall presentation of the stand. Any manufacturer would be proud of it never mind a University on a budget. But it was not only the presentation that was outstanding, it was the quality and craftsmanship of the work. It was all really beautifully made.

I particularly liked the work of Ellen Thomas (above),she showed her MILK stools, created as a response to a brief on value and what makes things valuable. Her response it a humourous mix of traditional craft techniques and contemporary aesthetics. Each piece has a etched pattern on the underside and one leg harks back to more humble milking stools. 

Over on the Brighton University stand the work of Adi Chambers from caught my eye.  I loved her beautiful Chippendale cabinet made from laser cut cardboard. Just as in the 18th Century apprentices made samples in minature, this piece was the same – but you could see exactly how it could be impressively transformed to life sized.

She also showed and inventive piece using discarded draws mounted onto a metal frame.  

This sample of New Designers is just a snippet of what was on show; and strangely I’ve selected an all female cast of high lights. This is in no means deliberate. But I would like to think that; particularly in 3D design where there has been a traditional male dominance; this is a thing of the past and we’re looking at an area of equality now.

  There was so much more to explore at New Designers do take a look over on their website  http://www.newdesignersonline.co.uk/

Idyll by Johan Lindsten His chairs shown in both Stockholm and at Designersblock in Milan “These stitches and dreams are for most people forgotten and thrown away to an eternal lost never to been appreciated. This furniture’s destiny is to elevate and promote these neglected pieces of art, bring back a long lost sentimental value and mix it with contemporary aesthetic”

Stitch by Pepe Heykoop is a range of items salvaged from skips or secondhand shops and given a new hand stitched fabric skin. The skin is then stuffed with soft fibres. I’m sure traditional upholsterers would dispair at the obvious lumps and bumps and the visible stitching; but that would be missing the point. They have been brought back to life and given a character by this treatment. The lamp is particularly animated and looks like he could jump about, reminding me of Pixar’s Luxo Jr 

  Under Construction #2 by Anila Rubiku for Plusdesign(pictured above & below)  is a beautifully stitched lamp constructed from paper with an LED light. Anila’s works offers a contemporary perspective to the traditional craft of embroidery with her chioce of subject matter and use of material. Using scenes from contemporary life, drawn and hand stitched onto the paper houses Anila’s work illuminates an everyday domesticity that we would all recognise.  

Urban Embroidery by Melissa French for Puff & Flock (detail picture below) This is another example of taking embroidery and applying the technique to an alternative material. Melissa has used an old bench and applied her own design (with the help of a drill) to plot the pattern across the surface.

Saved Handkerchief by Studio Makkink & Bey for Droog This limited edition range produced by Droog for Salone del Mobile 2010 was a response to the ongoing economic crisis. Droog purchased various items from companies that had gone into liquidation and invited designers to create something desirable from the unwanted. Studio Makkink & Bey were given 900 handkerchiefs to play with. They created an embroidery kit; with news reports from different newspapers printed over 30 days in March and screenprinted onto the handkerchief. They also provided a skein of embroidery thread and a needle. I have to say i,t requires a bit of skill from the purchasers (or should I say collector) but its an interesting challenge. I nabbed one, and you can spot a slightly confused looking me over on the Droog blog. You can also have a look at all the other products designers came up with in the range. 

Stool bySuperfolkThis Irish design studio produce products that are a tribute to Ireland’s traditional skills. The stools have been made using locally sourced Oak and Ash from sustainable forests. They can be linked together with  a series of cross stitches running through the holes drilling into the seat. If you don’t want to link them together the cord can be stored by doing a quick running stitch round the seat. 

Studio Job Bavaria Range Indian Rose wood limited edition of 6 produced for Moss. Inspired by Bavarian furniture of 17th & 18th Centuries, this range of furniture uses marquetry techniques but instead of laborious hand cutting, the inlays have been laser cut.  

Fergana Sofa by Patricia Urquiola for Moroso. Uzbek weaving techniques are combined with industrial manufacturing to produce a pared down version of the complex traditional patterns, more suited to western tastes. Another Uzbek tradition maintained in this piece is the positioning of the furniture. We tend to push our seating up against the wall, whereas in the Uzbek tradition is to sit in the round. The Fergana range are island pieces meant be seen from all angles, it would be a shame to push them to one side.  

Cathrine Kullberg combines fine workmanship traditional material and precision laser cutting to produce her Norwegian Forest lights.  The classic Scandinavian tradition of using thin birch strips was first used for lighting in the 50s & 60s. Cathrine has further updated the tradition with her beautiful forest scenes. Norwegian Forest lights show a deep pine forest with animals in light and shade. When lit, the blonde birch veneer shines with a warm glow, and the delicately cut forest motif lets light to filter out between the trees.  The lights are cut by a company producing model kits and are then hand finished using seams of natural leather lace For more of her work : www.cathrinekullberg.com

Niki Jones is a designer who trained at both the Scottish College of  Textiles and the Royal College of Art. Having worked for various interior companies as a textile designer and style coordinator she has now created her own company.   Seen here is another design inspired by Uzbek textiles.  The range is designed entirely by her creative team mixing traditional and specialist techniques. www.niki-jones.co.uk

Artist Yinka Shonibare covered walls, furniture and created clothes from traditional ‘African’ fabrics bought from Brixton market.  Although the fabrics look African,they are in fact Dutch and English. The designs appeal to African taste with colours and symbols of Africa mixed in with objects of life, for example mobile phones, and pictured above game consoles .  As Yinka says “They prove to have a crossbred cultural background quite of their own. And it’s the fallacy of that signification that I like. It’s the way I view culture—it’s an artificial construct.” 

I suppose with this in mind its ironic that Italian firm Moroso should create M’Afrique installation by American Stephen Burks and  SpaniardPatricia Urquiola.

“We wanted to showcase the creativity of a few of the great artists and exponents of contemporary African culture,” explains Patrizia Moroso, who devised the event, “because looking at Africa through the eyes of contemporary art, photography, architecture and design is perhaps the most appropriate way of approaching this vast, powerful continent, so creatively rich and diverse that today it is still one of the greatest sources of inspiration for modern design”.

Mixing recycling with traditional craft techniques is what we have come to regard as “African design” But companies like Moroso are now looking at using these skills, born out of necessity, to produce marketable products.

Seen below right is a design by Ayse Birsel & Bibi Sek being produced for the show. With traditional weaving skills which have previously been used on recycled cable, the artisans were set to work with new supplies to create products for the high end furniture market.

 And should you have your own idea or project that you would like to develop, Link Africa based in South Africa can help you get in touch with fair trade programmes who can produce your project.

http://www.linkafricahome.co.za/whatwedo.html

I’ve previously mentioned Philippe Bestenheider in my patchwork post but its worth showing his Binta chairs again “Binta was inspired by Africa. Its sculptural shape evokes African wood carvings, but its polyurethane rubber forms are softer. Like a baobab tree, Binta anchors itself firmly to the ground with thick, trunk-like feet whose elegant forms bring to mind the weighty baobab.” Gathered together they do look like a group of Yinka’s characters.

Building on his links in Africa and again using their traditional skills Philippe has gone on to produce his Kente range through Varaschin.

Traditional Kente woven cloth is produced in Ghana with each colour having a symbolic meaning. I’m not sure if Philippe’s colour selection is based on the symbolic meaning or purely on aesthetics , but heres a list of the symbolic meanings anyway, judge for yourself.

 Knitting along with other traditional crafts has enjoyed a revival in the past few years. We’ve rediscovered the art of making and experimented with materials old and new to create a whole different product

From a childhood spent in part in the Korean countryside Kwangho revisits the traditional craft of knitting and knots that he remembers from his youth.

For this range of lighting he was inspired by his mothers knitting and saw a pile of electrical cable as yarn and proceeded to knit a light, using varied lengths to create the different effects. Some wouldn’t look out of place wound round your neck like a scarf – not advisable though. Others appear wildly brush-like with the knitted loops extended out to trail onto the floor. 

In a further development Kwangho has knitted a sofa out of  garden hose. “I like to look for materials the same way I’m walking around the grocery store, thinking about what to make for dinner. And there is always a change in the end from what you start out thinking you’ll be making, which is quite charming. I just love finding materials, working on them and seeing where it takes me”

http://www.kwangholee.com/

Soojin Kang ‘s work  A Continuous Chain crosses the boundaries of art fashion and design, items can be worn or placed in the home. Her work is the antithesis of fast fashion and the problems associated with disposable design. Soojin  asks us to consider our basic needs and what we already possess and to use these materials wisely and beautifully. Using craft techniques and a combination of antique and raw materials to create the work is the logical means of expressing this. The craft traditions convey a considered thought process and have always seen the value in reusing and repurposing.

Olof Nordenson has encased a group of lights in what looks like mohair – but it could just be the light source picking up the finer bits of fluff! Five knitted braids extend down from the ceiling concealing the wires. As the braid is stretched the the wool gives the light a wonderful luminous texture. Olof has used a combination of hand and machine knitting.

www.olofnordenson.com

 Noose Light by Ana Maria Stewart-Pasescu is the culmination of a design challenge set by Phillipe Starck. Just a simple cable looped and knotted it could be seen as a representation of life and death. Its the choice and quality of material that really makes this design work. The chunky black cable, brass light fitting and the glowing element work so well together.