Workshop for Potential Design’s latest show at London’s Soane Museum

The city of London is all-aglow this week with the excitement of the annual London Design Festival. There’s so much to see, but one of our favorite exhibitions thus far is an intimate pop-up called Pieces. Inspired by the notion of fragments, the show presents work from five young, London-based talents, curated by the always thought-provoking Workshop for Potential Design.

Pieces is set in the breakfast room of the house-museum of Neoclassical architect and antiquities collector Sir John Soane. For those unfamiliar with the Soane Museum, sited in central London’s Holborn area, it’s a material culture playground filled with a mélange of sculptures, architectural fragments, ancient artifacts, old books, furnishings, and on and on, all accumulated by one of the originators of the very concept of a museum. Like all things born in the early 19^th century, the interior is rather busy, but that just means there’s a ton to see and examine.

What a rich backdrop to view such quiet yet absorbing object studies, created by engaging designers like Study O Portable, Gemma Holt, Sam Jacob, Peter Marigold, and Paul Elliman in direct response to various details found in the museum—many fragments from ancient Rome and Greece—and a calming experience that’s just right way to kick off the frenzy of the Festival. 

• Text by

  • 

    Wava Carpenter

    Seit ihrem Studium in Designgeschichte an der Parsons School of Design hatte Wava schon in vielen Bereichen der Designkultur den Hut auf: sie lehrte Designwissenschaft, kuratierte Ausstellungen, überwachte Auftragsarbeiten, organisierte Vorträge, schrieb Artikel und erledigte alle möglichen Aufgaben bei Design Miami. Wava lässt den Hut aber im Büro – auf der Straße bevorzugt sie ihre Sonnenbrille.