The world’s leading university of art and design is an inspiring place to hunt for unique Christmas gifts. Showcasing the raw talent of students from a variety of arts disciplines including textiles, fine art and ceramics, the Royal College of Art Christmas Fete is now in its 4th year. All proceeds from the event at […]
In anticipation of the British Museum’s forthcoming Indigenous Australia exhibition, we look at the rise of Aboriginal textile designs in fashion and interiors. Indigenous Australians’ oral tradition and spiritual values are based upon reverence for the land and a belief in the Dreamtime – a sacred era when ancestral totemic spirit beings created the world. […]
We thought you might like to hear more about the Visuology Lecture, which took place at Viktor Wynd’s Museum of Curiosities recently. The star attraction (apart from innumerable specimens of taxidermy, twisted ephemera, macabre and medical memorabilia) was Savile Row tailor, Richard Anderson. One of the most experienced tailors in the world famous street, Anderson […]
Ancient tribal crafts were based upon the faith of Animism – the worship of nature, and the belief that natural physical entities possess a spiritual essence. Traditional tribes hunted for food, then used every last piece of the animals they slaughtered to create useful products. They were resourceful and respected the natural world. We may […]
Some futurologists predict a world where embryos will be grown in test tubes at baby farms. Perhaps we will soon be ‘following’ the life of the celebrity embryo and foetus in advance of any such baby’s birth. Despite these prospects, in the age of the caesarian, the enduring familiarity of natural birth still excites us. Babies […]
Art and fashion lovers the world over are inspired by Frida Kahlo, yet few will ever have travelled to Mexico. Now there’s a chance to get a taste of genuine Mexican style in London, by visiting Made in Mexico at the capital’s Fashion and Textile Museum. The colourful new exhibition on the art of the […]
Craft workers and product designers are rapidly becoming the new elite of the art world. Master craftspeople, working with basic materials like wood, natural resin, wax, stone, metal, glass, leather, wool, paper or clay, create practical objects, as opposed to functionless art. Practicality and ease of manufacture is seen to outweigh the need for refined […]
The Japanese philosophy of Wabi-Sabi sees imperfection as a form of beauty – a product can actually be enhanced by its irregularity. Here we take a look at some designs which celebrate the imperfection of handcrafted work. In the spirit of our previous post, Kaixi Lin reuses discarded materals to create functional woven textiles. Inspired […]
This exhibition should have niche appeal – at least to ‘anoraks’ of the fashion world. Textile designers, embroiderers, costume curators, quilters and enthusiasts of handcrafted fabrics will certainly appreciate the work that has gone into creating the pieces on show. Historians and sociologists may well be fascinated by the backgrounds of the unintentional abstract artists. […]
The Designs of the Year 2014 exhibition, sponsored by international law firm Bird & Bird, starts today and runs through till 25th August. The Design Award nominators are practitioners, critics and academics, scouting for the very best designs – seventy-six of which have been chosen in this the seventh year of the awards. The disparate array […]