LONDON DESIGN FESTIVAL BEAUTIES

We loved being at the annual London Design Festival this past week, so we are sharing it’s most beautiful things with you this week. While the LDF officially ended yesterday, many of the exhibits and participating shops and studios will continue on, so you can still experience the latest Beautiful Design.

With over 300 projects happening around the city, LDF has 4 main features: The Design Destinations, Design Districts, Landmark Projects, and its hub at the Victoria & Albert Museum. The V&A hosts three big installations which we feature here today.

CANDELA

In the Tapestries Gallery, the darkest public space in the Museum, we find the first kinetic sculpture, Candela, by Felix de Pass, Ian McIntyre and Michael Montgomery. It is a large ceramic plate coated with a phosphorescent material, often used for watch faces, which emits an eerie green glow. As it slowly rotates, it passes through a light which recharges its glow, and creates hypnotic patterns.

DOUBLE SPACE FOR BMW - PRECISION & POETRY IN MOTION - OSGERBY & BARBER

“Double Space For BMW - Precision & Poetry in Motion,” a Landmark Project, is a fascinating kinetic sculpture that fills the entire Raphael Gallery on the main floor of the museum,  designed by Jay Osgerby and Edward Barber.

The installation features two giant silver mirrored structures, suspended from the ceiling, which rotate slowly, continuously. As they move, both the curved and the flat surfaces reflect different parts of the Gallery, with the Raphael paintings displayed on its walls. The choreographed motion changes your perspectives and views as you stand and watch.

Osgerby & Barber share an interest in aerospace, automotive and maritime engineering, which influenced their explorations of both the aesthetics of movement and performance -- all supported by BMW’s interest in technological innovation and precision.

CREST - ZAHA HADID

Another beautiful monumental experimental installation, “Crest,” graces the outside of the V&A, in the center of its John Madejski Garden. Designed by star architect Zaha Hadid, “Crest" investigates the relationship between formal arrangement and structural performance.

After its run in London, Crest will then be taken to Dubai to be installed at the ME Dubai Hotel, also designed by Zaha Hadid, which opens in 2016.

Hadid’s form is fluid, yet solid -- yet it is an incredibly thin shell-like structure. Is rises up out of the center pool, like the crest of a wave, offering a new set of perspectives of the courtyard and the adjacent iconic V&A. Its metallic surface reflects both the moving sky above and the water below.

Crest was engineered with Buro Happold and manufactured by Litestructures.

See more recent Hadid designs here and here.

Read more about Beautiful Design, as they relate to Arts/Design, Nature/Science, Food/Drink, Place/Time, Mind/Body, and Soul/Impact.

Enter your own images and ideas about Beautiful Design in this week’s creative Photo Competition. Open for entries now until 11:59 p.m. PT on 09.28.14. If you are reading this after that date, check out the current BN Creative Competition, and enter!

PHOTO CREDITS:

1. Photo: Courtesy of London Design Festival. Double Space for BMW - Precision & Poetry in Motion.
2. Photo: Courtesy of the Victoria and Albert Museum. Candela.
3. Video: Courtesy of Felix de Pass. Candela by Felix de Pass, Michael Montgomery and Ian McIntyre.
4. Photo: Courtesy of London Design Festival. Double Space for BMW.
5. Photo: Courtesy of London Design Festival. Visitor’s Perspective of Double Space for BMW.
6. Photo: Courtesy of London Design Festival. Reflective Mirrors in the Raphael Gallery.
7. Photo: Courtesy of London Design Festival. Crest by Zaha Hadid.
8. Photo: by Luke Hayes. Zaha Hadid: Crest.
9. Photo: by Ed Reeve. Zaha Hadid: Crest.
10. Photo: by Luke Hayes. Zaha Hadid: Crest.
11. Photo: Courtesy of The Design Writer. Zaha Hadid: Crest.