Articles by Guy Beggs

February 4, 2010 at Rich Mix, London: It was an honour to act as host for the evening at the 6^th Hidden Art Award Ceremony and to see so many established and emerging designers being recognized for their contributions to London’s vibrant creative scene. Here are just a few:

Most Influential or Inspiring British Company or Designer – SCP

The public voted for SCP due to their longstanding contribution as a manufacturer, retailer and supplier of contemporary design. Since starting the company in 1986 on Curtain Road in Shoreditch, Sheridan Coakley, MD and founder of SCP has provided a platform for young designers to grow and go on to become internationally renowned talents in their own right.

scp.co.uk

Hidden Art Best Press Profile -Susan Bradley Design

Susan made a massive impact through the press in 2009, with a variety of products including her London Landmark Bookends for Hidden Art Select. Her work appeared in ELLE Décor, World of Interiors, On Office, Living Etc and the Financial Times among many others.

susanbradley.co.uk

Best Furniture, Lighting or Interior Product – Dare Studio -Katakana Writing/Laptop Desk

The panel selected Dare Studio’s Katakana Writing and Laptop Desk, stating that it is “refreshing to see beautifully detailed, high quality furniture still on the contemporary design scene”.

Sponsored by 100% Design – Free 6m Stand at 100% Design London 2010

Hidden Art Product Development Award – JSCD

John Sprange of JSCD developed his Mind Dice product to advanced prototype stage using skills and support from the Hidden Polymers programme.

Sponsored by Metropolitan Works – £500 voucher for Metropolitan Works services

johnsprange.demon.co.uk

Most Sustainable Product / Environmentally Conscious Company – [re]design

Jason Allcorn and Sarah Johnson’s [re]design continually support and promote design for sustainability through imaginative, resourceful and effective engagement with all stake holder groups in the design sector.

Sponsored by Handmade In Britain – Free Stand 2×1 sqm value worth £500 at Handmade in Britain either Bath or Chelsea 2010

Most Popular Product on  Hidden Art E-Shop – Susan Bradley, Battersea Power Station Bookend

Produced as part of the London Landmarks series for Hidden Art Select, Susan’s Battersea Power Station Bookend produced amazing sales results through www.hiddenartshop.com, creating truly unique British design which ended up as a must have item.

susanbradley.co.uk

Crafts + Innovation Conference at CEARTE, Coimbra, Portugal

I was invited to give a paper on the impact of new technologies on traditional crafts at this conference that I entitled Traditional Crafts: New Frontiers. As with a similar paper I had given in Toledo the previous year I presented the new technologies as new ‘not by hand’ craft skills that should be seen as  alternative or complimentary rather than a threat to traditional hand craft skills, not an argument that is very well received in the traditional hand craft camp it has to be said. Whereas designers are taught to buy in craft skills to realize their designs as and when certain skills are needed, professional crafts persons can have a tendency to be more insular and therefore suspicious of any talk of New Frontiers.  In his article The Death of Craft (Crafts Magazine January 2009) US ceramics historian and writer Garth Clark makes the point that traditional craft is too small and cannot survive alone, but should align itself with design.

I used the work of four designers I had come to know through Metropolitan Works as exemplars who accessed new technologies in just the way that designers/makers had always accessed new technologies, simply as another tool. Here are the quotes each of the four gave me:

Tom Price “I approach the new technologies in much the same way as I would any other tool or material.I like to have a basic working knowledge of its intended use but then try to find a way to subvert the process. I try to find the glitches; make it do something completely new and unexpected; introduce a bit of entropy into thesystem.” www.tom-price.com

Assa Ashuach “More than ever, the pace of technological progress is increasing exponentially and the evolution we can expect in the next two years is likely to surpass the progress seen in the last ten years.” assastudio.com.

Tomoko Azumi“I enjoy the challenges of fabrication methods and materials and move freely between traditional and new craft technologies to complete a project.”                                          www.tnadesignstudio.co.uk

David Goodwin“I believe that just as the lathe and spinning machines had an impact on crafts in the industrial age, the technological revolution brings with it new opportunities that need to be explored by contemporary crafts people.”       www.david-goodwin.com

I was very pleased to be asked to chair this one-day forum because my first reaction when news of the credit crisis broke was dismay at the thought of the adverse impact it would have on the emerging designers that Hidden Art, Design Nation, Metropolitan Works and many other support agencies had done so much to encourage and support. But then I thought back to the previous recessions and realized that, because of these established support systems, contemporary creative practitioners where much better placed to weather the storm than they were in the 70s and 80s.  But they will still need all the help they can get, and this forum was designed to do just that by bringing together specialist speakers to present and discuss opportunities within the design industry and ways of accessing them.

The day-long event focused on seven main panel discussions, examining new Avenues for Selling, funding and other opportunities, prototypes, trends in the Recession and Sustainable Future. The Forum presented a selection of respected speakers willing to share their experiences including Ryan Malone (Decode), Giles Hutchinson-Smith (Meta), Corinne Julius, Sharma Guness (Supply London), Will Knight (London Design Festival), Anna Hart (Mark), Matthew Lewis (Metropolitan Works), Fionnuala Johnston (B&Q), Global Colour Research, and Wemake.