Clerkenwell Design Week - what worked for me

The highlight of last week was the 'Clenkerwell Design Week' lasting for three days only but definitely giving the feeling of a week at least. There was so much to see, so many new people to meet, so much to experience and draw inspiration from.

Spread in four rather quirky locations and opening doors to many more local art, craft and design shops and showrooms around Clenkerwell, there was a lot to indulge one's taste buds in.

The map above shows the covered area in bright pink, that would correspond with the signage flags on locations, so that it was virtually impossible to miss anything.

The locations included House of Detention or Order of St. John Priory church and Crypt, both places revealing atmospheric experience of hidden rooms and corners.




Ochre is a design company focusing on lighting, furniture and accessories. I came across their design in the Crypt of Order of St. John.

Descending down the stairs, suddenly I just had to stop and gasp in amazement. Such pure beauty in a chandelier is something I had not seen for a while. 'Round 112 buds' consists of glass drops attached to bronze fittings with LED lights hidden inside.

As you might imagine this chandelier is quite heavy given by the materials: glass and bronze. The effect it provides though is definitely worth the weight.

TDO Architecture teamed up with a jeweller Hannah Martin to come up with modern, sleek and stylish display stands that would correspond with the boldness, brightness and uniqueness of Hannah's jewellery.

The supporting images on the wall revealed the work process going into the design; these are layers of Corian, a material that can be thermoformed in 150ºC, then joined and finished to a required design. In this case, layers stacked producing corrugated effect.

I was so pleased to see these display stands with my own eyes. I had previously seen images only (stands were first produced for Hannah for the London Fashion Week) and was wondering about their height. Indeed, one does not have to bend down to view a piece locked up under a glass inside a table. These stands show the products in a comfortable height with triangular viewpoints. I can imagine myself as a customer floating among such display stands within a clean and clear environment. These stands are opening the space in a modern, sleek and stylish manner.

An elegant Victorian Farmiloe Building, former glassworks, was without a doubt the largest space of them all hosting variety of disciplines ranging from furniture, ceramics, basketry or graphics...

Visitors were welcomed by an artistic depiction of Ewan Gallimore and Claire Miller, two Royal College of Arts students who produced this stylish Jaguar depicting its unmistakable features giving it their future vision for Jaguar. Real Jaguar F-TYPE was parked nearby. What a juxtaposition of vision an reality.

After spending time admiring this installation, I raised my eyes and was left puzzled by two colourful diagonal lines of phone receivers hanging in a window.

When I finally reached this stand, I realised that this was a stand for ICON magazine offering a year subscription with a Pop Phone (by Native Union) as a gift. I must say, I could not resist, subscribed and received my orange Pop Phone (my choice of colour).

This just shows the importance of presentation. Seeing the display from the inner yard downstairs, my curiosity got slightly tackled only to grab me further by the knowledge of receiving a good deal and a gift upon subscription.

Yes, they got me but this time I actually do not mind. I wanted to subscribe to ICON for some time now and the orange receiver brightens up my day. This is something I want for everyone. Just find enjoyment in even the smallest object close to you. K-)

Towards a new life

If you remember this picture, you will remember that I used it in 'Paintography and Wassily Kandinsky' post few weeks ago. There I applied paintography to the entire image and pushed it further to abstract it, getting closer to Wassily Kandinsky's abstractions.

But there was something else that also caught my eye. To start with, I could not resist the small red buds. Their colour stood up so sharply against the white wall behind.

So fresh, so pure hinting the beginning of life...

However, at this stage, the string around and under also begun to catch my eye..

And so, all of a sudden, the attention shifted from a dream-like image of the red buds to the textured and sharp detail of the string.

The red buds started to blend with the surroundings; they became the background allowing the attention to switch to something else, something so trivial that so easily became the subject.

Focusing on the string only, the question is, do I need the colour?...

Cropping closer around the string and de-colouring, the image entered new dimension, new life.

And the circle of life continues. In a slightly different way than what we normally understand by these words but why not. Who says that there is only one meaning of the words 'new life'?

First we had the red buds, something that could be associated with new life. Now we have an image that was born from a journey of an image towards a new picture. When you think about it, new life can be found everywhere. This is just a food for thought for this week. Have a great time and see you next time. K-)

Ansel Adams

In my last post 'Laure Albin Guillot', I wrote about an exhibition I went to when in Paris. I wrote about the need of bringing some grandeur back to people's lives, especially after the horrors of the First World War. Soft approach and gentle touch of Laure Albin Guillot's photography was what people could easily relate and escape to. Her photography was art.

On the other hand, it was probably the harsh reality of the times that others photographers eventually decided to portray exactly what they saw in their work rather than produce 'idealised' images. In other words, there was the demand to see the real thing in photographs rather than art. And who says that the real thing cannot be as beautiful as art? Let's look at different country, different continent, different approach...

Ansel Adams who lived and worked in America took pictures most notably of Yosemite Valley, the Yosemite National Park and other National Parks in the US. The National Maritime Museum recently held exhibition showing his work; photographs of nature, of landscapes, of water, of mountains... The sharpness, clarity and the tonal work was and is incredible.

Do not forget we are talking about manual B&W photography which is something that seems to be so long ago in this digital colour world. This is the time when full understanding of aperture and shutter speed was essential to get at least a reasonable image.

Ansel Adams took this to perfection. What he produced were amazing pictures of American nature, in many cases before human interference reached it.


He was not only very particular  about the composition, the right exposure or detail. What he also put a real emphasis on was the production. He developed his own photographs and made sure that any reproduction would keep to its highest standard as well. This also pushed the publishers themselves who were astonished in what they were able to achieve.

The pictures in this post are scans from a book I bought 'The Portfolios of Ansel Adams' published by Little Brown with introduction by John Szarkowski who writes extensively about Adam's desire to capture the beauty of nature and show it at its best in publications.

One of the first things I noticed about this third edition is the quality; the paper, the reproduced photographs, the clarity and sharpness of the pictures. Now I can understand what experts mean when they say that one cannot beat the negative. The information that is captured on a negative cannot be depicted by digital photography. How amazing.

Just look at the light and dark places, the tonal difference of the middle tones, the grays and the balance in this picture. Now, try to take your digital colour photograph and turn it into black&white.

Do you think you can achieve this tonal depth? I tried and it was not easy. You can see some of my attempts on my G+ account here. Some of the photographs there are from my manual camera (shot on a film) when others are from my digital one, adjusted on a computer. Can you tell?

Have a great week and see you next time. K-)