The Design Museum‘s annual Designs of the Year Awards are back for the fifth year, celebrating the best in global designs from the past twelve months. Industry experts have nominated designs across seven categories: Architecture, Digital, Fashion, Furniture, Graphics, Product and Transport and the results are showcased at the museum.

DESIGNS OF THE YEAR, 8th February-15th July 2012

DESIGN MUSEUM

28 Shad Thames, London SE1 2YD (020 7940 8790)

The nominees cover a strong mix of designs including the Olympic Torch 2012 for London designed by Barber Osgerby, the Duchess of Cambridge’s Wedding Dress designed by Sarah Burton for Alexander McQueen and a wind-propelled Landmine Detonator which costs $40 to produce.

All of the nominations are on show at the Design Museum in the Designs of the Year exhibition. From this comprehensive list, a jury will select the seven category winners and an overall winner for the Design of the Year 2012.

The exhibition is curated by Ria Hawthorn. The winners will be announced on 24th April 2012.

Images – from top: Guangzhou Opera House by Zaha Hadid Architects (photo by Iwan Baan); 787 Dreamliner (photo by Ed Turner); Jawbone Jambox by fuseproject; Textile Field by Erwan and Ronan Bouroullec (textile by Kvadrat); Harbour Chair by Ed Carpenter for Very Good & Proper. 

Midcentury Modern, the popular one-day show of 20th-Century design classics and modern collectables, returns to Dulwich College. The event is a great opportunity to snap up rare or unusual products without high mark-up prices.

MIDCENTURY MODERN, Sunday 20th November 2011 (10am-4pm)

Christison Hall, DULWICH COLLEGE

London SE21 7LD

Entrance: £7 on the day

Browse around some of Britain’s leading mid-century dealers of Scandinavian, European and American furniture and decorative arts. Merging the past with the present, young British designers sell their designs upstairs.

Midcentury Modern is an unpretentious one-stop shop for busy people who love collecting beautiful pieces for their homes.

Participating dealers and designers can be seen on the Midcentury Modern website.

Copies of LONDON DESIGN GUIDE 2012-2013 are available to purchase at the show – head to the stand of contemporary design retailer Theo.

Annually, lovers of design classics flock to the popular sample sale at the Knoll showroom in London’s Clerkenwell. The one-day sale is an opportunity to pick up esteemed collectibles by leading 20th Century designers.

KNOLLSTUDIO SAMPLE SALE

Saturday 19th November 2011, 10am-4pm

KNOLL

91 Goswell Road, London EC1V 7EX (020 7236 6655)

Design lovers have the opportunity to take advantage of exclusive offers and buy ex-display and photo-shoot samples at up to 70% discount. Furthermore, you’ll be welcomed with refreshments as well as live music played throughout the day.

The sample sale includes products such as:

- Saarinen Tulip Tables from £199 (previously priced from £480)

- Florence Knoll Marble Coffee Tables from £549 (previously priced from £1164)

- Saarinen Tulip Chairs from £499 (previously priced from £984)

- Tulip Dining Tables from £756 (previously priced from £1512)

Look out for the Knoll Star Buy: an iconic Black Barcelona chair will be selling for £899 instead of its usual retail price of £4572.

Knoll is also offering a 15% discount on all orders on existing collections.

The Design Museum is marking the 80th birthday of the UK’s grandfather of design – Sir Terence Conran – with a major exhibition that explores his impact on contemporary life in Britain and abroad.

TERENCE CONRAN – THE WAY WE LIVE NOW

16th November 2011 – 4th March 2012

DESIGN MUSEUM

Shad Thames, London SE1 2YD (020 7940 8790)

The Way We Live Now explores Conran’s impact whilst painting a picture of his design approach and inspirations. The exhibition traces his career from postwar austerity through to the new sensibility of the Festival of Britain in the 1950s, the birth of the Independent Group and Pop Culture of the 1960s, to the design boom of the 1980s on to the present day.

The serial entrepreneur has transformed the look of the British home. He has established a design studio and an architectural practice with a worldwide reach. He was the founder of Habitat and The Conran Shop and a pioneer of the new restaurant culture driven by a passion for simplicity.

When it comes to design, business, food and ‘lifestyle’, there is little this man hasn’t achieved. Now in his 80th year, he has certainly contributed considerably to The Way We Live Now.

Images – from top: Terence Conran, photographed by Neil Wilder, John Parkinson Agency; Terence Conran circa 1950, photographed by Ray Williams

Now in its fifth year, the SuperDesign event returns with a collective exhibition of specially commissioned studio pieces by both well known and emerging designers, taking place at The Dairy in Bloomsbury.

SUPERDESIGN, 13th-17th October 2011

THE DAIRY

7a Wakefield Street, London WC1N 1PG

SuperDesign seeks to emphasise the current synergy between design and the visual arts with inventive displays that present contemporary design in a fresh light. Yearly, this show brings together collections from leading galleries and international designers at a crucial time in the art calendar year, during Frieze Art Fair.

Galleries include The Apartment, Nilufar, Spring Projects and Vessel Gallery.

SuperDesign, devised by gallerist Patrick Brillet, has cemented its reputation as an important exhibition of contemporary design-art pieces. The event is open both to the general public and to an audience of international collectors, critics and designers.

It’s official! The new edition of LONDON DESIGN GUIDE 2012-2013 is now available, featuring totally new content and plenty of great features. Order your copy now for only £12 and we will dispatch it to you wherever you are in the world.

LONDON DESIGN GUIDE 2012-2013 gives a fresh insight into the city’s contemporary and vintage retailers, as well as design galleries, museums and bookshops. All 140 new and established hotspots are compiled and reviewed by design commentator Max Fraser.

Shops are categorised by neighbourhood and accompanied by detailed maps – plus walking tours written by local tastemakers including Sheridan Coakley, Tom Dixon and Kit Kemp – to help navigate the best that the city has to offer.

You’ll find restaurant, bar and cafe recommendations, selected as much for their design credentials as for the quality of food and service.

And we’ve commissioned 10 short essays by local experts including Naomi Cleaver, Hugh Pearman, Benjamin Hubert and Libby Sellers, each discussing an aspect of the industry, be it designing, producing, selling, communicating, collecting, even discarding design.

The 2012-2013 edition also introduces 4×4, a new 16-page supplement featuring the top furniture, lighting and accessories designs available in London design stores. The survey does your homework for you, evaluating the designs based on quality and longevity.

The 208-page LONDON DESIGN GUIDE is a snapshot of the design scene today, a celebration of creativity and a practical tool for Londoners and tourists alike. There’s no better incentive for exploring the wealth of design in the capital.

It’s “a must-read” according to the New York Times.

Publisher: Spotlight Press

Editor: Max Fraser

Book designer: Richard Ardagh Studio

Cover designer: Peter Crawley 

We’re giving away a ND105 stool worth £475, in partnership with the UK importer and retailer Sigmar. Designed in 1962 by Danish cabinetmaker Nanna Ditzel, the collectible design continues to be handmade today by a small rural workshop in Denmark. Enter our competition to win! Entry deadline: Monday 3rd October 2011.

The stool, also known as the ‘Toadstool’, was originally designed by the legendary Nanna Ditzel for her children and has only ever been produced by small cabinetmaking companies. It was the only other piece of furniture in the home of Danish architect and designer Finn Juhl that he didn’t design himself and the one piece that Ditzel asked to have by her side on her deathbed in 2005.

Measuring 400mm wide x 440mm high, the stools (which also double as side tables) are made of solid oak and oiled for a natural finish which will only become richer with time. Nanna Ditzel developed the shape over a period of 20 years and it now consists of 10 different stools and tables ranging from £340-£995 depending on size.

THIS COMPETITION IS NOW CLOSED. Congratulations to our winner, Harry Ledwith!

London’s Design Museum is celebrating items from its permanent collection in an exhibition titled ‘This is Design’, which examines the impact of design on the modern world and how it shapes our lives and contemporary culture.

‘THIS IS DESIGN’, 24th August 2011-22nd January 2012

DESIGN MUSEUM

Shad Thames, London SE1 2YD (020 7940 8790)

The collection contains pieces ranging from early items of mass manufacture through to cutting edge contemporary design and includes furniture, fashion, transport, products, ceramics and graphics. By using themes such as Identity, Manufacturing Innovations, the Digital Revolution and Lifecycle the exhibition looks at how design provides a visual language to help use the objects around us.

Prototypes, drawings, couture samples, models, first editions and finished industrial objects are on display demonstrating the design process and subsequent influence of design on the contemporary culture. The exhibition also explores ‘quiet’ design, demonstrating how design surrounds us and how whether accidental or subtle, design plays a role in shaping the way we live and enables us to understand the world around us.

In the forthcoming new home for the museum at the former Commonwealth Institute in Kensington, there will be a dedicated gallery space to display the collection and celebrate the importance of design through a permanent display.

Images – from top: Vespa Clubman, designed by Corradino d’Ascanio (1946); National traffic light system (1966); Road Signage, designed by Margaret Calvert and Jock Kinnear (1965); Anglepoise Lamp Type 1227 (1934); Candlestick Telephone (circa 1920). Images courtesy of Design Museum.

‘Sitting and Looking’ is an exhibition at Somerset House that brings together a juxtaposition of bespoke 21st-century design objects by ten renowned artists. Curated by internationally acclaimed furniture designers Jim Partridge and Liz Walmsley, visitors are encouraged to consider, sit amongst and even touch the objects, some of which are for sale.

‘SITTING AND LOOKING’, 30th June – 5th September 2011

SOMERSET HOUSE

Strand, City of London WC2R 1LA

Garry Fabian Miller – Burning (with Gwen)

Exhibits include ‘camera-less’ experimental photography from Garry Fabian Miller and Thomas Heatherwick’s innovative use of engineering, with his versatile seating made from planks of wood.

Interior of UK Pavilion, Shanghai Expo 2010 by Heatherwick Studio

Show RCA, Royal College of Art‘s annual postgraduate exhibition, returns this year to showcase the next generation of artists, designers, writers and thinkers simultaneously for the first time since the 2007 Great Exhibition. Show RCA 2011 features a culmination of the studio work and research of 431 graduating art and design students in a range of disciplines.

SHOW RCA 2011, 24th June-3rd July 2011

ROYAL COLLEGE OF ART

Kensington Gore, London SW7 2EU

Catherine Aitken – Textiles. Top: Louis Thompson – Ceramics & Glass

Jack Smith – Design Products

Makiko Nakamura – Ceramics & Glass with Marina Dragomirova – Design Products

Pia Wustenberg – Design Products

Sarah Wiberley – Ceramics & Glass