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.

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 

The well-reputed Midcentury.Modern one-day show of vintage and contemporary interior products is back, this time in a new venue – Lord’s Cricket Ground – which compliments its usual location at Dulwich College.

MIDCENTURY.MODERN, Sunday 15th May 2011 (10am-4pm)

LORD’S CRICKET GROUND

Nursery Pavilion, North Gate, Wellington Road, London NW8 8QN

54 exhibitors, 44 dealers in mid-century and vintage, 6 garden design plus 4 upcyclers are exhibiting their wares for one-day only. Browse around some of Britain’s leading mid-century dealers of Scandinavian, European and American furniture and decorative arts. Some real gems are to be found.

The mix of older designs with contemporary pieces reflects the reality of most people’s homes and provides a welcome contrast within the show.

Visitors in the market to buy should arrive early to avoid disappointment.

The Modern Danish Warehouse returns for a second year with a new pop-up warehouse and a strong focus on old school furniture. This year, the Warehouse is collaborating with Playtype, a type foundry from Copenhagen.

BACK TO SCHOOL, 5th-20th March 2011

THE MODERN DANISH WAREHOUSE

The Garage, North Terrace, London SW3 2BA (07957 207 073)

For two weeks, The Art Deco Garage is home to 250 vintage chairs, tables, sideboards and sofas. Prices are competitive, ranging from £100 to £1,500. Everything can be taken home immediately after purchase.

Playtype’s elegant products, featuring various letters of the alphabet designed with their own fonts, will also be on offer in the form of T-Shirts, coffee mugs, posters, leather computer sleeves, wallets and decorative letters. Bespoke fonts will also be packaged and available to buy for downloading at home.

‘Shop’ at Her House Gallery is an exhibition comprising a collection of hand made ceramics and seat cushions by architect Vicky Thornton and the personal chair collection of designer Morag Myerscough.

SHOP, 10th-12th December 2010

HER HOUSE GALLERY

26 Drysdale Street, London N1 6LS (020 7729 2760)

Architect, writer and illustrator, Vicky Thornton’s latest project is a collection of seat pads. Thornton has upcycled her growing collection of 50s and 60s vintage textiles and also used them as inspiration for a collection of her own print designs, re-interpreting images from contemporary life like the iPod and takeaway coffee cup and printing them in bright, bold colour designs.

Sitting alongside the seat pads are Thornton’s hand-thrown stoneware ceramics, made using recycled ‘waste’ clay from the throwing and turning process. Her ceramics, ranging from jugs and cups to bowls and vases, all share a modernist aesthetic: simple forms and bold colours.

At the heart of SHOP is Myerscough’s personal chair collection. Unashamedly describing it as a ‘bit of an obsession’ the collection of vintage chairs has grown considerably over the last few years and acts as a backdrop for Thornton’s designs. The show also features a bench with lacquered legs and a reclaimed wood top, designed by Myerscough and the artist Luke Morgan – a new product under the Her House Gallery label.

Open from 11am-6pm.

Specialist in finely-crafted stationery, online shop Present & Correct is temporarily popping out of cyberspace into a physical Christmas ‘pop-in’ shop at House of Propellers gallery space in Clerkenwell.

PRESENT & CORRECT’S CHRISTMAS POP-IN SHOP

4th-21st December 2010

HOUSE OF PROPELLERS

5 Back Hill, London EC1R 5EN (020 7278 7287)

The gallery is being transformed into a festive vintage school classroom, complete with tree, candy cane decorations, school desks and blackboard.

Both new and carefully sourced vintage items are on sale, including rare and out-of-print books and posters. Prices start from just £2.50.

At the shop, you can find functional objects to help organise and decorate your home – desk tidies, calendars and vintage posters; books and games including classics by designers such as Bruno Munari, Charley Harper and Ken Garland.

A selection of vintage French school posters and English travel posters are also available, sourced especially for the event.

Furthermore, Christmas cards, vintage wrapping paper, gift tags, crackers and paper garlands are available. You can even write and post your Christmas cards via the special Present & Correct Christmas post box.

Fans of mid-century Scandinavian furniture and homewares should head over to the second ‘pøp üp butik’ from Lulu Bright, where one can find an edited selection of vintage pieces for sale throughout the Christmas season.

THE LULU BRIGHT CHRÎSTMÅS BUTIK

29th November 2010 – 1st January 2011

57 South End Road, London NW3 2QB (07535 637 731)

Pick up investment pieces by the likes of Wegner, Poulsen and Ekstrom, as well as smaller items such as pottery from Danish designer Per Linnemann-Schmidt, or 1950s cocktail sticks from Georg Jensen.

These Nordic treasures can be previewed on their website, although check availability in advance in case items have already sold.

Images, from top: ‘Curtis’ tea set from Rorstrand (c.1970); ‘Ruster’ chair by Yngve Ekstrom (1958); Cocktail sticks from Georg Jensen (c.1950); ‘LamPetit’ desk lamp by Louis Poulsen (1968)

Check out this successful one-day show of collectible designs from the last century, mixed in with contemporary future classics. Housed within Dulwich College in South London, Midcentury.Modern is a great opportunity to snap up rare or unusual products without high mark-up prices.

MIDCENTURY.MODERN, Sunday 14th November 2010 (10am-4pm)

Christison Hall, DULWICH COLLEGE

London SE21 7LD

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.

The full list of exhibitors can be seen on the Midcentury.Modern website.

This year sees the 4th edition of the Pavilion of Art and Design London, a key event as part of the Frieze Art Fair week. Fifty international dealers are gathering on Berkeley Square to present an historical panorama of covetable and iconic pieces from 1860 to the present day in the fields of Modern Art, Design, Decorative Arts, Photography and Tribal Art.

PAVILION OF ART AND DESIGN LONDON

13th-17th October 2010

Berkeley Square, London W1

PAD London covers a large spectrum of design and art and is considered one of the most exclusive rendez-vous during Frieze week. The event is conceived with meticulous care to meet the lofty expectations of a wealthy collecting audience.

Highlights include a strong first appearance from contemporary glass specialist Clara Scremini with a solo show of Czech glass master Frantisek Vizner, dramatic woodwork furniture by American artists Michael Coffey and Jack Rodgers, and the latest in interactive design form Carpenters Workshop Gallery.

Also showing at  PAD  London  is  a  new  project  conceived  by  curators  Janice  Blackburn  and  Nigel  Coates,  aimed  at  supporting  young  design  talents.  Drawing  from  the  departments  of  Architecture,  Ceramics,  Glass  and  Design  Products  at  the  Royal  College  of  Art,  the  curators  have  selected  some  twenty  pieces  from  this  year’s Graduate  Show  to  be  exhibited  at  the  fair . Fifteen percent of the profits generated from the sale of these works will go towards the RCA Student Fine Art Award Fund.

Images, from top: Faceted Console by Paul Evans; Untitled by Anish Kapoor (1998); Onyx Cabinet by Christophe Come (2002); Italian Walnut Console by Ico Parisi.

LuLu Bright is launching its first ‘pøp üp butik’ in London to present a diverse collection of authentic midcentury Scandinavian furniture and design pieces, providing a snapshot of Scandinavian design and lifestyle in Clerkenwell.

PØP ÜP BUTIK

1st – 11th September 2010

97-99 Clerkenwell Road, London EC1R 5BX (07535 637 731)

Jacobsen Stools – c1950

Primarily comprising of original Scandinavian furniture from prestigious designers such as Jacobsen, Wegner and Mogensen, the collection also has pieces inspired by the clean and minimalistic approach of the Nordic aesthetic.

Uosikkinen for Arabia Jars – 1966

Acquired from the infamous Mangano Collection of the Italian curator and promoteur of Finnish design, there’s also on show a selection of Arabia jars and iittala glasses designed by Timo Sarpaneva. In addition, the boutique features The Bright Finds – more affordable and regularly updated range of vintage products found and presented by Lou and Louie Bright.

‘Kekkerit’ Timo Sarpaneva for iittala – 1972

The opening of ‘pøp üp butik’ coincides with the launch of LuLu Bright’s new online boutique – lulubright.co.uk – where visitors can learn more about the fusion of practicality and sophistication that is typical for Scandinavian design. One can also browse and shop the entire LuLu Bright and The Brights Finds collections.

Ekstrom ‘Rustler’ Chair – 1959

Top image: Hvidt Coffee table – 1956, Larsson Armchair – c1950