What's on in London this month: the best design events, craft shows and architectural talks happening in October

From pop-up events showcasing over 50 vintage dealers, to a celebration of Sixties design, here are the best design events happening across the capital this month.
Barbara Chandler10 October 2019

1. The Knitting and Stitching Show

From today until Sunday at Alexandra Palace, Wood Green, N22. Free shuttle buses from Wood Green and Alexandra Palace stations.

Tickets: £16 online, £19 on the door.

Reader offer: show this paper/your device and get two tickets for the price of one (theknittingandstitchingshow.com/london).

The craft boom continues unabated and this show embraces its soft side, from embroidery, quilting, knitting and weaving to needle felting, crochet, lace making and dressmaking.

Go to be initiated or to perfect your skills at over 250 workshops, talks and demos, including a dressmaking studio and live catwalk shows of capsule pattern collections.

Buy essential supplies from around 350 exhibitors — fabric, yarn, sewing machines, haberdashery, patterns and kits.

Be inspired by 21 leading contemporary textile artists and groups from all over the world.

Relax in the “craft village,” or at a prosecco bar in the Grand Hall, or in one of the venue’s many cafés.

2. Midcentury East

Sunday, October 13 at Haggerston School, Weymouth Terrace, E2. Opens 10am-4pm.

Tickets: deals online include £9 all day; two for £10, entry from 1pm; free “taster” ticket after 3pm. Or £10 on the door, last entry 3.30pm (modernshows.com).

The perfect venue for a midcentury pop-up show, this school hall was designed by Ernő Goldfinger, as was nearby Balfron Tower, of which developers Londonewcastle are coming to chat about brutalist architecture.

Browse 55 top vintage dealers under one brutalist roof showing an eclectic mix from rare collectibles to functional furniture, striking posters, quirky lighting, Berber rugs, ceramics, jewellery and glass.

Or bag a status-laden 20th-century icon, such as a Grand Prix chair by Arne Jacobsen.

New exhibitors include Studio Yaya, sauce.ldn, Danish Vintage Jewellery, Modern Home and Turner V&R.

3. Made London: Marylebone

October 24-27 at One Marylebone (opposite Great Portland Street Underground station), NW1.

Tickets: £10; private view Thursday Oct 24, 6pm-9pm, £20 with wine and live band (madelondon-marylebone.co.uk).

What a wonderful venue for this design and craft fair — a gracious former church by Sir John Soane, the neoclassical architect celebrated for the Bank of England and his own two London houses.

It will host more than 100 designer makers of contemporary homewares, jewellery, textiles, metalwork, mixed media, art, wood, handcrafted furniture and ceramics — including Lucy Ogden Ceramics, whose orange seaweed plate is pictured above.

A new exhibitor is Bim Burton, fresh from London Design Festival where he showed his unusual upcycled chairs converted from enamelled baths.

Also meet Finnish Katriina Seppälä, with her finely crafted cutlery.

4. Urushi Wajima: New Work by Max Lamb

Until October 26 at Gallery Fumi, 2 Hay Hill, W1 (galleryfumi.com).

One of London’s most original designer makers, Max Lamb’s chunky, hand-carved style is his hallmark.

Urushi is the 9,000-year-old Japanese art of lacquering and to explore it, Lamb has been many times since 2013 to Wajima, its homeland.

The process can take months, as multiple craftsmen apply numerous slow-drying coats of resinous sap with a final skilful finish of great beauty and depth.

On display are Lamb’s lacquered three-legged stools, plus tables, cabinets, shelves, benches and chairs.

5. Bamalama Takes a Trip: A Celebration of Sixties Design

Oct 21 to Dec 21 at Bamalama, 55 Leather Lane, EC1 (020 7404 6512; bamalamaposters.co.uk).

Posters can transform a wall and this show celebrates the anarchic world of Sixties music that spawned a spate of iconic band logos and psychedelic art.

Even gig flyers that were slapped on lamp posts are now collectors items.

Uniquely for this show, graphic artist Nigel Waymouth — of Sixties design duo Hapshash and the Coloured Coat, and co-founder of the iconic Granny Takes a Trip King’s Road boutique — is re-releasing early Hapshash artwork as limited-edition prints priced from £95.

Particularly timely is their SAVE EARTH NOW poster from 50 years ago.

Prices range from £300 for the one-off 1970 Progressive Pop Festival poster, up to £1,500.

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