10 Things to See at LDF 2021

Over the past near-two-decades, London Design Festival has championed the power of design across multiple disciplines and celebrated its place in the capital. Now, in its 19th year, the links between London, creativity and the economy have become even more explicit: the event specifically bills itself as “exploring the power of creative and cultural activity to help reignite the capital and kick-start London’s economy.”

This year’s festival identity has once again been designed by Pentagram, which has created the LDF graphics since 2007. The only consistent element running though the branding for each year has been the bold red and white colour palette, while other elements have responded to and anticipated trends in form, typography and overall aesthetics. 

Titled Form, this year’s identity uses type to explore ideas around dimensional depth. Domenic Lippa, Partner at Pentagram, who has created the festival’s graphics since its inception, said: “Our lives are multi-dimensional, and so is design. All design has shape, structure and yes, form. It can change and develop and can inform the space it inhabits. And this includes our society.”  

Taking place from 18-26 September 2021, the festival features a series of outdoor installations, exhibitions and special events; and follows last year’s event, which was one of the few to plough on (albeit in limited physical formats) despite the pandemic fallout for most cultural goings-on in 2020. Ben Evans, London Design Festival director, says, “Cultural and creative activity is a powerful tool to help reignite the city and kick-start London’s economy. London Design Festival will provide the public and visitors with an opportunity to take to the streets to discover new pockets of London, and find works by leading designers and emerging talent, while enjoying all the city has to offer.” 

Sir John Sorrell, London Design Festival Chairman, adds, “We hope that this year’s Festival will not only be seen by those in London but audiences all around the world, and that we’re able to demonstrate that design will be at the heart of the future.” 

Here, we round up some of the things we’re most excited about seeing this year.

Tokyo 1964: Designing Tomorrow, 18-26 September

Held at Japan House London, this exhibition  explores the design strategy and legacy of the Tokyo 1964 Olympic Games through its pictograms (the first ever for sports, apparently); the original Games posters; and the award-winning Tokyo 1964 symbol designed by Kamekura Yūsaku.

According to Japan House, the exhibition “shows how a group of young Japanese designers and architects harnessed the opportunity presented by the 1964 Olympic Games to reframe the country’s profile and tell a fresh story to the world,” and demonstrates the impact that these designs have had on all subsequent major international sporting events in Japan.  

 ‘Looking For A Certain Ratio’ by Pentagram, 18-26 September

If you’re as much of an early-Eno-meganerd as I, then as soon as you read the exhibition title “looking for a certain ratio” (especially with those not-accidental quotation marks), you’ll instantly be singing his gorgeous 1974 track The True Wheel. If you’re most archly post-punk inclined, maybe you’ll think of A Certain Ratio. If you’re all about design and nothing but design, you’ll possibly think of ratios; likewise geometry/statistics. Whichever way you’re inclined, it’s certainly a smart title from LDF stalwarts Pentagram.

The exhibition, ‘Looking for a Certain Ratio,’ takes place at 14 Cavendish Square in the Mayfair Design District, and presents graphic art by Pentagram partner Angus Hyland and works on stone by illustrator Marion Deuchars. Hyland’s compositions explore different relationships between three or more individual points, referencing  three different systems: the golden ratio, the ISO paper system (where all the ‘A’ sizes are based on the square root of 2) and the rule of thirds, “which broadly speaking means that if a third of the space is filled, your composition will have a natural balance,” Pentagram explains. 

Deuchers’ works in stone, meanwhile, take individual elements and combine them into compositions that vary from the pointendly message-based to the entirely abstract.  

Rye Here, Rye Now at Peckham Levels, 25-26 September

Taking place on the fifth and sixth floors of Peckham Levels on Rye Lane in south London, this year marks the first ever collaboration between  Rye Here, Rye Now and Peckham Levels for a two day festival of Doodle Talks, workshops, a maker’s market and an exhibition.  

Rye Here Rye Now is a Peckham-based monthly meet up co-founded in September 2017 by designers Miho Aishima and Kat Garner. It aims to form a community to bring together graphic designers, illustrators, design thinkers, photographers, filmmakers, artists and other creatives in a social setting. 

100 Days of Gratitude by Justyna Green, 18-26 September

Taking place in Islington, north London, this exhibition features 100 portraits of creatives and what they’re grateful for by illustrator and On Design podcast host Justyna Green. The project was born from the idea that even in tough life situations, there’s always something to be grateful for, according to LDF.

Prints are being sold at the exhibition/pop-up shop and online for £100, with 10% of all sales being donated to charity.  Among the project participants are creatives from Anyways Creative, Google, WIRED, Time Out, Cockpit Arts, Handsome Frank, Dezeen, WePresent and other companies, as well as  independent artists, creative directors, designers, musicians and curators. 

“As the project submissions came in from across the world, it quickly became apparent that we have a lot in common and that we might not be as divided and fearful as the news would have us believe,” says Green. “Some of the common themes found in the exhibition include portraits of loved ones, gratitudes for the little rituals in life, appreciation of nature as well as love of our creative pursuits.”

Diaspora mural by Sara Abdalla/Creative Visionaries Studio, 18-26 September

Sara Abdalla is a multidisciplinary Scottish Egyptian mural artist, maker, activist and teacher working with hand painting, relief printing, photography, type and collage. She’s also founder of Creative Visionaries studio, a London-based community interest group that provides access to arts and crafts workshops for marginalised and underrepresented youth, aiming to give them a safe space to explore, engage, learn and create. 

For London Design Festival this year, Abdalla has created a hand-painted mural in Tybalds housing estate in Holborn, Central London. She describes it as a “representation of the diverse mix of people living” there, using “vibrant colours and shapes [that] bring positivity and cheer reflecting the community, diversity and multiculturalism that make London and Britain great.”

Art of Ping Pong and Campbell Hay, 18-26 September

Another playful, colourful use of public space here in the shape of a collaboration between Art of Ping Pong and Campbell Hay, which has resulted in eight  uniquely designed ping pong tables. The designers are inspired by the idea of opposition, aiming to “capture the dynamic nature and signature moves of ping pong”. The designers have created accompanying AR-based  Instagram filters to further bring the typographic tables to life through animation that allows viewers to see them “bounce, smash and block,” we’re told.

On show at Islington Square, north London, two of the tables will remain as permanent installations, while six smaller ‘ArtTables’ are displayed in a gallery setting at Islington Square when not in use.

It’s a Sign by DN&Co, 18 September

Over in the Southwark Design District., design agency DN&Co has orchestrated an exhibition celebrating all things signed, “from hastily scrawled arrows to nationwide motorway signage systems.”

Showcasing work from some of today’s leading designers and architects working in wayfinding, the show “points the way to the beauty of the humble sign” with “uplifting surprising pieces of everyday design and the stories behind them.” An exhibition catalogue immortalising the signs on show is also going on sale, with proceeds going to Southwark homelessness charity Manna Society.

Shaping Space: Modelling, Making And Activism / Save Ralph by Andy Gent Arch Film Studio, Victoria And Albert Museum, 18-26 September

Renowned stop motion puppet-maker Andy Gent has worked on films including Wes Anderson’s Isle of Dogs (2018) and The French Dispatch (2021), and Tim Burton’s The Corpse Bride (2005). At the LDF festival hub, the V&A, sets and a puppet from his new short film, Save Ralph (2021) will be on show. As the still images suggest, this is no cutesy romp: the film was produced to campaign for the end of animal testing by the cosmetics industry, so things get a lot Watership Down than, say, Farthing Wood. The show is also part of the Shaping Space – Architectural Models Revealed free exhibition opening on 24 September 2021 at the Building Centre in Bloomsbury.  

Sonic Bloom, Yuri Suzuki,18-26 September

Another Pentagram-associated offer here in the shape of Sonic Bloom by sound artist, Pentagram partner and designer, Yuri Suzuki. Billed as “a community-focused, multi-sensory installation exploring the nature of communication through the interactive deployment of sound,” this iteration of the piece has been curated by Alter-Projects to form a “unique digital experience to be shared globally” from its physical LDF home in Brown Hart Gardens, Mayfair.

The piece takes the form of a network of colourful horn-shaped elements that together create an interactive flower. The sculpture amplifies the sounds absorbed from the surroundings and transports voice recordings from people at street level through its stems. 

As such, the artwork invites participants to listen on one side, and speak on the other, all the while observing Covid-19 safety regulations. “On one hand, it enhances the music of the city that often goes unnoticed: birdsong, leaves rustling and passers by. On the other, it invites visitors to record their own voices through the horns, emerging on the other side of the listening tubes,” say organisers. The digital version uses a website that transforms participants’ voice recordings into flower animations which are planted on a map of Mayfair and which invite others to collaborate on the flower design.

Emerging designer film showcase by the V&A Youth Collective, 18-26 September

Members of the  V&A Youth Collective will be showcasing three emerging designers through films documenting their career journeys and creative processes, aiming “to inspire the next generation.”

The works use various modes of moving image creation to respond to the climate crisis:  Richard Ashton, co-founder of climate club Adapt, for instance, uses design, art, humour and contemporary culture to communicate climate issues and reframe climate activism. Meanwhile Grace Emily Manning’s interdisciplinary approach is driven by environmentalism, encompassing film, performance and experimental storytelling; and Scarlett Yang challenges waste in the fashion industry through developing innovative approaches at the intersection of fashion, design and technology.