Objects of Use | Oxford

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A few weeks ago me and my university group headed to Oxford to check out the History of Science museum (which I will write about in another post but long story short the museum have asked us to create things for their gift-shop). While in Oxford we checked out a little shop called  Objects of Use for some ideas of how we can create things to fit within the museum. This shop has really sweet and all very useful things. There was kitchen ware, bathroom toiletries, children toys, all sorts. They stock items that have little environmental and production impact by using natural materials and the majority of their items are manufactured in the UK, Europe and Japan. Also all of their things went well together, it all felt like everything had been carefully picked for the feel of the shop. Here are some photographs of the things they supply.

I think you'll agree that the tags are a very sweet idea and quite comforting. You get to know a little bit about the object, the materials, where/ how it was made, the history behind it. The tags make the object seem to make the object more special and unique.

Looking at the museum and Objects of Use its very clear to me that we should create things that will fit well with the feel of the museum and gift shop, be well made and sustainable and also be unique, be something that you wouldn't find anywhere else. I feel that it should also be something that you can take away that is special and represent the museum itself and the knowledge that it holds as if you are taking a piece of the museum home with you.
I feel that knowing where and how what you are buying has been made is important but I don't think the idea of using tags fits well with the museum but maybe we could create some stickers or something similar to stick on the pack of the packing so that people have some information about what they are buying.

Short but sweet post today, thank you for reading and I hope that you enjoyed. If you are ever in Oxford you should check out Objects of Use even if you're not planning to buy anything, I'll link their website below if you fancy a browse or want to buy anything from them. See you next Wednesday! x

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Objects of Use: http://www.objectsofuse.com/

A Visit To Somerset House | London Design Biennal 2016 | Part 2

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Hello, a few weeks algo I popped on a train to visit Somerset House in London to look at the Design Biennal exhibition. The exhibition showcased the work of different artists exploring the theme Utopia to different countries. This is two.

  This exhibition was very interesting and everything had an element of fascination to it. I won't go through everything I saw but will pick a few things that I found interesting and things I didn't find interesting and explore why - I'm going to write a part one and part two for these. I actually didn't like much from this exhibition when looking at the the work but I liked how in a way it took you to another place, it felt enchanted. Many of the installations where interactive, you could walk through the work, touch it, hear it and be apart of it.

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Things I didn't find interesting.

Top Left to Right: India - Chakraview . Saudi Arabia - Water Machine | Bottom Left to Right: Sweden - Welcome to Weden . The United Arab Emirates - Al Falaj Water Systems of the Gulf's Oases

India - Chakraview

This installation was in a large room with a smaller room at the back of it. To the side of you the walls were filled with traditional textiles ancient mythology weaved together to create a sense of modern India, above you were hanging tassel chandeliers and the floor (along with the back wall) was like a mirror girded like a disco floor. The installation is to show India's multiple utopias to explore the continuities between India's past and future. To me these looked cheap and tacky by the materials chosen and I don't like the printed textiles nor the mix of colours however I do like effect of the layering of the hanging circles.

Administering Body - India Design Forum (IDF)
Designer - Sumant Jayakrishnan
Curator - Rajshree Pathy (Founder, IDF)
Supporting Body - Aditya Birla Group (Principal Sponsor)


Saudi Arabia - Water Machine

This installation created by sisters Noura and Basma Bouzo is trying to highlight the need for global structural change towards sustainable use of resources and I found it somewhat disappointing.  You couldn't actually use the coin hole to buy a blue ball (water) and also I feel the idea doesn't really work, this installation is a gumball machine but instead of giving out sweets, it gives you water. As a kid there used to be these ''gumball'' machines that gave out bouncy balls, so this installation just reminds me of them. I also find it very hard to take this piece seriously for its wariness about usage on resources as gumballs are fun and not serious. 

Administering Body - Saudi Design Week

Design Team - Basma Bouzo, Noura Bouzo
Curators - Basma Bouzo, Noura Bouzo
Supporting Bodies - Alf Khair; Baraboux; Saudi British Sociiety; Oasis Magazine


Sweden - Welcome to Weden

I don't think much of this installation, I feel it's just a collection of home decorations but I think that the concertina surface they are sat on is interesting. This installation is looking at design and manufacturing as collaborative work, inviting 15 designers and manufacturers to work together on different and more equal terms. The installation is inspired by the ''we'' in Sweden and wants to promote a more inclusive future society - a ''wetopia''. The designers and manufactures worked on this piece together towards smaller-scale and non-hierarchical local production challenging the existing model of unethical, far-flung and large-scale mass production.

Administering Body - The Embassy of Sweden, London 

Design Team - Form/Design Center (producer); Katja Pettersson (exhibition architecture); Varv Varv (graphic design)

Curator - Jenny Nordberg
Supporting Bodies - Ministry for Foreign Affairs; Swedish Arts Council; The Swedish Institute; Department of Culture, City of Malmo

The United Arab Emirates - Al Falaj: Water Systems of the Gulf's Oases

As like the gumball machine I'm kind of disappointed with this installation, I really enjoy minicher things like mini towns and was excited by the little palm trees but there's hardly any detail to these little towns. The installation shows how A1 Falaj: Water Systems of the Gulf's could be relevant to the UAE's rapidly growing cities by giving private realms somewhere to meet, facilitating exchange, dividing water, a measured way of allocating resources in a hot and dry climate creating a utopian idea in nature. I feel like this installation doesn't give us that idea of what benefits A1 Falaj; water system can give as it only shows you the layout of the water system.

Administering Body - Cultural Engineering
Design Team - Cultural Engineering; Case Design
Curators - Rashid Bin Shabib, Ahmed Bin Shabib, Samuel Barclay, Anne Geenen
Supporting Body - Embassy of the UAE in London, UK

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Thank you for reading and I hope you enjoyed. I have done another post talking about the things I did find interesting, linked below. I will also link below the website to London Design Biennale 2016 if you are interested seeing more. See you next week! xx

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Part one: http://vaartanddesign.blogspot.co.uk/2016/10/a-visit-to-somerset-house-london-design.html

London Design Biennale 2016: https://www.somersethouse.org.uk/visual-arts/london-design-biennale-2016

A Visit To Somerset House | London Design Biennal 2016 | Part 1

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Hello, a few weeks algo I popped on a train to visit Somerset House in London to look at the Design Biennal exhibition. The exhibition showcased the work of different artists exploring the theme Utopia to different countries. This is part one. 

  This exhibition was very interesting and everything had an element of fascination to it. I won't go through everything I saw but will pick a few things that I found interesting and things I didn't find interesting and explore why - I'm going to write a part one and part two for these. I actually don't like much from this exhibition when looking at the the work but I liked how in a way it took you to another place, it felt enchanted. Many of the installations where interactive, you could walk through the work, touch it, hear it and be apart of it.


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Things I found interesting

Top left to right: Austria - LeveL . Indonesia - Freedome | Bottom left to right: Japan - A Journey Around the Neighbourhood Globe . The Netherlands - Design Diorama The Archive as a Utopic Environment

Austria - LeveL

This installation is interactive where you can move within the mobiles. As you move you may push them around or as you walk create a draft that will move them and the LED lights will dimmer. They seem so delicate and fragile that you don't want to move around within them and look at their beauty from the outside. This installation is all about balance and reflects on how the idea of an utopia couldn't work as it's not a stable reality.

Administering Body - Austria Design Net
Design Team - Mischer'traxler Studio
Curator - Thomas Geisler / MAK Vienna
Supporting Bodies - Federal Chancellery of Austria - Arts and Culture; Advantage Austria; Austrian Cultural Forum London


Indonesia - Freedome

At first thoughts to me this was some sort of alien planet and the bowl at the top was their spaceship. It even made noises like a spaceship as it span round and flashed blue, it was even hovering over the dome to give it the illusion of defying gravity to suggest an ''open staellite''. Some of the balls of coir also span around and to me these where like little homes for the aliens.

To my disappointment this installation was not inspired by aliens but by a Utopian enterprise - the 1955 Asian-African Conference, held in Indonesian - Bandung. It is to represent the continuing search for the principles in Bandung Charter; independence, equality, humanity and peace.

Administering Body - Indonesia Agency for Creative Economy 

Design Team - Adi Purnomo, Irwan Ahment, Bagus Pandega

Curators - Danny Wicaksono, Diana Nazil, Hafiz Rancajale, Hermawan Tanzil.

Japan - A Journey Around the Neighbourhood Globe

When I first walked into the room I saw the inflated human figure, titled ''Napping Traveller'' which was very impressive due to it's large scale but I didn't feel that impressed by the rest of the room. It wasn't till I turned around to leave the room that I saw the photograph framed on the wall above a fire place. In my eyes this photograph was the moon and was amazed by it's beauty. This photograph is actually an apple, titled ''Constellation of Apples'' and if you take a closer look around the room you can see the elements of the apple. There is an apple in the glass box with glass figures of ''Napping Traveller'' and as you can see in the photograph of ''Napping Traveller'' there is a tv in the bottom left with an image of an apple, this room is a perfect example of development and exploring ideas.

This installation by Yashiro Suzuki promises to change the way you look at everyday things, which in fact it did for me looking at the photograph of an apple and thinking it was the moon. Suzuki likes to look at objects in a different view, a Japanse concept called ''mitate'' or  ''Looking at on thing as if it were another''. Suzuki says ''When they leave the room, visitors' way of looking at the world will have changed''. 

Administering Body - The Japan Foundation

Design Team - Yasuhiro Suzuki (Artist); Noriko Kawakami (Curatorial Advisor); Hiroshi Kashiwagi, Motomi Kawakami, Kozo Fujimoto, Noriko Kawakami (Advisory Committee)
Supporting Bodies - WOW inc.; Mediaturge Inc; ROCKET Project (Research Center for Advanced Science and Technology, The University of Tokyo)

The Netherlands - Design Diorama: The Archive as a Utopic Environment

This installation is a foam diorama of it's own creates's homes and is about the power of objects and the designers relations to the world. This display explores how designers keep their own archive, but also asks questions on how institutions collect history.

For me this installation makes me feel very confused about how I feel about it. This one is my favourite out of the whole exhibition, I love how clean and comforting it looks yet oddly unsettling. I feel as though the unsettling feeling is created by the lighting making it dreary and also the fact that it feels sanitary as if it was a babies bedroom (created by the blue colour) or a hospital room. Depending on how you feel about babies bedrooms and hospital rooms will probably alter how you feel about this installation. Though the fact that everything is the same colour makes it very satisfying. I feel like we don't know enough about the objects to see what the narrative is and I think that this piece would have been more powerful if you could walk among the objects creating a better connection between them and you.

Administering Body - Het Nieuwe Instituut

Design Team - Studio Makkink & Bey
Curators - Studios Makkink & Bey
Supporting Bodies - Embassy of the Kingdom og the Netherlands in London; Dutch Ministry of Education, Culture and Science

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Thank you for reading and I hope you enjoyed. I will be doing a part two to this post talking about the things I didn't find interesting so do come back and have a look next week.xx

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Utopia Project | Pages 1,2&3

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Hello! I have finished some of the pages in my sketchbook and would like to show and talk to you about it. Like I've said before I've been using it like a scrapbook and I plan to continue this throughout my book.

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PAGE1.

Page one is a combination of research of Utopia and things that I would include in my own utopia.

I've used a mix of collarging methods where I have stuck objects and layered paper over the top of each other. Using masking tape to stick them in place.

I have some photocopies from out of books, a photocopy of a postcard, a mind map, some writing about the postcard, some leaves and some writing about utopia which reads; Mid 16th Century based on Greek ou not + topos place; first used ''Utopia'' (1516) by sir Thomas More.

This is a mind map which I used to pick things from this world that I love and would take with me to my own utopia. I've just used a brio pen for this and tried to make it as busy as possible.

I wrote things like snow, crunchy leaves, flowers, Christmas lights...

I might plan to draw some of these things later on in my book.

This is a map of Utopia by Ambrosius Holbein, from Froben edition of March 1518, photocopied from Tomas More's Utopia, published in 1516.

I love the look of this map but I thought the map of Utopia would be much bigger then this!

I have also written about the other things on this page that you can read about here: Sketchbook Sneak Peeks | Utopia Project










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PAGE2.

As I said before I'm going to try and continue the whole scrapbook theme so here again I have used collarging and masking tape to stick down the things on this page.

Theres brown paper that got printed out wrong - notes about it, a photocopy of the Utopian alphabet and a quote I pulled out of Dylan Evans ''The Utopia Experiment'' on page 28.

The quote reads; ''To call something utopia is, of course, not entirely positive. The connotation of a perfect society is offset by that of a hopelessly impractical ideal.''

I agree with Evans on this statement because even if you was to create your own utopia it would have many problems, kind of like a film with plot holes.

Utopian alphabet with a quatrain in that language followed by a translation into Latin, from the Froben edition of March 1518. Photocopied from Thomas More's Utopia 1516.

I have also talked about the missed print on the brown paper over on my other post, that you can read here: Sketchbook Sneak Peeks | Utopia Project












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PAGE3.

This page shows research from Disney's (cartoon) ''Alice in Wonderland'' and Lewis Carroll's ''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland''. I've also included a quote from Dylan Evans ''The Utopia Experiment''

I've hand wrote the quote in the bottom right and it reads: ''...we might dream of a perfect society, we will never find it in this world''.

In the bottom left I have typed up the lyrics of two songs sang in the Disney's cartoon version of ''Alice in Wonderland'', In a ''World of my Own'' and ''Very Good Advice''.

In a ''World of my Own'' Alice sings about having her own world, at the top of the page I have wrote about this being like her own utopia. In ''Very Good Advice'' she sings how she has got herself into trouble and in my writing I've said how her own utopia becomes a dystopia as she doesn't want to be there any longer.

This is page 33 photocopied from Lewis Carrol's ''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland''.

I've included it into my book because it reminds me of my miss print on the brown paper and got me thinking about how Wonderland seemed perfect to Alice at the start but then turned out to be a kind of dystopia.

If I have missed anything on these pages that you would like to see/ read about I have another post I did before hand with the missing things on, that you can read here: Sketchbook Sneak Peeks | Utopia Project





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Thanks for reading! I hope you have enjoyed this post and it has given you some ideas for your own sketchbooks and research! Be sure to check out my other social medias linked below.xx

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Sketchbook Sneak Peeks | Utopia Project

Hey hey, I have been working on my sketchbook for my utopia project. I have found more things that I would like to place in my perfect world. Here are some photographs I have taken of things I have suck into my sketchbook. I have been using it like a scrap book as I find that easiest to work with and I think it makes it look really interesting. 

Here is a happy accident. I have tried to create the effect of typewriter on brown paper with the definitions of utopia that I found on the internet. My printer wasn't happy with the brown paper, I'm not sure why but it chewed it up. Though it didn't go to plan I am happy with the outcome, the writing has been distorted - moved - enlarged - miss printed. This works really well for the idea against utopia - dystopia. 

This is a photocopy of a postcard stuck in with masking tape. The postcard is of 101 Dalmations 1961 - Characters Roger Radcliffee and Pongo. 
The reason I have chosen to include this postcard is because of the house they live in. In my perfect world I would live in an old town house/ a house built in the 1930s which is furnished with antiques such as things shown in the postcard - the fireplace - piano - chairs, I also love to have a vintage record player and type-writer. Being made in the 1930s the ceilings would be high and I'd convert the attic so that I could have an art studio. The walls around/in the house would be covered in prints/art with mix and matched frames that are different woods and colours. I'd be married to/have a partner who is tall and blonde similar to Roger. The house would be located near the back of a small town - I've described it being like Stars Hallow from Gilmore Girls in previous posts. The town would then be surrounded by fields and there would be many fur trees that the town would decorate around Christmas time.

I have stuck this leaf into my sketchbook using little strips of masking tape. I have chosen this leaf because I think it is stereotypically a autumn/winter leaf and I wanted something to represent that my utopia would be autumn most of the time. I have written in previous posts that I would still keep spring and summer but I have deiced that I want my world to be 80% autumn and 20% winter. When it is winter it will be snowy a lot of the time. 













Leafs, writing and printed up text.
I have also suck in a bay leaf, its from my dads bay tree and again I have suck it in using little strips of masking tape. I chose it because of the colour it has - it's hard to tell in this photograph but it is a very dark red brown colour which I think works perfectly for the idea of autumn as again they are stereotypically autumn colours. 
The writing is just my handwriting explaining why I have stuck them in. 
The printed up text, I have also used the masking tape for (I just love masking tape)  this but I have covered the text in one strip. The masking tape is translucent so you can still read the text through it. The text is the same as the text of the brown paper (definitions of utopia) but obviously has printed out correctly. The text reads as ''Modelled on or aiming for a state in which everything is perfect; Idealistic''. I think the masking tape works well with the idea of my utopia as it gives it a rustic feel that I want my utopia to have.




That's all I have for now, thank you for reading and be sure to check out my other social medias!x

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