Rivington Street, London

My very first professional job at the tender age of 20 (sadly so long ago now) was working with a Textile Designer named Kate Blee based in Rivington Street, now new(ishly) built up. At the time I remember having to walk through what was then a series of building sites to get to the studio, based above an Architectural practise along this street. Although I have been along here many times since I left Kate I don't ever remember looking at it with the same eyes. It does still appear to have that nightclub after the party feel about it - you know, when the main lights are switched on at the end of the night and you suddenly realise that the carpet is stained and sticky, the walls are falling down and your date is no longer as pretty as the flashing club lights led you to believe in fact, as the graphic says, Scary. Anyway, through serendipity I did find this place, in particular the window display below which is quite interesting. This is the home of YCN.72 - a place which showcases and provides a platform for emerging talent

Central St. Martins Interior Styling Course

The examples shown here are ones that I collected from recent students. The group were allocated just half an hour to produce these ideas. The students were given a 'word' as a starting point and then gathered objects, materials that informed a particular trend. Students had to think about the points of focus and composition while applying design principals. The group decided that it was far more effective to focus on the composition and close in on details, identifying colour, form, texture and pattern. Inspiration was found from editorial images while looking at lighting, focus, viewpoint and composition. In effect these have become a kind of three dimensional mood board which captures the essence of the trends they were working with.

Central St. Martins, Interior Design for Retail Course, Student Guest Blogger Elsa Sanchez

Elsa Sanchez: Industrial Designer, Mexico
This was my first time in London, another amazing city that never sleeps… this place offers lots of options and many things to enjoy, whatever you want to do is possible, great to party, great museums, wonderful shows, beautiful landscapes…and everywhere you feel different atmospheres but all of them have their own charm!
The first few days in my trip were really sunny, and while I was walking just in front of Dali´s museum, there was an ice sculpture just melting and losing its beautiful shape… I took some pictures and then, I realized that Big Ben, Thames River, the ice and the Sun were playing a fantastic composition just showing how I will remember London…

This below is an example in Mexico city in my work place. The display itself is inside the store rather than in a window, which I think is what is so interesting. This is the first time since we opened, that we have used a Mannequin and not in the window, just in one of the sets that illustrates to customers, our living room furniture.
This display was created to explain a service that we offer for people that are planning to get married, and is for those who want to buy their presents in our store for this kind of event. The mannequin represents a bride with some gifts around the furniture and accessories that we sell.

What do you think about our display at Casa Palacio Retail Store in Mexico?

Tiffany, Bond St., London

I don't normally photograph jewellery in store windows, although, Tiffany windows always present their product so creatively and incredibly well that I couldn't resist including it. They create a kind of game by making us hunt for the pieces within a amazing narrative based scheme, this one of course uses an under water theme with coral, sand and bubbles and the jewellery is seeming effortlessly placed within the scenario as if it had been dropped into the sea and floated to the bottom. Luxury brands really do get product presentation right and this is such a pleasure to view on my evening city wanderings.

Braganza House, Chandor, India

No visit to Chandor, India could ever be complete without visiting the Braganza House. This stunning old mansion dates back to the 17th Century and is in fact two houses owned by the same family - although as I understand it they haven't spoken to each other for generations. The mansion overall is furnished with priceless artefact's which include Ming vases, crystal chandeliers, fabulously hand carved furniture and its very own religious artifact - the finger nail of St. Francis Xavier. I was fortunate while on on my visit to meet Mrs. Braganza (who was at least 90 years old at the time) who lives in the West wing of the mansion and who told me stories of how during land reforms they had escaped during the night to Bangalore and were in hiding from the Portuguese regime in the 1960's. Of course, today it has an air of faded glory about it, however this is such a fantastic example of colonial living from a by gone age.

Harvey Nichols, Knightsbridge, London

Thankfully, London 'Sale' windows are gradually being replaced with more creative narratives which always bring me so much pleasure. Walking through Knightsbridge, here in London, I came across the new installation at Harvey Nichols. What is so interesting here are the links that can be identified between yesterdays blog and these windows. My students used 2mm plywood and began to visualise their two dimensional drawings into a three dimensional outcome. While the creatives at Harvey Nichols would not necessarily have produced these thinking or working in the same way, the end result illustrates how potent these ways of working can be and how they can have other applications, but ultimately, as is my intention, how we can move these concepts forward.

Working from 2-D to 3-D

During my students first term of their Design course I take them on a series of site visits t0 such places as Kew Gardens, The Science Museum, The Victoria and Albert Museum and the Imperial War Museum over a series of several weeks. This enables students firstly to work on their observational drawing skills and also to begin looking at recording the information with the theory of three dimensional Design firmly in their minds. During this time we also begin a series of model making exercises and translating their drawings into a variety of materials that they have never used before. Here are some examples of students work using two millimetre plywood which my students experimented with using their drawings from Kew Gardens, looking at Repetition, Radiation etc.

Central St. Martins, Interior Styling (Lifestyle Boards)

There are many types of presentation boards, each with their own titles and purposes. Essentially, they show all visual information relevant to a project and represent and Interior scheme or concept with the aid of product images and samples. It is far easier to 'sell' your concept to your client through visuals rather than through words alone.

Types of Presentation boards :
Sample boards - Illustrating surface finishes
Colour board - Communicating a colour scheme
Mood board - Similar to colour boards, although using inspirational imagery
Trend board - Defining and predicting a look or scheme
Lifestyle board - Depicting a look or lifestyle of your target market.

London College of Communication, Student Guest blogger Kathryn Kane

Kathryn Kane, Fda Display Design, Work Placement at Marks and Spencer.
In June I had the opportunity to gain some work experience at Marks and Spencer at the new Westfield Shopping Centre. It was a very busy time as M&S were celebrating their 125 year anniversary. The first week was spent making sure we had all the decor for the store and the right outfits for the mannequins in the window, and over a very long night shift it all came together. The windows were unveiled the next morning, revealing vintage inspired window displays for each department. Marks & Spencer had decided to go back to their roots as inspiration for these displays reflecting different decades from the 1920’s onwards. I like the vintage inspired idea, reflecting the many changes in fashion and lifestyle. I think that Marks & Spencer 125 year celebration is reflected well in these windows.

Central St. Martins, Interior Styling Course (Editorial Photoshoot)

Trends and Photoshoot Project:

Working in small groups students had to create a product based editorial for an Interiors Magazine. Students identified trends, created a backdrop with a limited composition, avoiding large objects and focused in on detail They then worked with professional photographer Austin Hutton to create these images. Each group were allocated just 40 minutes to create their composition while thinking about lighting, colour, focus and viewpoints. Inspiration was gleaned from existing editorials, however, each composition was informed by students own research rather than plagiarising existing concepts.

Central St. Martins Interior Design for Retail, guest student blogger Rahayu Darmastuti

Rahayu Darmestuti, Architecture Student, Indonesia:

While I was passing through Copenhagen Street in the King’s Cross area of London, the window display of The Guardian and The Observer office caught my eye. Its waving façade also added to the unique value of this building. However, the most unique thing here was the window display. An arrangement of big letters of the brands (The Guardian and The Observer) displayed in the large windows of this building. What I found interesting about this was that it was arranged in such a fantastic composition by putting these out-sized letters hung in a 'back and forward' composition so that I was able to see them in different positions and in different angles. The genius part was instead of putting them at the front facing the main street, they put them in one of the side windows of the building facing an alleyway, so that everyone who passed the main street could experience the different views and different angles.

Central St. Martins, Interior Styling Course

These are good examples of how retailers have used these spaces as a type of catch-all for samples of several products from everything in the store. This way of displaying items, by removing the fourth and in some case the third and fourth wall, retailers use this as a strategy which is intended to capture the buying public through a contrived setting which gives the illusion that we can buy all of these products for our tiny homes and still have a sense of space - which of course is a premium. Naturally, we would never be able to see the rooms in our homes from these angles but we are drawn in anyway. What these kind of retailers do so well is show us, sometimes perhaps confidence lacking public how to choose what we want without looking foolish.

What I have also tried to do here is to break down the dynamics of the space in an attempt to identify the vanishing and focal points of the space. Of course the space may not have been created with this in mind, however neither did I originally photograph these spaces originally with the intention of trying to do this, however it does present the idea of how we can.

Interior Design for Retail Course @ Central St. Martins, student guest blogger Beverly Chan

Beverly Chan, Environmental Designer, Vancouver, Canada:

Over the last two weeks, having visited factories, learned from artisans, and seen all that goes on behind the scenes of Visual Merchandising, the experience I am most grateful for has been the opportunity to witness works of truly captivating craftsmanship – crafts that have been made even more beautiful by their modest nature and understated importance in the worlds of Retail and Design.
For instance, although the Mannequin manufacturing industry was the last place I would’ve thought to find such a unique craft, it was during our visit to meet Tanya Reynolds at Proportion-London that I discovered a newfound appreciation for the interdisciplinary world of Retail Design. In particular, Proportion-London stands out in my memory because I admire their consideration and care for the finer details. I think their approach to implement antique, innovative, and global influences is very successful: they preserve older techniques that have been passed down from the early 1900s (to create their signature papier-mâché mannequins), they are experimenting with eco-friendly methods and materials, and they continually source inspiration from artefacts from around the world. Companies like this give me hope for the future of Retail Design!
Thank you again, Jonathan, Aarti, Ayu, Barbara, Elsa, Nimet, Sezen, Youjung! It has been an honour getting to know you all… (Next time: World Tour!)