The New Design Museum

Open House is an annual event that celebrates architecture by allowing the general public to experience some of the capital’s best buildings and spaces over the course of a weekend. This year Cambridge Design Partnership’s Robert Curtis attended the open House event at the new Design Museum, which is the former Commonwealth Institute in Kensington. The building was opened to the public before work commences on revitalising this derelict building into a vibrant and engaging design venue.

In its new home the Design Museum’s goal is to expand its presence as part of an ongoing effort to raise the profile of design in the UK. It will continue to offer a captivating programme of exhibitions showcasing classic and contemporary design, talks from influential figures and more light hearted events such as the Summer Ball and drawing classes which are all popular with us designers; however the Museum has set itself the goal of increasing the number of non-designers that come through its doors.

The Commonwealth Institute’s central location should help reach that goal as it is in close proximity to the Science, Natural History and Victoria and Albert Museums, which are all compelling lures for London’s culture seekers. The plan is to use the new building’s spacious floors to accommodate a greater number of large exhibitions, while giving a permanent space to a free exhibition of the Museum’s permanent collection, which is currently in storage. Although the UK has a rich history of design and has produced many successful creative individuals (Tom Dixon, Jonathan Ive and Sir Norman Foster to name but a few), it seems that the design and innovation process is often overlooked or misunderstood amongst the public, who are ultimately the end-users of these designs. Whilst the concept of factories and machinery that produce the products we buy is well understood, the idea that everyday objects have all been through a design process is more abstract and difficult to grasp. So CDP fully supports the Design Museum in its quest to highlight what designers such as ourselves do in the design process to bring these products into being; from sketching and modelling, to prototyping and getting the final production line to make the finished products.

To show solidarity among designers Robert gave a presentation at the Design Museum during the Open House event. Through the course of two days, the new site received thousands of visitors, several hundred of which Robert presented to.

“In my presentation I gave a brief summary of the materials used in the construction of the Commonwealth Institute. This is significant as the architects who took on the project in 1958 were saddled with a limited budget from the British government, and so ingeniously enlisted the help of Commonwealth countries to donate materials for the construction.”

“I greatly enjoyed my involvement with the Design Museum through Open House and was pleased I was able to donate my time to a cause I fully support. I strongly urge anyone interested in product design to visit the Museum’s current home in Shad Thames. My thanks go to Sara Ayres for organising the event, and all of her colleagues and fellow volunteers who made Open House at the Commonwealth Institute possible. I look forward to visiting the refurbished Design Museum at its new location, and anticipate that the move to Kensington will go a long way to increasing awareness and appreciation of this rich resource we possess in the UK. This will help greatly in promoting the UK creative industry”.