Following the recent merger with Design Factory, Design-Nation has held its first selection of new members as a merged organisation. Twelve applicants were selected to join the portfolio and they will now benefit from a range of opportunities to support, promote and develop their businesses.
Applications are assessed by an independent panel of craft and design industry professionals. The new members are located across the country, from the Shetland Islands to London, and include designer makers in Manchester, Norfolk and Wiltshire.
“I’m proud to be joining this group and I’m looking forward to the opportunity to join in, to share and to be part of a network of amazing designers, artists and craftspeople” commented Melanie Roseveare of Melody Rose London.
The twelve new Design-Nation members are:
Amanda Denison: Amanda works from a studio by the river in West London and creates items of wearable art using mixed metals and enamels. Her magnetic brooches can be displayed on the body or on a wall. Amanda’s fine art background has a strong influence on her work; mark making is integral and her work is inspired by the traces left behind through decay, dilapidation and dereliction and by the marks stamped on the urban environment.
BAKKA: BAKKA is the trading name of Mary Macgregor and is a Fair Isle knitwear venture located in Bakka, Shetland. For her range of contemporary wearable textiles Mary uses a luxury 100% superfine merino yarn to knit traditional patterns and colours. Mary is passionate about promoting and preserving Shetland’s renowned textile heritage. She draws inspiration from the oldest patterns then creates her own designs by mixing up different ones to create a contemporary look, but one which adheres to the traditional way of using colour.
Danny Lee Design: Danny Lee Design offers a range of digitally crafted artisan pieces made using mindfully sourced luxury materials. The collection, designed in Danny’s East London studio and manufactured in the UK, is a result of extensive research into new materials and knitting technology. With an interest in pushing the boundaries of constructed textiles and sourcing materials from around the world, Danny has created a tactile range of homeware and accessories.
Jane Sedgwick: Jane makes bold, playful wooden jewellery which she turns and hand paints in her studio near the North Norfolk Coast. Her current range is influenced by classic educational toys, which focus on developing basic skills such as dexterity and counting through play. Jane uses traditional woodworking techniques and manages a small woodland that provides a sustainable supply of sycamore for her work.
Jonathan Rose Design: Jonathan’s passion is designing and developing contemporary furniture with a focus on quality and function. He developed his bespoke furniture business ten years ago following a career as an engineer; a background that forged Jonathan’s love of solving problems hands on. Based in Aberdeenshire, Jonathan has strong links within the Scottish craft, art and furniture communities. His approach is progressive, he welcomes ideas from many sources and works regularly with other makers and small batch producers.
Laura-Jane Atkinson: Laura-Jane is a Manchester based designer maker specialising in handmade interior accessories that challenge and re-appropriate the known application and behaviour of often under-celebrated materials. Her creative process is rooted in design by making, allowing the personality of materials to drive the nature of sampling. Laura-Jane produces commissioned and batch manufactured statement products that blend traditional craftsmanship with material innovation – ‘jewellery for the home’.
Melody Rose London: Melody Rose London works with a 3rd generation pottery in Stoke-on-Trent to produce a range of screen printed bone china. Each piece, gilded by hand by designer Melanie Roseveare, keeps at its heart the quality that has made Britain renowned for its ceramic heritage, while adding a 21st century artist-led sensibility to the design process. There are five current collections, a bespoke service and ranges for restaurants and museum shops.
Nicki Jarvis: Nicki creates wall pieces combining textiles and ceramics from her Lincolnshire base. Inspired by the quilt as an art object, her work references traditional techniques but with an aim of telling new stories. Batch production is an integral part of the process for Nicki; in the form of mark-making, screen printed repeats and multiple button making. Each work created is part of a quiet journey of exploration into the quilt-as-metaphor, exploring ideas about the domestic and wider social sphere.
Rachael Howard: Rachael has been making textiles since leaving the Royal College of Art in 1992 as one of the first post-graduate students of embroidery. Her graphic, lively sketches of everyday life typify her powers of observation and knack for catching the moment. Rachael works in her Cheshire studio, pioneering a lively mix of embroidery and printing techniques; using image, text and object to tell often autobiographical stories of the everyday.
Raw Studio: Nick Rawcliffe of Raw Studio is influenced by the discovery of new materials and processes, within an environment of craft-technology crossover. His work is a result of a holistic design process informed through his diverse background, combining unique concepts from a Royal College of Art training and the efficiency of process learned from a mechanical engineering degree. Each piece of work has a narrative hidden in its unique design process that adds an extra dimension to the value of the finished work. Nick works between Lancashire and London.
Sasha Wardell: Sasha has over thirty years of experience in the world of bone china and porcelain, having studied in Stoke on Trent and Limoges, France. From her Wiltshire base she has taken elements of this industry and adapted them to a studio environment with her own production, including bespoke vases, bowls, lighting and tea ware. Sasha has concentrated on perfecting the craft-based skills which enhance the inherent qualities of bone china. Her carefully produced distinctive work embraces and reflects contemporary taste and lifestyle.
Theo Wright: Theo is a textile artist and handweaver, based in Coventry. His current work has two strands. Since 2011 he has designed and made woven scarves, with a particular focus on developing patterns and colour combinations that will appeal to men. Since 2014 Theo has also produced collections of non-functional textile artwork for interiors. These have a stronger theoretical basis, taking a mathematical concept and interpreting it through weave in a series of related but unique woven pieces.
For more information visit www.designnation.co.uk or @Design_NationUK
