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Designed by Morag Myerscough, it’s had global media coverage and has turned a dirty, unloved and derelict railway yard that was blighting the local community, into a crazy, high profile, creative hub that is now a much-loved part of the High Street.

In the run up to the construction phase a programme of art and design projects on the site, curated by a team at the café, will build an amazing story, putting the area on the map and enriching the developer’s sales process. Instead of going to market with only the promise of a new shiny building, they can tell a story of a vibrant place, rich in culture that is already established as a cool place to live.

Our plan is to create a programme of temporary activity as a catalyst for change in the very early part of the formal redevelopment process…

…bringing attention to a part of London that doesn’t yet have a clear personality.

Below is the Tate Institute, built by Henry Tate in 1887 as a social club for his workers at the Tate and Lyle plant that’s still across the road.  It closed in 1933, was a library until 1961 and now sits empty, rather forlorn and forgotten.  We’d love to get our hands on it and open it up…

North Woolwich train station (below) has been a museum since it closed as a working railway station building in the 1970’s.  Another amazing building, empty, dead and crying out for use.

Spain Through The Looking Glass at Decorex 2010

A decade ago, Spanish design was not considered to be competitive amongst the UK’s aficionados.  In 1998 we began a campaign to support the import into the UK of furniture, textiles, lighting and other design products.  Over the 12 years we have managed to build Spain’s reputation as a producer of world-class design through a sustained PR campaign working with designers and manufacturers.

We created a magazine, Spanish, (now published 4 times a year by Media 10), to bring news of the best of Spanish design to the UK market.  We edited the collections, chose the companies to work with, edited and produced the magazines, presenting a coherent and relevant vision of Spanish design in the UK.

Spanish Magazine

Diseño, its sister publication, which we design, write and produce, tells the Spanish Design brand story behind the products and is published annually.

Diseño

Diseño

We create annual programmes of events to help raise the profile of Spanish manufacturers and to support Spanish design talent in the UK.  In 2006 we mounted the first solo commercial exhibition of work by Jaime Hayon at Aram Gallery, winning Icon Magazine’s award for best exhibition of the London Design Festival.

Jaime Hayon

Aram Store in London's Covent Garden

Our campaign for Aram Store and The Aram Gallery maintains the reputation of one of London’s most famous design brands.  Aram Store is London’s largest and most beautiful contemporary designer furniture store.  We handled the opening in April 2002 and we’ve worked with the Aram family since to keep it at the forefront of the London design world.

We run a highly efficient press office, delivering strong, consistent media coverage, create events to promote the store and its products and run publicity campaigns to promote the store’s regular promotional campaigns.

Aram40 Peter Blake

To celebrate the company’s 40^th anniversary 40 of the best known and most respected names in international design, architecture and art were asked by the Aram family to design a rug – amongst them, Zaha Hadid, David Bailey, Ron Arad, Peter Blake and Jasper Morrison. We ran a high-profile, international media relations campaign to support an exhibition at the store.

Stage by Jamie Hayon at Aram Gallery

We have helped to establish The Aram Gallery – the entire top floor of the store – as one of London’s most vibrant design galleries.

London Burroughs of Hackney & Islington

We created a campaign to encourage local authorities to switch public spending from ‘grey’ projects like road building and heavy engineering projects to ‘green’ schemes like street trees, parks, green roofs and waterways as a way of addressing climate change more effectively, improving public health and making our communities more beautiful.

Exhibition

As nobody has effectively mapped England’s green spaces we commissioned artist Morag Myerscough to use a combination of computer technology and painstaking hand rendering to create a series of  maps that give a clear sense of the quantity and distribution of the green infrastructure in three UK locations.

A nationwide roadshow and media relations campaign spread our message across the UK.

The scheme offers grants to fund work or study trips abroad, to enable people without any formal design training to experience good practice first hand and gain practical understanding of delivering and managing well-designed public space.

Urban farming, Chicago

Urban farming, Chicago

Mercury - Priestmangoode's UK high speed train concept

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Our work for Priestmangoode, one of the UK’s leading multidisciplinary design groups, revolves around a campaign to build their reputation as experts in their field and extend their experience into new business sectors alongside an international media relations campaign to promote their work in product, environment, transport and packaging design.

The Health Manifesto is the first in a series of publications we have created that allows Priestmangoode to raise the design debate in a number of industry sectors.  Original design work offering clever solutions to big problems are included and a promotional campaign, including extensive use of the web and online communication channels, is proving highly effective.  The Recovery Lounge (below) is a concept for a day surgery recovery suite at an NHS hospital built with the knowledge learned from Priestmangoode’s extensive experience in designing luxury airline interiors.

The Priestmangoode Recovery Lounge

We have been promoting their own product design output, including Waterpebble (below), an innovative water-saving device for the shower, and we are building a programme of international speaking engagements for the principals.

Francis and Berthe Climbie

More information from The Forgiveness Project

The Old Truman Brewery, Brick Lane, London

Among other things, we helped to conceive and produce the first Designersblock – a contemporary furniture and product design show that runs alongside 100% Design.   Created as a way of showcasing the Brewery’s empty spaces as potential places to work, the exhibition is now one of the most talked about shows in the London Design Festival calendar.  The building was fully let within six months.

Designersblock, September 1998

We also created Fashion East and Free Range – two events conceived as a way of showcasing The Old Truman Brewery’s event spaces and maintaining its reputation as a centre for emerging cutting-edge design.  Fashion East, a programme to support emerging talent in British fashion design, is now an established part of London Fashion Week whilst Free Range has become Europe’s largest graduate art and design show.

Freerange, July 2001