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SUMMARY:London Design Festival 2026
DESCRIPTION:Soho joins the Map\, China and Japan take centre stage\nLondon Design Festival‘s 24th edition runs from 12 to 20 September 2026. Soho becomes the eleventh district\, joining Bankside\, Brompton\, Chelsea\, Dalston to Stokey\, EC1\, Fleet Street Quarter\, Mayfair\, Park Royal\, Blackhorse Creates and the renamed Shoreditch Design Week. The Mayor of London is Principal Supporter this year\, while Bloomberg Philanthropies continues to back the Festival through the Bloomberg Connects digital guide. The stated theme for 2026 is dialogue – East and West\, past and future\, human and non-human – and it shows most clearly in three projects built around Chinese and Japanese craft. \nDiscover London Design Festival 2025 \nQuick Facts for London Design Festival 2026\nLondon Design Festival\, London\, September 12-20\, 2026\nFor professionals and general public\nSize: 11 Design Districts\, 350\,000+ visitors\nHub: V&A South Kensington\nOther venues: Barbican\, Somerset House\, the Strand\, Wapping\nIn general\, free admission\, some events require paid tickets  \nCheck the complete guide & calendar for opening hours \nVisit londondesignfestival.com for info \nFraming LDF 2026\, Courtesy Pentagram & London Design Festival \nThe Asia Programme\nAt Somerset House\, Chinese media group Sun Media Group presents Reviving Craft — Chinese Intangible Cultural Heritage and Contemporary Design. It’s the third edition of the exhibition\, after the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris in 2024 and Palazzo Serbelloni in Milan in 2025. Curators Su Dan (Tsinghua University\, Academy of Arts & Design) and Yang Lan (broadcaster\, chair of Sun Media Group) bring together more than sixty Chinese and international artisans under the theme Reflection of the Mind. Sun Media Group is also a Programme Partner of the Global Design Forum this year. \nThe Japanese artisans pair with designers\nCraft x Tech returns for its second edition\, curated by Maria Cristina Didero and founded by Hideki Yoshimoto of design studio Tangent. It pairs craftspeople from Japan’s Tokai region with international designers: Australian designer David Caon with third-generation ceramicist Yohei Ito\, Singapore studio Lanzavecchia + Wai with paper-maker Takanori Senda\, Canadian designer Philippe Malouin with Ando Cloisonne\, a metalwork house founded in 1880. \nDiscover Material Matters 2026 \nCraft x Tech Tokai Project group photo. Photo: Noritoshi Kuroki\, courtesy London Design Festival \nMixZ\, a new platform connecting Asia and the UK\, stages two projects: a Dehua porcelain exhibition at the V&A\, and an installation at the Old Selfridges Hotel on future living through Shenzhen’s design and tech sector\, with several Chinese brands making their UK debut. \nThe Landmark Project\nThe Festival’s Landmark Project\, The Pangolin Shield by Studio Saar and Atelier One\, adds an adjacent reading of the same theme: a bamboo pavilion on the Strand built from Indian police shields and rain shields\, positioned facing the bust of Jawaharlal Nehru outside India’s High Commission. \nDetail of The Pangolin Shield drawing\, courtesy London Design Festival \nOther Special Projects at London Design Festival 2026\nMADE x Barbican launches an interiors collection at the Barbican\, developed from archival research into the estate’s interiors and the work of designer Miriam Howitt. The 23-piece collection covers furniture\, lighting\, textiles and accessories\, available from MADE.COM from August 2026. \nMade x Barbican collection \nAt the V&A\, this year’s edition of V&A x LDF is titled Awakenings\, co-curated by Carrie Chan and Kristian Volsing. The programme spans the museum’s galleries and includes work from Henry Svendsen\, Sam Ghantous\, Andre Williams\, Nina Davies and Albert Yonathan Setyawan\, alongside new commissions from Aziza Kadyri\, Eunjo Lee and V&A Emerging Designer 2026\, Playfool. \nThe Design Museum’s LDF programme includes NIGO: From Japan with Love\, the first retrospective on NIGO\, KENZO’s Artistic Director. The museum’s annual PLATFORM series presents new work by designer and artist Simone Brewster\, with a guided tour by curator Hadeel Eltayeb on 12 September and a panel on design practice and motherhood on 15 September\, featuring Brewster\, Laxmi Hussein\, Emefa Cole and Hettie Judah. \nL-Acoustics presents an immersive sound installation at Wapping Hydraulic Power Station\, built in 1890 and open to the public for the first time in 13 years. \nThe eleven Design Districts\nSoho and Shoreditch Design Week carry the most defined programmes this year. \nSoho joins the Festival for the first time\, led by Informare’s Anna King\, with a programme involving architects\, property developers and branding agencies. \nShoreditch Design Week\, the evolution of the former Shoreditch Design Triangle\, is now the Festival’s largest district: more than sixty showrooms and galleries\, running 15–20 September\, with four main exhibition venues concentrated in the first three days around emerging designers and new materials. \nDiscover Shoreditch Design Week first edition \nMaterial Matters at Unlocked \nThe remaining nine districts — Bankside\, Brompton\, Chelsea\, Dalston to Stokey\, EC1\, Fleet Street Quarter\, Mayfair\, Park Royal and Blackhorse Creates — complete the Festival’s map. \nMedals\, Launch Pad and Identity\nThe London Design Medals will be awarded on 14 September across four categories: London Design Medal\, Lifetime Achievement Medal\, Emerging Design Medal and Design Innovation Medal. Winners are announced in early September. \nPith® sponsors five emerging designers through the Festival’s Launch Pad initiative this year\, giving participants a physical or digital platform plus editorial coverage across LDF and Pith® channels. Applications closed 31 July 2026\, with participants announced in August. \nPentagram\, the Festival’s design partner for more than two decades\, developed this year’s graphic identity under the theme Framing LDF. \nWhy visit\nCombined with a new district\, an enlarged Global Design Forum and the Festival’s usual concentration of museum and gallery programming\, it is one of the few weeks in the calendar where these conversations are staged at this scale in one city. For an Asia-focused audience\, LDF26 offers three exhibitions built directly around Chinese and Japanese craft\, backed by institutional partners on both sides — Sun Media Group\, Tsinghua University\, and a first UK platform for a number of Shenzhen design and tech brands.  \nThe V&A’s Awakenings\, the Design Museum’s NIGO retrospective and MADE’s Barbican collection give the week a strong museum-led draw on their own. Soho’s debut and Shoreditch Design Week’s expanded format also make this an edition worth tracking for anyone following how the Festival’s district model evolves. \nQuick Facts for London Design Festival 2026\nLondon Design Festival\, London\, September 12-20\, 2026\nFor professionals and general public\nSize: 11 Design Districts\, 350\,000+ visitors\nHub: V&A South Kensington\nOther venues: Barbican\, Somerset House\, the Strand\, Wapping\nIn general\, free admission\, some events require paid tickets \n\nCheck the complete guide & calendar for opening hours \nVisit londondesignfestival.com for info \nRelated events: Shoreditch Design Week\, Material Matters\, Global Design Forum
URL:https://designweekguide.com/event/london-design-festival-2026/
LOCATION:London\, London\, SW1\, United Kingdom
CATEGORIES:Design Festivals
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