Clerkenwell Design Week 2025: Highlights Worth Talking About
Clerkenwell Design Week has a knack for turning the often restrained world of commercial design into something much more enticing—and this year is no exception. From monumental installations to material innovation and playful colour moments, CDW 2025 delivered a thoughtfully curated celebration of creativity, form, and future-forward design. Here are Curateology’s highlights from this year’s show:
Headline Installation: Alex Chinneck’s ‘A Week at the Knees’
Artist Alex Chinneck returned to CDW with another gravity-defying moment. His installation, A Week at the Knees, features a brick arch slumped as if in mid-collapse—made from a staggering 7,000 bricks. The piece mimics the familiar Georgian façades of Charterhouse Square, but warps their symmetry into a theatrical optical illusion. It’s bold, witty, and instantly iconic.
Digitally Crafted Calm
This year’s Clerkenwell Design Week offered a fresh reminder that technology and tactility can coexist beautifully. Two highlights stood out for their fluid forms and digitally led craftsmanship.
Architect Arthur Mamou-Mani’s Harmonic Tides was a showstopper—an undulating, 3D-printed installation that doubled as seating. Inspired by the movement of water, its soft curves and rhythmic structure played with light and shadow to create a moment of sculptural stillness amidst the noise. More than just a space to pause, it invited reflection on how digital fabrication can enhance rather than overpower material presence.
Vienna-based duo Sheyn Studio made their CDW debut with a collection that felt equally meditative. Known for their algorithm-inspired jewellery and home objects, their pieces channelled a quiet precision—organic geometries rendered through advanced digital design, yet always grounded in tactile materiality.
Playful Colour
Injecting a needed dose of colour and humour into the event, Beasley’s Biscuit Bar by Sons of Beasley is a pop-up café like no other. With joyful, ultra-colourful furniture made from Plykea offcuts, the installation turns recycled materials into something fresh, fun, and undeniably Instagrammable. It’s a cheeky, well-executed nod to sustainability with style.
EH Smith’s display of colourful bricks and tiles turned hard surfaces into a tactile rainbow. The palette ranged from bold primaries to muted naturals, with finishes that played between high-gloss glaze and chalky matte—perfect for those curating expressive architectural spaces.
Texture + Tech: Natural Materials Meet Innovation
Throughout CDW, a subtle but powerful theme emerged: the merging of natural materials with advanced construction methods. From fluid timber forms to plant-based composites shaped by CNC machining, designers are redefining what “natural” can look like in a tech-driven age. This was particularly apparent in emerging studio showcases where material experimentation met elegance and precision.
Thank you CDW for another inspiring event !