When you get asked by a brilliant team like Design Nation to take part in a hugely impressive event for London Craft Week - the natural and instinctive route for a designer surely would be to take your best work in the knowledge it will work wonderfully, be on brief and on schedule.
Er...did we do that? No.
For what would be one of our most successful exhibitions to date, we decided to go off piste. Not only going for one of our largest architectural origami pieces with movement ever, a significant challenge in itself. But we also chose to go for a new aesthetic using bold bright colours, oh and added a new flocked texture to our much loved Tyvek too.
So why did we risk it? in the throes of trying to accurately fold flocking (which by its very nature doesn't want to be manipulated without looking distressed) and carefully transporting these huge panels across London we asked ourselves the same thing. Why?
But when we heard the responses to our work. When we saw the reaction on those faces. When we heard the delight in the voices of the visitors who explored the movement in our installation. We knew.
Challenging yourself and stretching out of your comfort zone is what makes art and design so compelling. If we play it safe we'll never explore our full potential or reap the rewards and satisfaction that challenging your abilities will deliver. We will continue to push and to make life hard for ourselves - it's our duty as designers to take the less travelled road to explore the possibilities for the fabrics we craft.
We have to say a huge thank you to all the amazing visitors who came to see us at the Marks and Tools exhibition - your feedback and enthusiasm for our work was really inspiring. And to Design Nation and Barbara Chandler for supporting us and believing in our work so much that we're able to take chances and push architectural origami further - we were honoured to be part of your show.
F+B
