THE PLACES WE GO: LONDON, OUR HOME AWAY FROM HOME

Kathy and I lived in London in the late 90s when I was running 2 companies overseas. In the late 90s, we considered London the unofficial Capital of Europe. It was the transformation of London’s restaurant scene from Fish and chips shops to an explosion of Michelin star restaurants, British fashion designers dominated the global fashion scene and “Britpop” centered in London with the likes of Blur and Pulp and even Oasis moved to the city. After 4 years, we left London in January 2000 and never returned. 

That was until this last September when we flew over to participate in the London Design Festival. For us, London still felt like home, but it also felt like a place that we had never visited before. The reason was simple, the sun was shining. 

London Design Festival was launched in 2003 to create an annual event that would promote the city’s creativity, drawing in the country’s greatest thinkers, practitioners, retailers, and educators to deliver an unmissable celebration of design. In 2019, the Festival welcomed a record-breaking 600,000 individual visitors from over 75 countries. 

Among the many installations around town, the most unique collaboration is between the Victoria and Albert Museum and the Design Festival. Now its 11th year of participation, the V&A fills the museum with an extraordinary range of design installations large and small, intricate and majestic.

This year, the spotlight was on the installation of “Bamboo Ring”, an experiment in weaving with the intent to be a catalyst for weaving people and place together. Japanese architect Kuma, who most recently designed the New National Stadium for the Tokyo 2020 Olympics, created the doughnut-shaped structure by weaving rings of bamboo and carbon fiber together. The installation was an exploration of pliancy, precision, lightness and strength: by pulling two ends, it naturally de-formed and half of the woven structure was lifted into the air.

My personal favorite at the V&A was the unique glass installation by Czech designer Rony Plesl. Three identical hexagonal glass tree trunks contrasting with a glowing forest made of uranium glass radiated a sublime green fluorescent light, evoking branches and flames. In this way, the installation paid tribute to the key components of glass making – fire and wood. Very cool. 

It is our continued hope that in sharing our personal stories of our travels around the world, you can appreciate that much more, not only the furniture in our showroom, but the education and one-on-one experiences we have with the makers. We are passionate about what we do and we enjoy sharing with you.  

From a design point of view, you can’t think about furniture design without thinking of self-taught British designer Tom Dixon. From his departure point in the early eighties welding salvaged steel into radical furniture, he has constantly reinvented himself through a series of different design lives – working with luxury Italian goods with Cappellini, Creative Director at Habitat and Artek, creating Plastics company Eurolounge and finally instigating his own eponymous brand in 2002.

 17 years on, Tom Dixon is now a widely celebrated global force in interior design with his own hubs in New York, Hong Kong SAR, China, London, Los Angeles and Tokyo. With over 600 products from lighting to furniture; they are instantly recognizable for their sculptural qualities and engineered materiality.

Opal Pendants 

Working with their German engineering partners, Tom Dixon designed a recipe of opalescent polycarbonate, resulting in a satisfyingly ethereal orb. They decided to remove the usual dangling lightbulb and replace it with our latest LED disc, making an extremely powerful illuminating device.

Melt Hanging Pendants and Wall scones

Melt is a beautifully distorted lighting globe that creates a mesmerizing melting hot blown glass effect. Translucent when on and mirror-finish when off, it emits an attractive, mildly hallucinogenic light. Available in copper, gold, chrome and smoke.

Spring Hanging Pendants 

Spring is a series of three pendant lamps made up of stainless-steel strips. Pliant ribbons of stainless steel have been arranged like a whisk around a custom-made dimmable Tom Dixon LED disc. The semi-transparent shape thus created can be adjusted to a variety of silhouettes - from a flat arrangement reminiscent of a spirograph drawing to a flying saucer configuration and on to a fuller shape akin to a pumpkin.

Tom Dixon awarded London Design Festival Medal 2019

Designer Tom Dixon has been awarded the highest accolade at this year's British Land Celebration of Design Awards, which also commended Vivienne Westwood, Daniel Charny and Ross Atkin for their work.

https://www.dezeen.com/2019/09/04/tom-dixon-awarded-london-design-medal-2019/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=140&v=PbOtQNgDX4s&feature=emb_logo

Home Resource is the exclusive representative of Tom Dixon in Sarasota. 

Visit our showroom to see the Tom Dixon lighting and furniture on display and learn more about their unique products.