About

London Craft Week’s 2026 Symposium explores the transformative power of craft: from visionary social initiatives to the role of making in global architecture and our relationships to the things we make. Join leading experts including Dr James Fox, Kate Malone MBE, and Dr Gus Casely-Hayford as they examine the vital role of craft today.

1.00-2.00pm: Crafting Impact: Visionary Initiatives Reshaping the Value of Craft

What futures are created by sharing a passion for craft through a visionary initiative? This panel offers a rare opportunity to hear from the leaders behind the most impactful craft-led initiatives of today, and tomorrow.

Chair: Dr James Fox, author of Craftland and Creative Director, Hugo Burge Foundation

Panelists: Crispin Kelly, Founder of Clay1A and CEO of Baylight Properties; Kate Malone, Founder of FiredUp4 and award winning ceramic artist; Celine Vogt, Events and Programmes Director, Michelangelo Foundation. 

2.15-3.15pm: Crafting Places: Cultural Expression in the Built Environment

This panel explores how craft practices across times and places could contribute to rejuvenated, dynamic and critical places and spaces in our built environment. Through materiality, technique, and equitable exchange, craft can inscribe and re-inscribe memories and meaning reflecting hybrid and diverse heritages and identities.

Chair: Dr Neal Shasore, Founder, The School of Building CIC and the City Craft programme

Panelists include: Ben Bolgar MVO, Executive Director, The King’s Foundation; Daniel Robbins, Senior Curator, Leighton House. More to be announced soon.

3.30-4.30pm: Objects and Us: Dr Gus Casely-Hayford in conversation with TF Chan 

Dr Gus Casely-Hayford, Director of V&A East, joins TF Chan, Director of Collect, to explore how we relate to and connect with the objects in our lives, and the role museum collections can play in shaping contemporary culture.  

TICKETS FOR EACH TALK CAN BE PURCHASED SEPARATELY VIA THE EVENTS LINKS BELOW