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From the tinkers and tailors to the candlestick makers, London has long been home to much exemplary craftsmanship. In recent years, too, advances in technology and a wealth of innovation have pushed the (handmade, letterpressed) envelope to exhilarating new heights. Having proved itself world class when it comes to design, jewellery, fashion and art (which each already have their own weeks) London’s inaugural Craft Week seems long overdue.

But on the other hand, it’s only recently that we have relearned an appreciation for this industry. For too long the word ‘craft’ has taken a back seat to bling, and only in the last few years (happily) has our newfound fascination with process and respect for heritage and provenance begun to redefine the term “luxury”. This, for me, is exactly what will make the week so unmissable. And I know I’m not alone in looking forward to celebrating bespoke, creative and rarified skills across the city.

Henrietta Thompson
Editor at Large – Wallpaper

I have been interested in the Crafts pretty well all my life, not least because I am married to a Bookbinder-turned-Jeweller, who was trained at Camberwell School of Arts in the late 1970s and then worked as a bookbinder for nearly twenty years before turning to the more miniature world of fine art jewellery.

As a result, we have always followed, and as far as possible collected, the work of other craftspeople, first at the Cropredy Gallery in North Oxfordshire which was run by Ann Hartree in a barn owned by the Crossmans, later through the Crafts Council shop at the V&A and Marsden Woo, and more recently by going on annual pilgrimages to Collect at the V&A and the Saatchi Gallery.

In the early 1980s, craft was either low value and rural in the Bernard Leech rustic tradition or low value and urban in a funky Crafts Council way. What I have watched with the utmost interest is the way that Craft practice has gradually become properly accepted, as it should be, as a fine art with the emergence of practitioners who would not dream of being called craftspeople like Grayson Perry, Edmund de Waal and Hylton Nel. Just as important has been the emergence of dealers and galleries who treat the work with appropriate seriousness, like Adrian Sassoon and The New Craftsman.

London Craft Week will bring this form of practice which sits between art, traditional craft and luxury goods to a wider public.

Charles Saumarez Smith
Royal Academy of Arts

COLLECT 2015, Saatchi Gallery

The Crafts Council’s COLLECT has been running for 12 years and acts as a wonderful showcase for contemporary craft. This is very much making at the fine art end of the craft spectrum where function often plays a subsidiary role to aesthetics.  As well as containing some of the best galleries from around the world, this year the exhibition also has installations from the likes of designer Tord Boontje and textile artist Ann Sutton; there’s a dance piece from Caroline Broadhead and Angela Woodhouse; while the Crafts Council will be giving visitors a sneaky peak at its next major touring exhibition devoted to contemporary jewellery, I AM HERE. Oh and if you happen to be visiting on Saturday do feel free to come along to a talk I’m chairing at 2.45pm for London Craft Week on why we collect stuff. The panel includes leading gallery owner Adrian Sassoon, collector-curator Sarah Griffin and collector-designer Beverley Rider, so it should be well worth your while.

Mo Coppoletta

There are a lot of installations and shows devoted to the luxury, branded end of making at this year’s festival, and quite possibly for that reason I find myself drawn to an event that arguably represents street craft. In his famous essay of 1929, Ornament and Crime, Adolf Loos decreed that: ‘The modern person who tattoos himself is either a criminal or a degenerate. There are prisons in which eighty percent of the inmates have tattoos. People with tattoos not in prison are either latent criminals or degenerate aristocrats.’ How things change. The architect couldn’t possibly have foreseen a time when getting tattooed would become a rite of passage for students travelling the world on their gap year, nor could he have predicted the rise of the footballer-cum-global-brand David Beckham. And lord knows what he would have made of the rose painted on Cheryl Fernandez-Versini’s backside. Not only has tattooing become socially acceptable, it is a recognised craft. And Mo Coppoletta, who will be opening up his studio, is one of its best exponents in the world.

The Crafted City

Contemporary Applied Arts temporary pavilion in Southwark promises to be one of the highlights of the week. Designed by architect Allies and Morrison, which among other things was responsible for the excellent revamp of the Royal Festival Hall in 2007, it promises to showcase work from the likes of glass makers Michael Ruh and Kate Maestri, ceramist Dylan Bowen and furniture maker Alex MacDonald to name just a few. The idea is that it will become a place for visitors to meet, discuss, and explore craft. There will be talks too from silversmith Adi Toch and furniture designer Angus Ross. It promises to be fascinating.

Wyvern Bindery

Clerkenwell has long been a hotbed of radicalism and making. It’s where, for example, Lenin edited the underground revolutionary journal, Iskra, while by the end of the eighteenth century the area is estimated to have been producing 120,000 watches each year. Crafts Central is still located there of course and Cockpit Arts is around the corner (both will be having open studios during LCW incidentally), but there’s little doubt that Clerkenwell is changing. The famous cutting edge jewellery gallery Lesley Craze has recently shut up shop and the contemporary craft gallery Marsden Woo has moved to Shoreditch, while the area is increasingly dominated by office furniture showrooms. Perhaps this is why I felt a twinge of nostalgia when I saw that Wyvern Bindery was holding a demonstration that will allow visitors the chance to understand its process. It seems to me a place that is still intimately connected with the heritage of the area during a time of flux.

Grant Gibson
Editor of Crafts Magazine

To illustrate the breadth of London Craft Week’s inaugural programme, which will comprise over 50 craft demonstrations across London from 6 to 10 May, Their Royal Highnesses were presented with ‘The Suit’, deconstructed to reveal the many elements of skill needed to create one item. Those who contributed include designer Patrick Grant, spinner and knitter Rachael Matthews, Savile Row tailor Kathryn Sargent, livery tailor Keith Levett from Henry Poole & Co, Daniel Harris, a weaver from London Cloth, and for the finishing touch, Hawthorn and Heany, who embroidered the maker’s label. The Prince of Wales then tried his own hand at pattern cutting.

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This May, The Crafted City will spring up from Bankside to house an array of informative and interactive events. This joint initiative, generously funded by Arts Council England, will centre around the construction of a purpose-built pavilion situated at Contemporary Applied Arts in the Borough of Southwark, an area renowned for its tin-glazed pottery, glass and leather tanning – materials which will be interwoven throughout both the making of the pavilion and the activities to which it will play host during the week.

This innovative and elegant pavilion will perfectly encapsulate the ethos of London Craft Week, offering an elegant and flexible space from which to showcase exemplary skills, whilst serving as a craft object in and of itself. Designed and made by leading local makers, working across a range of disciplines, The Crafted City will offer a flexible space for audiences to meet, talk, learn about and explore craft, whilst serving as a hub from which one can explore the week’s other activities dotted throughout the capital and highlighting the richness and diversity of London’s many creative neighbourhoods. London’s proud heritage as a continuing creative incubator will shine through all elements of the project and visitors will benefit from a dynamic and engaging programme of talks, demonstrations and making sessions.

Christine Lalumia, Executive Director of Contemporary Applied Arts added, “Our maker members are using ancient skills, many of which are in danger of being lost forever, and interpreting them in their own unique voice and in contemporary idiom. The results are often both stunning and thought-provoking.”

We are delighted that Cockpit Arts have decided to move its Spring Open Studios at Holborn to coincide with London Craft Week. Cockpit Arts is an award-winning social enterprise and the UK’s only craft business incubator; a benchmark for creative excellence, where emerging talent and established businesses are nurtured and helped to grow and succeed.

This is a rare opportunity for visitors to see behind the scenes, meet the 170 talented makers and buy beautifully crafted work direct from these independent designers.

Cockpit Arts Deptford Open Studios will also run between 15-17 May at 18-22 Creekside, London SE8 3DZ.