About

Design Exhibition Scotland has curated two showcases: DES 2018 and DES 2019, arguably the most thorough surveys of contemporary objects in design in Scotland to date: designers & artists included Harry Morgan, Derek Welsh, Chalk Plaster, Frances Priest, James Rigler, Rachel Adams, c.a. walac, Arrange Whatever Pieces Come Your Way & Andrew Miller. Integral to the exhibitions were a series of DES Debates & in April 2020, to further fuel debate & raise the visibility of contemporary design, we launched DES, a new online journal & Studio Visits via Zoom.

Key to DES’s vitality is that we work closely with designers to support ambition & a sense of adventure. We coax ambition and encourage collaboration & through commissions, we bring to fruition new ideas & explore fresh ways to think about everyday objects & materials. In 2019, we commissioned artist Tania Kovats and collaborators Laura Aldridge and James Rigler to design thoroughly contemporary drinking fountains. In 2018 we commissioned Andrew Miller to design Terrace, a brilliant sculptural seating composition and Rachel Adams to create Elevation, a vast tie-dyed linen wall hanging. And designer Namon Gaston and upholsterer, Peter Holmes who had long discussed working together were spurred on by DES to produce their Oxbow Lounge Chair, which was later awarded a prestigious Design Guild Mark by The Furniture Makers’ Company, London in 2019.

And importantly through our exhibitions, we introduce a wide audience to new design. DES 2018 saw the debut of Alice Jacobs‘, designer at Flux in Glasgow, Utility Stacker chair. Perfectly plain and made from FSC-certified birch plywood, the Stacker caught the eye of the public agency, Architecture & Design Scotland. This led to Jacobs being commissioned by Our Lady of Missions primary school in East Renfrewshire to design and produce a range of site and needs-specific furniture. The result was a brilliant, bespoke and cost-effective local alternative to ‘standard issue’ school furniture. Flux is now working with numerous primary schools across Scotland.