We are thrilled to see Chelsea College of Arts graduates represented at this year’s New Designers One Year On feature at the Business Design Centre.
Each year New Designers present young, entrepreneurial designers who are in their first year of business, and One Year On complements their main exhibition of emerging design covering a wide range of disciplines. This year we see a return for MA Textile Design alumni Rosamund Hanny and Rowenna Mason, BA Textile Design graduate Maria Sigma, plus BA Fine Art graduates Abigail Booth and Max Bainbridge of Forest + Found.
“To find truly cutting edge design, there is no better marketplace than One Year On” – Barbara Chandler, Design Critic, London Evening Standard
Forest + Found and Rowenna Mason have also caught the eye of Design Critic, Barbara Chandler, and are mentioned in her glowing review of New Designers One Year On in the Evening Standard’s Homes & Property segment, where she urges readers to ‘Catch this talent while you can — you may not be able to afford their work later.’
Forest + Found
Abigail Booth and Max Bainbridge graduated from BA Fine Art back in 2013, and since then have set up their sustainable craft and design partnership, Forest + Found. They work with traditional methods of craft producing contemporary wooden objects and hand stitched textiles. The haptic element of working with their hands to create work from natural materials is the key focus of their practice.
Forest + Found, 2016. © Forest + Found
Forest + Found have received significant press coverage, and been featured in Crafts, Vogue, House and Garden, Elle, and Country Living magazines.
Back in January, Forest + Found took over our Instagram and gave us a glimpse into their beautiful workshop and their working practices, you can see their story here.
Website: forest-and-found.com
Instagram: @forestandfound
Rowenna Mason
Rowenna is an award winning weaver, who graduated from MA Textile Design at Chelsea College of Arts back in 2015. She uses traditional techniques and rural materials to produce textiles featuring geometric patterns inspired by the urban landscape, celebrations the British Heritage of weaving through contemporary design.
Rowenna Mason, 2015. © Chelsea College of Arts
Rowenna won the Laura Ashley Family Foundation Scholarship, The Campaign for Wool Award, Funding from the Worshipful Company of Woolmen, The Textile Environmental Design Award for Sustainable Design and Craftsmanship, plus the Cockpit Arts/ Clothworkers’ Foundation Award. She has also received coverage from You magazine, The Maker Press, The Guardian, Confessions of a Design Geek, and Figura Interiors.
Barbara Chandler from the Evening Standard described Rowenna as a designer who’s ‘closely woven fabric has neat geometric motifs made into elegant piped cushions.’
Rowenna Mason, 2015. © Chelsea College of Arts
Website: rowennamason.co.uk
Instagram: @rowennamason
Maria Sigma
Graduating from BA Textile Design in 2014 is Maria Sigma, another award winning weaver who creates beautiful functional textiles and objects through ‘zero waste’ design and craftsmanship by re-interpreting traditional craft techniques in a lively, colourful, and contemporary way.
Maria uses high quality, sustainable British wool to create throws and cushions, and recently won the Cockpit Arts/ Clothworkers’ Award 2016 for a second year.
Website: mariasigma.com
Instagram: @mariasigma.woventextiles
Rosamund Hanny
Rosamund Hanny, 2014. © Chelsea College of Arts
Rosamund Hanny graduated from MA Textile Design in 2014, and since then has continued to create sustainable textiles after setting up the Ethical Textile Print Room.
“Sustainability within fashion and textiles is a complex issue and one that can seem overwhelming for designers and makers.”
Rosamund explained in our blog feature back in 2014, and as a solution to this
“The Ethical Textile Print Room provides a community for textile screen printers and dyers. The aim is to engage practitioners in an ethical approach by providing a database of simple and accessible environmentally sensitive methods. We want to highlight responsible design by profiling textile artists who are pioneering ethical projects and act as a platform for debate. Encouraging designers to contribute ideas, information on processes and links to their work. Sharing creative solutions to improve efficiency, save resources and reduce environmental impact.”
Rosamund Hanny, 2014. © Chelsea College of Arts
Rosamund’s works across disciplines, and her process involves exhaust dyeing and exhaust sublimation printing on digital embroidery.
Website: rosamundhannytextiles.com
Instagram: @rosamund.hanny.textiles
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Find out more about studying at Chelsea on our course pages.