The Exhibitions to See at London Design Festival

“Our first project nearly killed us,” Ben Evans CBE, Director of London Design Festival and Chairman of Global Design Forum, recounts in the hallowed halls of the V&A Museum. Much has, of course, changed since the first London Design Festival and, hopefully, now in its 24th iteration, the challenge is no longer existential uncertainty but finding new ways to showcase the best of the world's design capital. That said, 300 events across the city, complete with 11 individual design districts, is no small feat. 

SPHERE attended one of the preview events at the V&A Museum to give readers a sneak peek of what to expect from the week ahead. From the intersection of AI and art to fresh perspectives on traditional Japanese craft, this is everything you should have on your radar this year. 

The Point of Unity and Soul, Mykola Kabluka, Expolight

One of London’s most iconic landmarks will next week be lit up with work from Expolight, Ukraine’s leading lighting design and media art studio and Mykola Kabluka, Ukrainian lighting designer and contemporary artist. Both projects – Soul and The Point of Unity – seek to reshape the perception of architecture, space and human connection. Against the backdrop of Russia’s ongoing war in Ukraine, the works carry a perspective shaped by a society living through rupture, uncertainty and profound transformation.

V&A x LDF26 Awakenings 

The festival’s longstanding fixture, the V&A, will be a focal point for the week’s activity. This year’s edition, titled “Awakenings”, has been co-created by Carrie Chan and Kristian Volsing, the latter of whom described it as inspired by the “destructive and creative potential of artificial intelligence”, but more broadly “investigates the unequivocal relationship between design, craft and technology.” The programme features works from a global talent line-up of Henry Svendsen, Sam Ghantous, Andre Williams, Nina Davies and Albert Yonathan Setyawan, alongside new commissions from Aziza Kadyri, Eunjo Lee and Playfool – the 2026 V&A Emerging Designer. 

Albert Yonathan Setyawan, Metamorphic Modulation 

In a ceramic installation that comprises over 700 hand-modelled clay and terracotta pieces that resemble both a flower and a leaf, Setyawan explores pattern and repetition. “I deliberately limit myself in working with assistants and work with everything from the ground up. I’m interested in the tension between what is mechanical and analogue,” he tells us. “I treat myself as the machine.”

Nina Davies, Image Syncers

Derived from an outlandish Trump claim that Kamala Harris was using AI to doctor her rally attendee numbers, Nina Davies in Image Syncers toys with the concept of humans behaving like AI-generated images in real life. Through hoodies with garbled text, curled fingers and juddery movement, this live performance documentation blurs the boundary between the authentic and the artificially constructed. 

Daniel Copper and Saki Maruyama, The Server

This year’s emerging designers, Daniel Copper and Saki Maruyama, draw on the museum’s routine practice of cleaning objects. Playfool homes in on a task in this context that currently resists automation – cleaning – which often gets overlooked in the pursuit of progress. It’s an interactive piece and people are encouraged to clean the server with an object that resembles a hoover. Once the task is completed, the participant receives a printed summary of their performance. 

Linda Dounia, Once Upon A Garden

In a montage that looks both futuristic and realistic, Dounia references her West African childhood, watching her grandmother pick flowers. Using AI as an almost time machine, she pieces together visual data to replicate flowers that may have grown in her grandmother’s garden. Because the images are generated from imperfect human memory, the work calls into question the incomplete datasets on which AI tools are trained. 

Sam Ghantous, your golf course made my GPU

Zurich-based multidisciplinary artist Ghantous’ practice, in his own words, centres on the “interdependencies between the material and digital worlds and the ways they influence each other.” The running theme is sand and, across three screens, manipulated footage plays in different formats, exploring the medium. First, it looks at a mine in North America, which is the source for the premier golf course in the US and the chips that are the hardest to produce. It then looks at China’s largest sand-carrying ship that is said to “edit the map by creating artificial islands”, before ending with quartz crystals that make atomic clocks – the precursor to the network of time we use now. 

Henry Svendsen, Lovers Hold

Interrogating how bodies interact with objects through a queer lens, Svendsen centres his sculpture on kissing chairs and how they create a relationship between two people. The resulting viscous, grotto-like forms pooling over stainless steel armatures evoke fleeting contact, traces of desire and the notion of how bodies engage with structures not necessarily designed to hold them. 

Aziza Kadyri, Sender Unknown 

An installation of four parts, Kadyri works with suzani – intricately hand-embroidered textiles traditionally associated with a bride’s dowry. “Humans historically have always borrowed information and put it in their lived context. I’m making parallels with AI models that are collecting our knowledge and encoding it,” she describes. In borrowing this traditional technique, Kadyri questions the point at which meaning becomes simply a pattern. 

Andre Williams, Time After Time

“I turn small drawings into big projects and fill spaces with colour. I want people who see my work to smile and laugh and have their own ideas,” says Williams. Time After Time is a colourful clock and sound system, housed inside the V&A’s Mirrored Room. Referencing vintage video games like Mario Kart and Pac-Man, with Soul and Garage booming from the clock itself – “I love these songs, they make me want to dance” – it’s a joyful expression of nostalgia. 

When the Void Gazes Back, Eunjo Lee

Inspired by the V&A’s extensive and historic Buddhist art collection, Lee creates a futuristic world that questions whether AI's growing agency will disrupt spiritual awakenings. Through digitally sculpted film, screened in a wooden dome, this piece explores two central themes of karma and emptiness in various digital shamanistic deities and evolving cosmic worlds. 

Craft x Tech Tokai Project 

Pairing international designers and artists with Japanese craftspeople from the Tokai region, the Craft x Tech project seeks to both challenge and preserve traditional practices. On display at the V&A this London Design Festival, you can view modern interpretations of centuries-old techniques such as Mino Washi (Japanese paper produced along the river valleys in Mino), Arimatsu Narumi Shibori (ancient tie-dying), Kasane (stackable boxes), Kumihimo (braided cords used to lace together samurai armour) and more. 

MADE x Barbican 

If you haven’t already seen on social media, MADE has collaborated with the Barbican to make the estate’s iconic brutalist architecture accessible to homes across the country. The 23-piece collection references the original show flats, first furnished by Miriam Howitt, and draws on a warm palette of dusty blues and terracotta, with accents of chrome. The dual accent chair in olive velvet with cutout wooden panels is a particular favourite.

Design Districts  

While visiting all 300 exhibitions may be infeasible, London Design Festival’s Design Districts make it easier than ever to view local, free works of art. From Bankside to Brompton, Shoreditch to Soho, the festival unfurls across the city, inviting visitors and locals alike to explore distinctive design outside of the traditional gallery setting.