The Cottage Project is a micro-department store in New Cross Gate, South East London, launching in Autumn 2012 consisting of cafe, exhibition and shop space. We are passionate about the process of British making and enjoy sharing this with the community of artists we work with as well as the customers we serve.

Our aim is to promote the quality and craftsmanship of cottage industry produced food, home wares, textiles, accessories, apparel, furniture and art, connecting people to the products they make, use and buy. Our in house events consist of workshops, talks, designer product launches, exhibitions and classes, to engage local people in the making process.

Kingston alumni Osian Batyka-Williams and Holly Berry are the founders of The Cottage Project, and as well as doing all of the structural work to the building themselves; rescuing an almost derelict shop, they are both designer-makers, Osian in furniture and product design and Holly in woven textiles. Both are passionate about cottage industry, batch production and contemporary craft and aim to promote, celebrate and support the community of makers they find themselves part of.

 EVENTS LEADING UP TO THE LAUNCH OF THE COTTAGE CAFE, GALLERY & SHOP:

SHOW ROOM
Here at The Cottage Project we have decided that whilst the light is shining on London and Britain during this exciting Olympic celebration, we will open our doors to introduce and make a fuss of the British makers and artists we champion. The Cottage Project Designer-Makers showroom will be located in the Cottage Space at 106 New Cross Rd, SE14 5BA, the formerly derelict New Cross Tandoori. We have a hand selected group of exciting, bold and contemporary works by artisans and makers from many disciplines who all share the fact that they’re passionate about their making processes. Handmade ceramics, jaunty printed wall paper, sparkling stitched collars and concrete sculptures are just some of the treats we are showing.

This is a taste of what is to come at The Cottage Project Cafe and the standard of work you can expect to enjoy. You are invited to make an appointment with Osian or Holly to view the showroom and see the exciting work on offer, learning more about the artists and the philosophy of The Cottage Project.

Please call or email to book an informal viewing:
Osian: osian@thecottagelondon.com 07743448301
Holly: holly@thecottagelondon.com 07730565985

POP UP
During the Olympics The Cottage Project has connected with sports brand New Balance who are celebrating domestic manufacture for 30 years. Both the Cottage project and New Balance strongly believe in provenance and quality. The Cottage Project are running a Pop Up Makers Space at a high profile New Balance Olympic hospitality suite, ensuring that visitors are given the chance to observe, learn and participate in British making. Each day will see a different maker doing their thing on site, from weaving, patch work and ceramics, to upholstery, metal work, screen printing and the production of fine trimmings.

Follow our daily tweets and Maker of The Day news on Twitter: https://twitter.com/cottageproject

The new head of Kingston University’s Faculty of Art, Design and Architecture has urged politicians not to think of a university education as simply being about three years of training. “We’re educating people for life in a rapidly changing world in which they will face challenges that we can’t even imagine yet,” Professor Steven Spier, who has just taken over as Dean of the faculty, said. “We can’t lose sight of the fact that the education we provide will help determine how people’s careers develop – in part how their lives develop.”

Professor Spier, who is a leading expert on contemporary Swiss architecture, is joining Kingston after two years at the University of Ulster where he has been head of the School of Architecture and Design. “I chose to come to Kingston because it’s one of the best art schools in the United Kingdom and because London is one of the most important centres for the creative industries anywhere in the world,” he said. “As a trained architect, the post was also appealing because architecture and built environment at Kingston sit alongside fine art and design rather than engineering and this is uncommon in Europe.”

Professor Spier takes on the role just as the new fees regime introduced by the coalition Government comes into effect. He believes universities will have to work harder to demonstrate their worth, but that art and design education can readily meet the challenge. “Its value isn’t as immediately obvious as that of a business or a vocational course, but art and design education helps us make sense of the world around us. What’s more, it teaches students to be entrepreneurial, flexible and responsible for their own learning,” he said. “We have to make it clear that it’s a valuable education for life. We need to get out there and show the world the interesting and relevant things we do.”

 With a Finnish mother and American father, Professor Spier was born in Canada, brought up in the United States and holds four passports. He has a broad liberal arts education with a Bachelor’s degree in philosophy from Haverford College in Philadelphia. “Being educated for life has influenced my approach to education to this day,” he said. “I had to study the natural sciences, the social sciences and a foreign language before I majored in philosophy.”

 After a spell working in New York, he studied for his Master’s in architecture at the Southern California Institute of Architecture. He then travelled to Germany to work in practice. “The Berlin Wall had only just come down and I was living in what used to be East Germany,” he said. “It was a pretty tough time in the former East and like the Wild West in the West.”

He remained in Europe, moving to the world-renowned Swiss Institute of Technology in Zürich ETH to teach. His first position in Britain was at London South Bank University, before he moved to the University of Strathclyde, where he was head of the School of Architecture for six years. In 2006, Professor Spier was appointed founding principal of the new HafenCity University Hamburg in Germany, which specialises in urban planning, architecture and civil engineering. After four years, he returned to the United Kingdom to take up his most recent post at Ulster, while living in Glasgow.

 Professor Spier has two major research areas in which he has published extensively. The first is contemporary Swiss architecture and the factors that have allowed a relatively small country to attain an international reputation for the excellence of its architecture. His book ‘Swiss Made’, which has been published in the United Kingdom, Spain, Germany and the United States, was chosen as one of the books of the year by Architects’ Journal in 2003.

His other area of expertise is choreography as a form of spatial organisation. ”What I try to do is think of choreography as a way of organising people within space – which is also what architecture aims to do,” he explained. He has recently edited the first English-language book on the renowned choreographer William Forsythe, ‘William Forsythe and the Practice of Choreography. It Starts from Any Point’.

Professor Spier has links with a wide range of cultural institutions in Scotland. He was appointed to the board of Architecture and Design Scotland when it was established in 2005, is an honorary fellow of the Royal Incorporation of Architects in Scotland and is on the board of Scottish Ballet. He has recently been made a director of Glasgow-based and internationally renowned producing art house Cryptic. When asked if he had any advice for students at his new faculty, Professor Spier quoted Cryptic’s slogan: “Stay curious”.

 Further afield, he has been honoured by the Association of German Architects (BDA), has advised the Austrian Government on the development of its art colleges and reviews research proposals for the Austrian Science Fund and the Commonwealth Scholarship and Fellowship Plan. He has sat on the Royal Institute of British Architects judging panel for design awards and the equivalent panels in Scotland and Northern Ireland.

 “Kingston’s art, design and architecture courses already have a formidable reputation and I am confident that, as an expert in architecture, Professor Spier will build on this,” Kingston University’s Vice-Chancellor, Professor Julius Weinberg, said. “His insights into universities in the United States and on the continent will be immensely valuable as British higher education enters a new era.”