The countdown to The Queen's Diamond Jubilee has officially begun across the United Kingdom and the Commonwealth and it's no different here in Windsor at Studio Velardi. In what is the same year I conceived the creative design enterprise, Studio Velardi marks Queen Elizabeth II's sixty year reign in 2012 with a new red, white and blue Twitter background and witty homepage design that goes live from today and for the duration of the Jubilee celebrations.
This weekend Studio Velardi will be at a special Jubilee Windsor Emporium with my exclusive collection of environmentally friendly stationery on Sunday 3rd June at The Guildhall, Windsor - visit Windsor Emporium for more details and followtwitter.com/studiovelardi for the latest news on my whereabouts around Windsor and Berkshire.
With a little over a week to go to the celebrations of The Queen's Diamond Jubilee that will kick off next weekend in what is being called The Central Weekend, the countdown to quintessential 'made in Britain', that is pomp and circumstance, has officially begun.
With a plethora of exhibitions, events, interactive sites and digital apps, this Diamond Jubilee is a very twenty-first century affair where past and present shall be beamed across the globe in high gilded resolution. More on the nation's best Jubilee-to-dos next week, but for now, in the run up to the festivities in London and the extraordinary sight that will be the Thames Diamond Jubilee River Pageant, Sea Containers House on the South Bank has been given a right-royal-British-billboard this morning in the shape of a 100 x 70 metre wrap depicting the Royal Family on the balcony of Buckingham Palace during the Silver Jubilee in 1977 and is the largest image of its kind to ever be erected (from left, HRH Prince of Wales, HRH Prince Edward, HRH Prince Andrew, Lord Mountbatten, HM The Queen, HRH Duke of Edinburgh, Captain Mark Phillips and HRH Princess Anne)
Visit the official Diamond Jubilee website for more information about events near you and across the country.
This weekend sees the closing of the celebrated exhibition Leather Forever by French luxury house Hermèsand as promised, before leaving for Italy I paid a visit to Burlington Gardens to explore a material that remains the house’s ‘noblest conquest’.
If a brand was human,
leather would be its skin and Hermès would be the top model of them all –
charting the history of six generations up to the present Dumas family member Pierre-Alexis, who is artistic director, the story of Hermès is rich in style as
well as substance.
Greeted by a specially
commissioned leather-lined Citroën 2CV to mark the automobile company’s 60th anniversary in 2008,
the message that visitors would be taken on a journey could not have been more
clear.
Up the stairs and past the unassuming marble statue (Kelly bag under her
arm), the exhibition consists of twelve interactive rooms that have been
exquisitely designed by Alexandra Plat and created by Speeg Michel and
Sigmasix.
From the library
of supple and exotic hides hung from pulley systems to the multimedia
installation of the house’s signature orange boxes piled high adjacent to two
leather craftsmen from the Pantin studios, surrounded by their customised tools
and threads - if the first two rooms were anything to go by this was not to be
any old retrospective.
For anyone who receives the Hermès newsletter or visits the World of Hermès, you will already know creativity with a dash of wit are the key ingredients that keep this brand young and fresh. Between the vitrines of leather goods from the house’s archives and private loans – my favourite being the large bespoke artist’s portfolio – one is walking through a horseshow on white sand in one room and through a curtain of leather piping the next; an incredible digital display projects the motions of stitching and hardware on a series of leather bags and clutches, followed by the final products in all their glory set in a wondrous nomadic pop-up tent with jet set trunks and luggage, immersed in that trademark orange light.
Subtle and discreet as is the brand,Leather Forever is anincroyablepresentation of how to make anexhibition of one of the world’s most expensive luxury brands – free from brash logos – exciting, as well as accessible. Colour, texture and the perfume that is leather make this an exhibition for the senses and it is evident the same attention to detail curatorially has been directly inspired by the heritage of craft and execution that is simply Hermès.
This very execution par
excellence features in the final room where four one-of-a-kind Passe-Guide bags
have been created to represent England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales. Christie’s
are currently conducting an online auction that will end on 31st May
2012 with all proceeds donated to the Royal Academy of Arts - visitChristiesfor more information.
Leather Forever closes this
Sunday 27th May 2012 at 6pm
It takes the luxury house of Hermès to remind us that the current trend in all-things-craft is in fact an ethos the French brand adhere to every moment of the day and one that has been going since the eighteenth-century. Next week sees the opening of a new exhibition in London, Leather Forever that will celebrate both the brand's desired luxury talent from bags to saddles and silk and its 175th anniversary from its beginnings as an equestrian outfitters. A selection of exhibits from each department will be on display at Burlington Gardens as well as artisans from the house's workshops - cutting templates and stitching leather parts to create one of the many iconic products into a work of art.
The exhibition will chart Hermès' heritage and the importance of craft that the house prides itself on, granting it the status symbol that its products now command globally. Specially commissioned works will be on display as well as a series of four unique Passe Guide handbags, that debuted in the A/W 2012 collection, to represent England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales, all crafted in sumptuous leathers and hides that will be auctioned online at the end of the exhibition by Christie's. I'll be reporting on the exhibition after it's opening so be sure to visit jonathanvelardi.blogspot.com next week - until then for further details on the exhibition visit theWorld of Hermès.
Leather Forever 8th - 27th May 2012 6 Burlington Gardens London W1S 3ET Images courtesy of Hermès
