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The Tree of Life: Animism and the Earth Spirit

In the Middle Ages, when everyone trusted in god, they also believed that nature was alive. The existence of “Mother Earth” proposed by Aristotle, as interpreted by St Thomas Aquinas, was taught in universities. Animals and plants were believed to have souls, the Latin word for soul being “anima”. The scientific revolution starting in the […]

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Raw Talent and Retro Texture at Collect Craft Fair

No one would have guessed that the Great Pottery Throw Down would make for compelling television entertainment, let alone that BBC Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour would be running its own craft competition to celebrate the programme’s 70th anniversary. Likewise, few could have anticipated the rise and rise of craft, at a time when ‘authenticity’ is everywhere, […]

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Slow Solutions for a Complex World: Visuology Visits London’s New Design Museum

Whether you go to London’s new Design Museum to see the architecture or the exhibits, you are unlikely to be disappointed. Hailed by original founder and inspirational octogenarian, Sir Terence Conran as, “a cathedral of design,” and “the most important moment of my career in design… so far,” the museum brings to life a dream […]

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Chic Favela: Brazilian Inspired Sustainable Textile Design

Discarded materials have been put to good use in Cheryl Higgins’s textile collections. The young designer’s slow textiles incorporate used bottle tops and ring pulls reworked into sustainable mixed media designs. Her 2015 degree show at Loughborough University won her a place as one of the Top 30 New Designers in the annual show of the same name. Cheryl […]

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Biophilic Style at Clerkenwell Design Week 2016

In Visuology Issue 2, we featured Outside In living, drawing attention to the growing desire to be at one with nature. Carpet tile maker, Interface, has researched the global impact of biophilic design in the workplace. Workers in office environments with natural elements, such as greenery and sunlight, report a 15% higher level of wellbeing, […]

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Sustainable Summer Hats at Fiona Bennett, Berlin

Why is it that art galleries and happening concept stores are always off the beaten track? There’s probably a correlation between the difficulty of finding a place and the level of slow style snobbery. On the same stretch of Berlin’s Potsdamer Strasse as uber-trendy Andreas Murkudis, a new Acne outpost, a fair few Turkish grocery […]

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China Tea Connection: History, Culture, Ceremony and Craft

Everything is connected. People say the world is getting smaller, but external cultural influences have inspired tastes in food, style, art and design for as long as man has travelled. In China, tea has been drunk for millennia, but the art of drinking tea is a culture all of its own. Gonfu Cha, the Chinese tea ceremony means “making […]

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Threads, Fringes and Handcrafted Fashion: In Conversation with Kelsey Hutton

From passementerie to fashion adornments so extreme that the decoration becomes the fabric itself. Just when you thought we were over fringing, this is something you’ll be seeing even more of in the spring – with fringing becoming an integral part of the fabric. The frayed fabric look has been seen on the catwalks of Chanel, […]

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