Liberty's Makeover
Keeping Company Tray, John Derian
The London store Liberty gets a major makeover this spring, with new collections and designers on show from 14 February.
This spring Liberty’s fourth-floor furniture department will showcase a range of new collections and products alongside its specially selected vintage pieces. One of its new stars is Tom Dixon, and Liberty will be showing work from his eponymous company (set up with David Begg six years ago) including sofas and chairs produced in collaboration with the upholstery specialist George Smith. Alongside these will be smaller pieces such as hand-beaten brass vessels and lights from Dixon’s Beat Collection which were inspired by traditional Indian metalwork.
Liberty’s furniture and lighting buyer Michelle Alger has also chosen some younger designers for the re-vamped fourth floor. Look out for pieces by the Cornish furniture collective MARK, which produces innovative high-quality furniture as well as furniture collective naughtone, Russell Pinch’s company Pinch and Sean Sutcliffe and Steven Owens’ Benchmark.
There’s also a raft of new names on sale in the new-look Gift Room, which has been given a major re-furb and moved to the third floor. It makes for an eclectic selection of products which range from Snowden Flood’s glasses decorated with crisply drawn silhouettes of wintry tree to New Yorker John Derian’s decoupage trays and paperweights and glass created for Swarovski by the Swedish design group Front.
And in a nod to its Arts and Crafts roots, from March Liberty will be re-starting its highly popular Sewing School, which will offer ‘Learn to Crochet’ sessions, Patchwork classes, and workshops on how to make rag dolls and fairies.
www.liberty.co.uk
