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London-based Max Radford Gallery presents 53 works across ceramics, furniture, lighting and sculpture in a warehouse near Borough Market, marking the gallery’s first open-call group exhibition since 2021 and signalling a broader international push for London’s emergent designers.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
London-based Max Radford Gallery has transformed a warehouse space near Borough Market into a vibrant showcase of 53 collectible designs, spanning ceramics, furniture, lighting and sculpture. The Dry Cleaning exhibition occupies Clink Street Ceramics\u2019 large Borough Market warehouse from 16 to 24 August 2025, a setting that Radford says helps blur the line between art and design. He describes the show as the gallery\u2019s first open-call group exhibition since its 2021 debut, Uncommon Found, and as a deliberate \u201cscene check\u201d that captures how London\u2019s design community has evolved. \u201cI knew how much things had progressed in the past few years in London and was keen to do a show that represented that wider world and brought it together at the same time,\u201d he told Dezeen. The show contains some provocative and tactile works, including a room divider by Anouska Samms made from leather, human hair and velvet, as well as Alex Whitfield\u2019s Devil Lamp cast in polished stainless steel and resin. Adam Maryniak\u2019s Landlords Special Chair and Gus Langford\u2019s Aubade \u2013 Vessel 3, crafted from recycled leather with lambswool stuffing, invite visitors to stoop, lean in and inspect texture as a threshold between object and idea. The photography in Dezeen\u2019s coverage is credited to the publication\u2019s agency, and Radford emphasises that the contributors were not given any design brief in advance, allowing the works to \u201cspeak for themselves.\u201d The warehouse setting also underlines Clink Street Ceramics\u2019 heritage, with the space described as part of a historic family business that sat alongside Borough Greengrocers. The show comes amid broader cross\u2011pollination between London ceramics, craft and design, and follows a progression in MR\u2019s programming that increasingly places emerging designers on an international stage. The project has already reported strong sales as a sign of life for London\u2019s up\u2011and\u2011coming makers. <\/p>\n
The Dry Cleaning project sits within a longer arc of MR programming that has alternately blurred lines between disciplines and foregrounded process as a driver of value. In 2023, Greyscale at Clink Street Ceramics brought together fourteen creatives newly connected to the Radford roster, spanning ceramics, lighting, furniture and sculpture as it explored a tonal spectrum from black to white to frame materials and narratives within a shared space. The cross\u2011disciplinary approach opened up London\u2019s design scene, inviting audiences to experience design as a spectrum rather than a single category. The collaboration with Clink Street Ceramics provided a platform that extended MR\u2019s reach beyond the gallery setting and into a broader ceramics and craft ecosystem. In 2024, Now 4 Then, curated for MR\u2019s Covent Garden location in collaboration with Aram, showcased ten UK\u2011based emerging designers\u2014Amelia Stevens, Andu Masebo, Charlie Humble Thomas, Eddie Olin, EJR Barnes, Freddy Tuppen, Isabel Alonso, Jaclyn Pappalardo, John Henshaw and Lewis Kemmenoe\u2014under a banner that emphasised sustainability and \u201cdesign for the time.\u201d Aram\u2019s posting on the project emphasised the aim of re\u2011platforming UK designers for a global audience, signalling MR\u2019s ongoing ambition to act as a bridge between local practice and international markets. <\/p>\n
The present line\u2011up continues MR\u2019s commitment to process\u2011driven, material\u2011first design as a catalyst for visibility and opportunity. In August 2024, Sight Unseen highlighted ten designers whose practice foregrounds process and material inquiry, naming names such as Nicolas Zanoni, Tim Teven, Flora Lechner, Calen Knauf, Yoon Shun, Frank Penders, Arnaud Eubelen, Supaform, Studio Kuhlmann and Theophile Blandet as designers to watch. The framing of these designers as exemplars of \u201cprocess\u2011driven\u201d practice mirrors the gallery\u2019s own emphasis on long\u2011term development and experimentation, rather than quick novelty. London Design Week coverage from Tat London in 2023 also noted MR\u2019s Greyscale show as a boundary\u2011pushing expansion of the gallery\u2019s remit, marking MR\u2019s intent to elevate emerging talent on an international platform. <\/p>\n
Dry Cleaning has been framed as both a celebration of London\u2019s current emergent designers and a signal of MR\u2019s evolving curation strategy: an open\u2011call model that invites participation from a broad community, with works ranging across materials and forms to demonstrate the breadth of \u201cthe scene\u201d today. The show\u2019s title\u2014drawn from Radford\u2019s interest in the graphic language of old London laundrettes\u2014also serves as a metaphor for refreshing and presenting new work in a familiar urban context. The project underscores MR\u2019s aim to support designers not only through visibility but through meaningful engagement with an international audience, cultivating collaborations and networks that could sustain their practice beyond a single show. <\/p>\n