What to See at London Design Festival 2026

The useful part

From collaborations with the V&A (not surprising given that it's one of the world's leading art and design museums) to Landmark Projects, here are all the best things to see at this year's London Design Festival. Awakenings The V&A's festival takeover spreads across the whole museum this year, built around what happens to design when AI starts doing some of the imagining. Where better to exhibit such the landmark project than at one of London's most recognisable buildings, St Paul's Cathedral?

How it works

• Soul – an audiovisual installation exploring artistic visualisations of neurophysiological research into daydreaming – and The Point of Unity – an immersive light sculpture, conceived as a meeting point of...
• Aziza Kadyri weaves traditional Uzbek embroidery through imagery in Sender Unknown, Nina Davies studies how movement gets tracked and translated in Image Syncers, and Playfool's Emerging Designer commission...
• Sat 12th – Sun 20th September 2026 The Strand, Aldwych, London WC2R 1ES londondesignfestival.com Made x Barbican The Barbican has teamed up with homeware brand MADE on a 23-piece interiors collection...
• Sat 12th – Sun 20th September 2026 Barbican Centre, Silk Street, London EC2Y 8DS made.com Flukette:
• Make yourself at home in the café corner doing a one-off collaboration with Barnaby Bars, or join in with the candle-making bar running Friday to Sunday where you build your own scent to take away in a...

What to take from it

Backed by the Ithra Palm Initiative, it treats a genuinely ancient material as a live design proposition rather than a heritage footnote. Tucked into the Brompton Design District, it's easy to miss, but worth the detour. Fri 11th – Tue 15th September 2026 Wapping Hydraulic Power Station, Wapping Wall, London E1W 3SF londondesignfestival.com Like That?

Example or evidence

• Studio Saar has teamed up with engineers Atelier One to build a bamboo grid shell on the Strand and clad it in Indian police riot shield and the woven palm rain covers used by farmers in the northeast of...

Details worth keeping

Sat 12th September – Sun 18th October 2026 V&A South Kensington, Cromwell Road, London SW7 2RL vam.ac.uk The Point of Unity and Soul by Mykola Kabluka Mykola Kabluka's The Point of Unity and Soul is one of the Festival's two landmark projects. Mon 14th – Mon 21st September 2026 St Paul's Cathedral, St Paul's Churchyard, London EC4M 8AD londondesignfestival.com The Pangolin Shield by Studio Saar and Atelier One The Pangolin Shield is the second landmark project of the festival. The pangolin is the world's most trafficked mammal, and the pavilion uses that to ask questions about protection, displacement and who gets to call something a shield, deliberately angled to face the bust of Nehru outside the Indian High Commission.

Related coverage

• Standard: London is turning into a playground of immersive installations, exhibitions and workshops — here's our guide to discover the best of LDF, by Olivia Lidbury
• Londonist: Open House London! Heritage Open Days! London Design Festival!