A record number of Scottish designers are taking part in this year’s Chelsea Crafts Fair, presented by the Crafts Council, which opens today at Chelsea Old Town Hall and showcases established and emerging talent from across the UK.  It is a special year for the Chelsea Crafts Fair as 2004 marks its 25th anniversary.

Twenty three of Scotland’s leading designers are selling their work including national award winning sculptural willow artist Lizzie Farey and internationally recognised glass artist Alison Kinnaird, whose work ‘Psalmsong’ is currently featured at one of the entrances to the Victoria and Albert Museum.

Chelsea Crafts Fair is a setter of upcoming trends and amongst the Scottish designers participating for the first time are textile designer Ann Marie Weir who uses rubber to create contemporary home furnishings which echo the natural forms of nature; jewellery designer Clare Hillerby who combines precious metals with fragments of old books to convey the idea of short uncertain conversations; textile designer Sara Keith who has developed a new process combining the traditional Japanese dye technique of Shibori with silversmithing; ceramist Craig Mitchell who uses clay to breathe life into surreal comic characters and jeweller Alison Macleod who mixes precious metals and gems with objects of sentimental value such as the bra bits used to manufacture lingerie in the Fifties.

Basketmaker and willow weaver Lizzie Farey, who has just won the BBC Homes & Antiques magazine’s inaugural ‘Talent Around Britain’ £5,000 bursary award, is another first time exhibitor.  She creates sculptural pieces and vases from willow, which she grows herself in Dumfries, and as part of her award her work will be on sale and displayed in the windows of John Lewis’s flagship store in Oxford Street from 11 October.   Find out more about her work in our feature.  

Other Scottish designers exhibiting are glass artist Inge Panneels, furniture designer Mark Devlin,  textile designers James Donald (PickOne), Sarah Campbell of Mogwaii, Margaret Wilson and Ingrid Tait of Tait + Style, silversmith Grant McCaig, ceramist Philomena Pretsell, and jewellers Donna Barry, Emma Gale, Grace Girvan, Anna Gordon, Susan Kerr, Grainne Morton, Kaz Robertson and Suilven Plazalska.  

The designers taking part for the first time have received support from the Scottish Arts Council to participate at the event and many others have received professional development grants to help them develop their careers to this stage.

Presented by the Crafts Council, Chelsea Crafts Fair shows work by over 220 designers and takes place at Chelsea Old Town Hall from the 12–17 and 19-24 October 2004 with different designer-makers exhibiting each week.   Find out more in our feature about Chelsea Crafts Fair 2004.