Month: June 2026

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Architects Architecture Design Developers Luxury Restaurants

Oxo Tower Brasserie + Bar Southbank London

SupperClubbing

Palestinian American Muna Mustafa is the co founder of SupperClub Middle East (along with Mehreen Omar). She now lives in Abu Dhabi. Business is in her blood: “I always learned good lessons from Mom. She’s an excellent businesswoman and invested in her business early on and ran it successfully for 25 years. She continued to invest in property and now owns real estate in many countries.” It’s not all about money though. “The most valuable things in life were given to us free at birth: our body, mind and soul. Everything material, including money, can easily be replaced multiple times. You can lose and remake a fortune, but the things we got at birth can never be replaced and are actually what really matters.”

The fine living platform has an ever growing international reach. Expanding its portfolio of discounted luxury experiences with new collaborations in Africa, Europe and South Asia, the world is SupperClub’s oyster. As a Pakistani now living in Abu Dhabi, Mehreen says, “Bringing SupperClub to Pakistan last June felt like a full circle moment for me! It’s a country with a deep love for food, culture and connection. We are thrilled to have introduced something we built to the people who understand the joy of dining best. SupperClub gives locals and expats in Pakistan exclusive offers to their favourite restaurants in a way that feels elevated, effortless and just a little more special.”

Which brings us rather nicely to lunch at Oxo Tower Brasserie and Bar on London’s Southbank. We’re physically elevated (eighth floor dining) and with SupperClub’s ever smooth Concierge Service, it’s an effortless occasion. We’ve been frequenting Oxo Tower for more than two decades but today is just that little more special as we’re soaking up the rays on the sun drenched terrace. It’s the first day of the second heatwave of 2026. St Paul’s Cathedral shines brightly across the River Thames. Following a Leaders of London networking brunch, handily also on the eighth floor of Oxo Tower, lunch is a relaxed affair.

Oxo Tower Brasserie LondonBargehouse Oxo Tower Brasserie LondonBargehouse Oxo Tower Brasserie LondonOxo Tower Brasserie LondonOxo Tower Brasserie London

“The top floor restaurant, brasserie and bar are all owned by Harvey Nichols,” explains the manager. “They opened in September 1996. Fridays are like a ghost town in London. Mondays are getting busier but most of our business is now Tuesday to Thursday.” We’re happy to be ghosts if it means enjoying a more chilled ambience. A corollary of changing urban lifestyles. We’re all on for small plates not for sharing. A hand dived Orkney scallop chinooked in from the islands off the Scottish coast is accompanied by lemon butter. Crisp courgette flowers come with Rachel cheese and truffle honey. Chalk streamed trout is decorated with fennel and pickled lime. Traditional millionaire’s shortbread comes with childhood favourite popping candy. Looks good, tastes good, feels good.

Body, mind and soul are well catered for on the eighth floor. Oxo Tower is currently the ultimate mixed use building. The ground floor and galleried first floor are filled with cafés, shops and art galleries. An event space and studios occupy the second floor. There are 78 apartments on the third to seventh floors. The wonderfully not over restored Bargehouse to the rear has four levels of flexible exhibition space. The history of Oxo Tower is equally mixed use: constructed in the late 19th century as a power station, it was taken over as a cold store in the 1920s by the Liebig Extract of Meat Company who manufactured Oxo beef stock cubes.

The building was redesigned by Liebig’s architect Albert Moore in a modish Art Deco style. Skyline advertising was banned along Southbank so Albert came up with an innovative solution. He designed a tower rising over the centre of the rebuilt power station with three vertically aligned windows on each side in the shapes of a circle, a cross and a circle. Sometimes the best design solutions come from leapfrogging over regulations. Oxo Tower was restored and converted to multiple purpose occupation in the 1990s as part of a 5.3 hectare site redeveloped by the non profit Coin Street Community Builders. The architects were Lifschutz Davidson.

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Pedro Ispizua + Matio Ciudad Jardín Bilbao

Click Goes the Camera and On Goes Life

Back in 1892 in the genesis of town planning as a profession, the British theorist Ebenezer Howard published his highly influential tome Tomorrow: A Peaceful Path to Real Reform. Six years later, it was reissued with the catchier title Garden Cities of Tomorrow. His idealised garden city would house 32,000 people on 3,600 hectares based on a concentric pattern incorporating open spaces and public parks. A couple of decades after Ebenezer’s bestseller had hit the shelves, Letchworth and Welwyn, both on the outskirts of London, would become Britain’s first and last garden cities.

BilbaoThe idea took root across Europe. Bilbao is blessed with surrounding mountain ranges from Artxanda to the northeast to Pagasarri to the south. A beautiful sense of containment is the result. On the lower slopes of Artxanda opposite the Guggenheim Museum, above the far bank of the River Nervión, is the Basque interpretation of a garden city. Mainly white villas with black timbered details, clearly channelling a vernacular of old, are set in the generous verdant plots of Matio Ciudad Jardín.

Matio Ciudad Jardin BilbaoMatio Ciudad Jardin BilbaoMatio Ciudad Jardin BilbaoMatio Ciudad Jardin BilbaoCommercial and community buildings overlook Celso Negeuruela Plaza in the heart of Matio Ciudad Jardín. It’s all so low rise and low density compared to the mansion blocks of the tight urban grid that is central Bilbao. A hillside funicular and glass lifts descending from the Maurice Ravel Etorb dual carriageway connect Matio Ciudad Jardín to the city centre.

In 1922 Basque architect Pedro Ispizua won a municipal competition to design a residential led mixed use scheme for the stated funded Cooperative of Employees and Journalists. His 56 pairs of semi detached houses line roads striping and curling up the gradient. Regionalist architecture blends Basque farmhouse style with modern living requirements. Red pantile roofs contrast with the monochromatic elevations.

Later insertions include a pale grey rendered house with a corner circular conical roofed tower opening onto a large terrace made for parties and propped up by impossibly high retaining walls. Matio Ciudad Jardín, like other garden cities of Europe, is now a sought after address. The semi rural ambiance, the retro architecture and panorama across Bilbao to Pagasarri are an estate agent’s dream.

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Ascensor de Begoña + Old Town + St Joseph’s Catholic Church Bilbao

To Love You More

Old Town BilbaoThis century the largest city in Basque Country is inextricably linked to one piece of adventurous built form. Guggenheim Museum Bilbao is something of a showstopper. Yet follow the curve of the River Nervión eastwards and high above Old Town rises another piece of adventurous built form erected just over half a century before the museum took shape and shifted the dial of cultural tourism forever.

The Ascensor de Begoña elevates the humble lift both physically and architecturally. Architect Rafael Fontán’s Brutalist reinforced concrete was built for moving people, not moving (stationary) art. In such a hilly city, it linked the 18th century El Arenal parkland with the medieval Old Town. A 45 metre high (the equivalent of about 13 storeys) elevated passageway connected the hillside to a square hollow vertical column containing a lift. Unfortunately, Ascensor de Begoña has been closed since 2014 over a maintenance dispute.

Bilbao’s medieval Old Town is literally overshadowed by Ascensor de Begoña and metaphorically overshadowed by the Guggenheim Museum. Nonetheless it is well worth exploring. The historic core of the city, like its Basque neighbour San Sebastián, is a neoclassical plaza. It looks older, but Plaza Nueva was officially opened in 1851. A long build gestation – which could explain its earlier appearance – was inevitable with three architects on board: Silvestre Pérez, Antonio Echevarría and Avelino Goikoetxea. Pintxo bars are aplenty on Plaza Nueva under the arched Doric arcade. The very dog friendly Tostao café and bakery (with its resident canine) faces onto ZIngira Kalea next to the river.

Old Town BilbaoTostao Cafe Old Town BilbaoOld Town BilbaoOld Town BilbaoOld Town BilbaoOld Town BilbaoOld Town BilbaoBilbao

St Nicolás’ Catholic Church is a fine example of baroque Basque architecture. It was designed by Ignacio Ibero and completed in 1756. The monumental exterior is constructed of local Ganguren stone. Twin belltowers flank a central belfry on the façade; the St Nicolás Plaza facing elevation has a double height arched arcade. A vast octagonal tower enclosing an interior dome is slightly set back from the building line. To the north of St Nicolás’, the river facing City Hall was built to the design of municipal architect Joaquin Rucoba in 1892. Second Empire was the style of choice: France is after all a mere 120 kilometres from Bilbao.

The turn of last century apartment blocks of Old Town have beautifully detailed winter gardens. Projecting balconies encased by glass and timber panels provide residents with all year round usability, noise insulation and nosying opportunities on neighbours. Who needs Gogglebox? Winter gardens are all the rage with London planning authorities. Nothing new under the sun.

On the far side of River Nervión set in the turn of the 20th century grid of development is. Architect José María Basterra’s Gothic design was completed in two parts: the spire was erected 14 years after the church was inaugurated in 1918. The gleaming white stone exterior of St Joseph’s (the ubiquitous Bilbao red pantile roofs hidden behind parapets) looks new under the sun.

While the city sleeps, we explore its streets like curious cats. The reflection of golden illumination from street lamps relieves the velvety darkness of the River Nervión. We prowl riverside along Paseo de Uribitart. Ascending Villarías Kalea, shop windows display goods but nobody’s browsing. On the far side of the river, in the Old Town, the scent of baking bread escapes from bakeries. The bells of St Nicolás’ aren’t a’pealing. We slink past the Dog’s Fountain on Txakur Kalea. A lone jogger runs by. Dawn’s about to crack this nocturne in black and gold.Old Town Bilbao

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Frank Gehry + Guggenheim Museum Bilbao

A Word Based Universe

No time for a deep dive? Guggenheim Bilbao. On budget. On time. Unlike the Scottish Parliament Building. The container outshines the contents. Still successful. Only into its second year of publication, an article in the September / October 1997 edition of the glorious Wallpaper* magazine under the mastery of Tyler Brûlé is worth quoting. Almost in its entirety. Andrew Tuck’s 48 Hours in Bilbao sums up the excitement of that era, “A decade ago Bilbao seemed to be heading for a slow but sure death. After centuries at the heart of Spain’s shipbuilding and steel industries, it found that it could no longer compete with rivals in the Fat East, and neither could it attract the young pioneers of new technologies to the city. Bilbao simply lacked the lifestyle and culture that would make anyone want to move there.”

“The city’s leaders started looking for ways of reinvigorating Bilbao, just as the board of New York’s Guggenheim Museum was planning satellite museums around the world (the Guggenheim was facing Bilbao’s crisis in reverse: it had too much art and no chance of expanding at either its main Manhattan home or tiny Venice outpost). In 1991, after a year of courting, a union was announced that would bring together Basque taxpayers and the Solomon Guggenheim Foundation to build a vast $100 million contemporary art museum on the banks of the Nervión River in the heart of the city’s declining docks.”

Bilbao“The next move was to sign up an architect and after a restricted competition Frank Gehry won the day. Famed for his numerous international projects, Gehry has developed a complex style of non linear architecture in which flowing shapes fit together to create buildings that, while extraordinarily dramatic, blend perfectly into any cityspace. His fluid style was also perfect for dealing with a triangular site that is dissected by one of Bilbao’s busiest traffic bridges, the Puente de la Salve.”

“Now, just six years later, Gehry’s greatest building, and one of the wonders of modern architecture, is preparing to open its doors on 18 October, with a display of 20th century art from Cubism to multimedia installations, as well as the work of Basque artists. What’s more, the museum will be opening on budget and on time. The Guggenheim in Bilbao contains 18 galleries that vary from small classic and intimate spaces to the main gallery that, at 130 metres long and 30 metres wide, is bigger than a football pitch, and with doors that are large enough to let lorries through to deliver vast sculptures (such as the 170 tonnes of metal contained in Richard Serra’s work that is already in position). The central atrium is 55 metres tall and is ringed by walkways designed by Gehry to pay homage to Frank Lloyd Wright’s 1959 Guggenheim in New York.”

“But it’s the outside of the building that has won over the people of Bilbao: the exteriors of the galleries which house the photography and two dimensional painting collection are covered in limestone, but the spaces that will display more radical work and installations are covered in interlocking plates of titanium which recall the city’s shipbuilding traditions. It’s a metal that never blinds you on a sunny day and even at night reflects a soothing glow.”

BilbaoGuggenheim Museum Bilbao“Confident that culture and architecture can jumpstart Bilbao, the city has found funding to pay for a metro system designed by Sir Norman Foster, a footbridge across across the Nervión and a revamped airport both by Santiago Calatrava. The city is rerouting roads, building new apartments, parks, offices and a concert hall and cleaning up the polluted river. When the work is done, Bilbao hopes to become Europe’s new cultural capital. Mixed in with the new is style and luxury from the old days. Then there’s the chance to eat Basque food and tap into the region’s Celtic soul. In short, it’s time you dropped by.”

It’s time to unpack, rewind but nor relax – there’s too much to discuss. Back to the present. Frank Gehry died last year aged 96. He never retired. Born Frank Goldberg, he had a working class Jewish upbringing in Toronto. The architect changed his surname in the 1950s to protect his children from antisemitism. A sign of things to come – trailblazing deconstructivism – was the transformation of his bungalow in Santa Monica by adding layers of corrugated metal, plywood and chain link fencing. It didn’t do down well with the neighbours. But it was Frank’s harnessing of computer technology intended for the design of aircraft to buildings that set him apart from his contemporaries, eroding the line between architecture and sculpture.

Guggenheim Museum Bilbao“I want buildings that have passion in them,” he said in 1997, “that make people feel something – even if they get mad at them.” It was a good year to make that comment: the newly completed Guggenheim is filled to the skylights with passion. Later, he would apply a rationalised form of his trademark sinuous style to residential and commercial buildings. The following year came the RheinHafen Arts and Media Centre on Düsseldorf’s Am Handels and in 2022 the apartment block Prospect Place at Battersea Power Station, London. Despite their idiosyncratic volumes, both these developments use standardised windows unlike Enric Miralles Benedetta Tagliabue’s Scottish Parliament Building.

It’s easy, very easy, to get distracted by the billowing waves of cool silvery titanium – a sea of giant anchovies – but look closer and the Guggenheim Museum is materially anchored to the earth by warm yellowy Spanish limestone. Two components are picked out in colour: the hot blue administration block and the burnt red bridge. Across the river is the comforting proximity of vast villas, three dimensional reminders that Bilbao was once Spain’s richest city.

The complexity of the exterior is only matched by the intricacy of the interior. Three floors of enfilade free galleries offer three experiences: regular shaped rooms; irregular shaped rooms; and open spaces around the central limestone panelled and white painted plaster atrium. Big architecture needs big art. Andy Warhol’s 150 Multicoloured Marilyns, 1979, is the right scale for the permanent collection. The Pop Art mantra that image matters more than experience may seem a little dated now but then this is a (late) 20th century container of (mainly) 20th century contents. Jenny Holzer’s Installation of Bilbao, 1997, off the atrium is also suitably large. This site specific LED artwork consisting of nine signboards filled with scrolling texts rising up their 12 metre height is colourful, insightful and interactive.

Guggenheim Museum BilbaoDeep dive on one of the biggest architectural splashes of 20th century architecture and design over.

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Guggenheim Museum Bilbao + Lucinda Mudge

Art Attack

Bilbao“We live in such a lovely part of the world,” says the artist Lucinda Mudge over a long lunch in the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao where she’s exhibiting. It’s September 2013. “We designed and built our own house in a natural dune forest in Keurboomstrand outside Plettenberg Bay. We are surrounded by trees and dense indigenous bush. It is an extremely attractive place to live.” That’s the beautiful side of living in rural South Africa. But there’s a darker, more sinister side. “When my husband is abroad working, and it’s just me and the children, I’m aware of how isolated we are and how susceptible to burglary or violent crime. I go through this checklist before I go to bed: lock the doors, turn on my walkie talkie as there’s poor cell reception, keep the landline near the bed, and so on.”

BilbaoThis dichotomy directly translates into Lucinda’s art. Doors Locked is one of 26 ceramic vases from her concurrent show The White Tiger and Other Stories at Knysna Art Gallery in South Africa’s Western Cape. On one side it’s a beautiful black and gold object “decorated with the sort of thing a magpie would collect”. She laughs, “I make glitzy vases. They’re quite bling!” But the other side menacingly has her security checklist inscribed into the clay and painted with a honey glaze. “I Will Kill You And Then I Will Eat You” is emblazoned on another piece. She sees what she hears. She makes what she sees: “I incorporate headlines and quotes from local news stories into my vases.” Duality of experience. “I like playing off the two.”

BilbaoThe inspiration for Lucinda’s vases is partly rooted in Battersea, south London. “My husband and I moved to London straight after getting married in South Africa. I managed to secure a contract as a photographer to Ralph Lauren and I worked for him on a freelance basis for the four years we lived in Battersea. I joined an evening class in pottery – next door to Edmund de Waal but I never met him – and it was there that I learned about using slip as a means to decorate.” She had previously studied fine art at the University of Cape Town.

BilbaoGuggenheim Museum BilbaoGuggenheim Museum Bilbao“I was not exhibiting in London,” Lucinda recalls. “In retrospect I can see I was internalising a lot and absorbing a wealth of information. My time in London helped me to see more clearly when we returned to live in South Africa. I saw inequality in a new and ugly way. I think that when one lives in a country where generally speaking people are pretty well looked after, such as the UK, it is hard to conceive the reality of the lives of the underprivileged people elsewhere in the world.”

Lucinda Mudge ArtistNo doubt her vase If I Ever Had To Run For My Life I Would Probably Die has a story to tell. Hard hitting stuff, yes, but much of it is delivered with humour. Her piece How Glorious To Be Filthy Stinking Rich features a middle finger pointing upwards. There’s an underlying and at times explicit satire: jokes with jags. Lucinda confides she did experience the dreaded home invasion only recently: “I was upstairs when I heard someone prowling around below inside the house. Filled with trepidation, I ran to the top of the stairs and came face to face with the intruder. It was a baboon! They’re scared of male humans but not females, so I growled in a deep voice and did my best masculine impression!” The baboon, a beautiful but potentially dangerous creature, fled.

Lucinda Mudge ArtistLunch – memorable in intellectual and edible content – is a cocktail aperitif (coctel aperitivo); vegetables, sautéed potatoes and greenbeam cream (verduras, patatitas salteadas y crema de vainas); baby squid on crunchy noodles, red onion and green pepper (chipirón, sobre fideuá crujiente, cebolla roja y pimiento verde); raspberry ice cream, citrus fruit yoghurt and crispy stones (helado de frambuesa, yogur de cítricos y peidras crocantes); and homemade bread, coffee and petit fours (pan artesano café y petit fours).

Life in Keurboomstrand continues for the artist Lucinda between exhibiting in London and across South Africa, ever vigilant, ever observing, ever commenting through her rather wonderful art. Guggenheim Museum Bilbao

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Guggenheim Museum Bilbao + Making Africa A Continent of Contemporary Design + Ruth Asawa Retrospective

Jumping off Stage Into An Embrace

“After studying art and then studying architecture, I never needed the clarity of being either a professional architect or being an artist, and found sound kind of middle ground that was contaminated from all sides.” Elizabeth Diller, 2020.

This isn’t our first rodeo. It’s our second to the museum with a city attached. Back in time to October 2015. The moated mountain that is the Guggenheim. Looking (hyphen optional) shipshape. It’s approached by foot along the Abandoibarra riverside walk under Louise Bourgeois’ 1999 arachnid sculpture Maman which resembles for all the world – Philippe Starck on steroids – a giant Juicy Salif Lemon Squeezer. Art or design?

While the Frank Gehry designed museum’s regenerating “effect”, a left bank titanium building as quarter, inspired a rash of grimly unsuccessful turn of the century cultural projects (nobody mention Sheffield’s National Centre for Popular Music, imitators failed to register the added ingredients of Bilbao’s mix. Not one but a multiplicity of super architect projects including Arata Isozaki’s two fingered 23 storey cloud bothering salute as well as even recognisable names such as Santiago Calatrava, Norman Foster and Zaha Hadid. A delightful 15th century historic quarter. Dramatic scenery. Great cuisine. Good looking locals. Together these ingredients all made a recipe for success. As Victor Hugo once quipped, “Everyone who has visited the Basque Country longs to return; it is a blessed land.”

Making Africa A Continent of Contemporary Design is the latest exhibition at the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao. The museum is closed to the public: we’re the first visitors. It’s curated by Petra Joos at the Guggenheim and Amelie Klein of Vitra Design Museum, Basel. The exhibition seeks to illustrate how design is steering change in Africa and presents the protagonists of this new epoch. Its context is globalisation through technology. “A part of this development is a new and open understanding of what design is,” explains Mateo Kries, Director of Vitra Design Museum. “It’s no longer limited to the creation of furniture, products, typography or fashion, but is very closely interwoven with the fields of photography, art, architecture and even urbanism.” He believes while this change is happening around the world today, it most clearly manifests itself in Africa.

Mateo’s counterpart Juan Ignacio Vidarte at the Guggenheim concurs, “It is in the intersection of innumerable creative fields that design holds a position as the focal point for multidisciplinary work. Making Africa successfully portrays the image of a continent that is beginning to move at this very moment.” C Stunners, 2012, eyewear sculptures by the Kenyan artist Cyrus Kabiru in the show’s Prologue section, are a metaphor for what’s to come. Who’s examining who? “We’re mutually examining ourselves,” Amelie contends. “The exhibition isn’t a totalising vision. Rather, a supplementary vision. Not an exhaustive dialogue – a starting point for our thoughts. One possible way, another way, of looking at the continent.” The exhibition cleverly conveys the diversity and complexity of Africa. After all, this is a landmass of one billion people.

Western misconceptions are diminished. Laughter replaces tears. “Something I got obsessed with is people dancing to Pharrell Williams’ video Happy!” smiles Amelie. “I really watched those videos, I dunno, for nights and nights in a row! There are dozens from Africa. Yet in our Westernised minds the continent is always struggling.” She selected the work of young South African photographer Jody Brand which depicts not only African street style but also party life and in doing so reflects a changing society. Jody’s images show there’s much more than struggle to Africa.

Guggenheim Museum BilbaoGuggenheim Museum BilbaoGuggenheim Museum BilbaoLike Mateo, Amelie believes “the continent is at the forefront of global technological change”. She continues, “Modernism was the result of change in Europe 100 years ago. What will we see coming out of this change?” The politics of representation are never far away. Who’s allowed to speak about Africa? The curators engaged in an intense three year preparation to quality. Their exhibition includes 75 recorded interviews with artists and designers. “In reality of course,” concedes Amelie, “there are millions and billions of different Africas. How can we speak about one Africa? From Cairo to Cape Town, there’s a lot in that!”

Making Africa attempts to answer many questions but the curators want visitors to go away asking new questions. And preferably seeing Africa in a new way or ways. “You will see art in this design show,” warns Amelie, “but I’ve used every single piece to make comment on design. That’s the thread that keeps everything together. I can make an argument for every single object on a key design issue.” One such issue is social and political commentary. Leanie van der Vyver’s Scary Beautiful, 2021, is a design statement – or is it art? – on cruelty in women’s fashion. Think historical ribcage crushing corsets or neck elongating braces. Leanie worked with shoe designer René van der Berg to create a pair of almost impossibly tall reversed high heels. Despite limiting the wearer’s mobility and controlling her silhouette to the extreme, the shoes are actually wearable. Segueing fashion to design and politics, Leanie asks the viewer to look anew at (not so) everyday apparel and what it represents.

The 120 contributing young thinkers and makers are a savvy and politically astute lot. They are a critical generation not afraid to speak out and are, perhaps, freer of the burden of colonialism. Making Africa doesn’t shy away from the darker side of the continent. South African artist Lucinda Mudge isn’t one to pull punches. Her hard hitting vases display home truths. “I use headlines from local crime story reports,” she says. I Will Kill You And Then I Will Eat You is emblazoned on the side of one of her vases. The other side, slogan free, is beautifully decorated in gold. Violence and beauty. One artist, duality of voice. Nothing is simply black or white. It’s a comment on not looking, on looking the other way. There’s more than one way to view a situation a design, an artwork. And a continent.

Parisian songstress Taali M bursts into song at the preview: “I’m gonna stand on the shoulders of giants…” Amelie informs us, “We have to rethink what design is. Is it art? Is it design? I don’t care! Design and art should be making bold statements about the future. Where do I come from? Where am I going? Who am I? If artists don’t make bold statements, if not them, who? Otherwise we will be stuck where we are. Period. Taali M sings: “Stand tall and rise above it all.”

Amelie keeps going, “Design is more than chairs It’s analogue and dialogue. We must speak about communications, systems, complexity – design is more than just objects. Critical design enhances change as it could or should be in the 21st century.” We agree modernism has gone. What awaits? Existential concerns aside, it’s 25 degrees outside. Hot, distractingly so, even for northern Spain, in late autumn. Where will we go? “Stand tall so tall I’ll be tall,” ends the statuesque Taali M to applause.

The Basque Country is famous for its nationalistic stance, but hosting Making Africa A Continent of Contemporary Design demonstrates its global outlook. The exhibition explores what’s beyond modernism while liberating visitors from Western myopia. Africa. The continent with a vision attached. And we’re back. Late spring 2026. Ruth Asawa Retrospective is the headlining exhibition curated by Thomas Weisel, Chief Curator of San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, in collaboration with Geaninne Gutiérrez-Guimarães, Curator of the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao. Works include looped wire sculptures, paper folds and sketches by the American artist renowned for making ordinary things special.

The Guggenheim Museum is aging well in physicality and popularity. On a Tuesday morning the public is queuing up the steps for the 10am opening. Victor Hugo was right about the allure of the Basque Country. And that was before Arata, Louise, Norman, Santiago, Zaha and most of all Frank left their mark on the cityscape.

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The Rooftop + The Artist Grand Hotel of Art Bilbao

Gabions Galore

Bookending (a favourite verb) the day with the upper echelons of international society (“global elite” is now too tarred a term) on The Rooftop of The Artist Grand Hotel of Art is one way to upgrade an otherwise meagre existence. It’s impossible to escape art in Bilbao so one might as well sit in it and on it. Or possibly even be it. Plus The Rooftop has the best view of the glittering titanium carapace (a favourite noun) of the Guggenheim Museum. Artist Javier Mariscal is the force behind the concept, the name behind it all. His 26 metre high sculpture Fossil Cypress, a gabion needle of 86,432 river stones, pierces the void of the full height atrium. A stepped flow of water at the base of the sculpture is a reminder of the origin of the found objects.

Sunrise: Desayuno Breakfast is all about topping up on conalbumin. Sunset: Huevos Fritos con Caviar keeps it local. El Bulli trained Executive Chef Abel Corral creates art on a plate (a cliché that rings true in this instance). The Rooftop reinforces the art of living as an achievable reality. Vacation as installation.

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WOW!house 2026 + Design Centre Chelsea Harbour London

Heaven’s in the Detail

Chelsea is synonymous with a great school (Chelsea Academy), a fab hotel (Chelsea Harbour Hotel) and of course an international design hub (Design Centre Chelsea Harbour). The latter plays host to WOW!house once again this year. This portmanteau with a sandwiched exclamation mark is back with aplomb. Despite being only five years old, WOW!house is already a firm fixture of The Season, betwixt the Chelsea Flower Show (more Chelsea) and Royal Ascot.

“London is leading the design world,” fashion powerhouse Dame Mary Martin believes, “and Chelsea is the microcosm of the creative Capital. Studios like The Bomb Factory Art Foundation on Lots Road near Chelsea Academy are exploding with originality. The terrace of the Chelsea Harbour Hotel is one of my favourite places for enjoying a cocktail in between shows.” Her eponymous brand Mary Martin London is now one of the hottest names in international haute couture.

Following the Ralph Lauren pre party (where blue and white are the new black) Darren Price, Director of Adam Architecture, introduces the reconfigured Size Group Façade: “I enjoyed talking to you last year about the original design. I wanted to play with the architecture and remodel it just as one might evolve a design in the real world. The central portico has been expanded either side to create a loggia. This provides a three dimensional experience for visitors.” His oeuvre ranges from restoring country houses to delivering complex interior packages with many projects involving Listed Buildings.

“I took the principles of early Georgian architecture,” Darren says, “and fast forwarded to the Regency period of Soane. I have not created a historical artefact: this structure demonstrates that classical design can be appropriate for contemporary settings.” He also designed the standalone Hector Finch Garden Folly which complements The Size Group Façade but takes on an apropos whimsical air with a tented roof. Darren concludes, “This folly was conceived as a moment of theatre and discovery!”

WOW!house 2026WOW!house Design Centre Chelsea HarbourWOW!house Design Centre Chelsea HarbourWOW!house Design Centre Chelsea HarbourWOW!house Design Centre Chelsea HarbourWOW!house Design Centre Chelsea HarbourWOW!house Design Centre Chelsea HarbourWOW!house Design Centre Chelsea HarbourWOW!house Design Centre Chelsea HarbourWOW!house Design Centre Chelsea HarbourWOW!house Design Centre Chelsea HarbourWOW!house

Enass Mahmoud, Founder and Creative Director of Studio Enass, designed the interior of the Hector Finch Garden Folly. She advises, “It’s a room evoking the escapism of an island getaway. At the heart of my work is storytelling. Here, I am the client envisioning a tranquil yet indulgent retreat designed for intimate joyful moments.” A shellwork frieze and scallop shell light pendent are breezy touches reflecting faraway places against the grounded richness of the gemstone red silk wallcovering.

Through the loggia lies Francis Sultana’s impressive Entrance Hall which leads into Róisín Lafferty’s immersive Shepel Library and onto the luxurious Lalique Home Bar designed by Chara Ghandi, Founder and Director of Elicyon. Chara gives a tour of this intimate 20 square metre space: “The bar is a collaboration with our sponsor Lalique. There are Lalique pieces dating from 1926 to 2026 incorporated into the interior. We have designed hidden compartments in the timber wall panelling which open to reveal more Lalique. It’s at once serene and spirited.” Even the stools have tiny pieces from the French crystal house embedded in their fabric covering.

She says, “This is a room that celebrates the pleasure of unveiling. It’s a journey for the curious. Luxury here is about precision, comfort and atmosphere rather than spectacle. We wanted the space to feel intimate and indulgent. The design presents Lalique through a crisp contemporary lens. “Rebecca Larn, Creative Director of Elicyon, adds, “Hosting is back at the forefront!” And Frederick Fischer, Managing Director of Lalique observes, “Crystal brings light, depth and surprise to any interior. The bar is a perfect setting for Lalique to shine in a modern context.”

Enass Mahmoud, Founder and Creative Director of Studio Enass, designed the interior of the Garden Folly. She advises, “It’s a room evoking the escapism of an island getaway. At the heart of my work is storytelling. Here, I am the client envisioning a tranquil yet indulgent retreat designed for intimate joyful moments.” A shellwork frieze and scallop shell light pendent are breezy touches reflecting faraway places against the grounded richness of the gemstone red silk wallcovering.

It’s Martin Kemp Design’s first show at the Design Centre Chelsea Harbour. The Parlour has plenty of wow factor! Founder and Managing Director Martin explains, “This room was conceived as a response to the immediacy of contemporary life – it rejects the idea of a single focal point. Instead, The Parlour unfolds as a sequence of layered moments. Many of the pieces in this circular space are from Avenue, a new furniture brand by Martin Kemp Design.” He was formerly Creative Director of the ultra luxury developer Candy and Candy. His current clientele is equally high end and international, from Monaco to Mumbai to Mayfair.

Whether George Smith’s “human sized dog bed” for the Russell Sage Studio or the dog bed in Misia for Casamance Group Bedroom Suite by Henri Fitzwilliam-Lay or the 55 lacquered “wall boxes” of the Benjamin Moore Minhwa Salon by Young Huh, this year’s WOW!house – all 600 square metres – is about lavish attention to detail. And what’s next for Darren Price’s Size Group Façade? Perhaps Vanbrughian vermiculated voussoirs for WOW!house 2027? As last seen at The Drama of Architecture exhibition on the distinguished wine merchant turned playwright turned architect held at Sir John Soane’s Museum, Holborn.