The Progress 1000 London's most influential people 2017 - Visualisers: Design

Camille Walala

Artist and Designer

Queen of colour Camille Walala is a pioneer of vibrant digital print. East London-based, she merges textiles with art direction and interior design to create installations, pop-up restaurants, furniture and fashion. Her signature Tribal POP style is relentlessly bold with influences including the Memphis Movement, the Ndebele tribe and Optical Art master Vasarely, always with the end goal of putting a smile on people’s faces.

Abigail Ahern

Designer

Ahern is known for her faux flowers or dark, inky colour palettes. Her trendsetting designs are synonymous with glamour, eclecticism and British humour. She began her career in interior design in the States, with a portfolio that spans lavish residential properties to the Ritz Carlton Palm Beach Hotel. On returning to Britain in 2003, she founded her own retail business, which is going from strength to strength. As well as the Abigail Ahern London store on Essex Road, she has a home line with Debenhams. Her global following is reflected with best-selling books and a lifestyle blog.

Sharon Ament

Director, Museum of London

Peckham–born Ament took over the reins in 2012 and is overseeing its relocation from London Wall to new premises in the old meat market in West Smithfield. The former wildlife conservationist previously worked at the Natural History Museum and was heavily involved in raising funds for its Darwin Centre.

Sophie Ashby

Creative Director, Studio Ashby

Half-South African, half-English, Ashby has a unique spin on design that draws on her roots. After setting up Notting Hill-based Studio Ashby just three years ago, she has a diverse range of projects under her belt from a boutique hotel in South Africa to a £12 million apartment in the new South Bank Tower and a penthouse in Soho. Ikoyi, Ashby’s first London restaurant design, was recently unveiled in St James’s Market.

Edward Barber and Jay Osgerby

Product Designers

Best known for their 2012 Olympic torch and £2 coin, this design duo continue to go from strength to strength, producing unfussy furniture, lighting tableware, tiles and more from their Shoreditch studio, for brands such as Vitra and Knoll.

Lee Broom

Furniture Designer

Celebrating 10 years in the industry, the lighting guru always set off to design, manufacture and retail under his own name. His ever-expanding furniture company is still privately owned. With an aesthetic which combines craft, heritage and modernity, Broom manufactures and retails his collections in 40 countries and has a standalone store in New York. His impressive array of collaborations with leading fashion brands from Christian Louboutin to Mulberry have further cemented his style credentials.

Martin Brudnizki

Designer

Brudnizki is the go-to man for London’s bling restaurants. The Scandi designer is behind glittering venues including Sexy Fish, Le Caprice, Dean Street Townhouse, Hix, The Ivy, Scott’s, 45 Jermyn Street and J Sheekey Oyster Bar. His signature sexy but sophisticated style is unashamedly glamorous. The Wigmore, a former banking hall inside The Langham Hotel with Michel Roux Jr in charge of the menu, showcases Brudnizki’s opulent twist on a traditional pub.

Nicholas Coleridge

Chairman of Trustees, V&A

Earlier this year the starting gun on the many changes at Vogue House were signalled when Coleridge announced he was moving upstairs, becoming chairman of Condé Nast Britain, after 26 years as the publisher’s managing director. In this time, the genial Coleridge estimates he has attended over 15,000 parties, while his chairmanship of the V&A suggest his position as a leading arbiter on London’s social and cultural scene is a given.

Jasper Conran

Designer

The second son of Sir Terence became a household name as a favourite dress designer of Princess Diana; he has since diversified into homewares and hotels, his most recent project being L’Hôtel Marrakech, a 19th-century riad, which opened last year where the rooms are swathed in nearly a mile of white voile.

Sebastian Cox

Furniture Designer

Named by Sir Terence Conran as a rising star, Cox is known for championing neglected British woodlands, transforming offcuts into turned bowls and sawdust into briquettes. He has designed kitchens for deVol and earlier this year, a wooden skeleton for Burberry’s hot air balloon at its Heathrow Airport pop-up.

Polly Dickens

Creative Director Habitat

Tasked with reviving the ailing fortunes of Habitat, Dickens, a former protégée of Terence Conran, has a predilection for orange and black and is known for her exacting standards, design flair and likeable persona. Collaborations with Henry Holland and Jackson & Levine are among new initiatives; let’s hope they work.

Tom Dixon

Designer

Known especially for his bold copper and brass light fittings, the prolific designer’s pendants and accessories have a signature shiny meets industrial vibe. His interiors arm, the Design Research Studio, is shaping the inside of apartment skyscrapers on the Greenwich Peninsula where he has also designed Craft for chef Stevie Parle. Dixon’s restaurant designs have global appeal and his latest big undertaking is a revamp of legendary Paris brasserie Le Drugstore. He is the Brit designer on the lips of every American interiors aficionado too.

James Dyson

Inventor

The Brexiteering inventor of the world’s first bagless vacuum cleaner has branched into lighting, hair-dryers, hand-dryers, humidifiers and heaters, with a combination of cutting-edge technology and cool good looks that has kept Sir James a market leader and household name. Said to be worth £7.8billion, he is married to carpet designer Deirdre. He is now working on a “radically different” electric car.

Alex Eagle

Creative Director

A busy year for Eagle since launching 180 The Strand, now home to LFW, Dazed Media and her design-savvy lifestyle brand The Store. A former journalist and PR girl for Joseph, Eagle earned her stripes as she wooed the suits at the Soho House Group to open outposts of The Store at their Berlin and Oxfordshire members’ clubs. Married to property developer Mark Wadhwa, she’s known for her enviable taste and interior design skills. Also has a way with hashtags that go viral (see #ImeanTheDream)

Matthew Elton

Product Designer

The east London-based furniture designer has produced a steady stream of beautifully crafted furniture, often without using a drop of glue, for clients including Alexander Wang, Dinny Hall and Heal’s. Responsible for the classic A-frame range.

Ben Evans

Director, London Design Festival

Evans, with Sir John Sorrell, began the festival in 2003 to promote London’s creativity. While its hub remains the V&A museum, the event gets bigger each year, with the whole of London now designated as a series of seven design districts, from Bankside to Brompton Cross. No design organisation or shop worth its salt does not participate.

Bethan Gray

Furniture Designer

The London-based Welsh designer has come a long way since scooping the New Designers Prize in 1998. After cutting her teeth as design director of Habitat, she established her own studio in 2008 and is now one of Britain’s foremost furniture makers. Her best-selling collections are stocked in retailers ranging from Liberty to Harrods. She combines a passion for luxurious natural materials — leather, marble and solid wood — with an extensive knowledge of craftsmanship and cutting-edge manufacturing technologies.

Luke Edward Hall

Illustrator and Designer

Hailed “the interior design world’s Wunderkind” by Vogue, Hall has collaborated with Burberry, Berry Bros & Rudd and the Parker Palm Springs Hotel in California. From curating an exhibition at Christie’s to selling a collection of drawings and vases at Liberty or revamping a Georgian house, he can turn his hand to a mix of design focused projects. His colourful portfolio is a lesson of merging old-school charm with the new school of interiors.

Nicky Haslam

Designer

Named International Interior Designer of the Year at last year’s prestigious Andrew Martin Awards, Haslam is as well-known on the London party circuit as he is for his unforgivingly exquisite taste — he notoriously banned framed family photos from all surfaces. Clients have ranged from Mae West to Kate Moss.

Henry Holland

Fashion and Home Designer

After neatly making the transition from fashion journalist to designer, Holland proved he can also make an impact on interiors with a home range for Habitat. His SS17 interiors collection was a riot of colour and bold, botanical prints mixed with modern gingham. Inspired by photography of traveller communities from the Eastern Bloc, it featured plenty of frills and florals. Watch this space for his next design adventure.

Kelly Hoppen

Designer

With 40 years’ experience, Hoppen is one of the world’s most-celebrated interior designers with an MBE under her belt. Her style is underpinned by a subtle co-ordinated fusion of East meets West; clean lines and neutral tones blended with warmth and sumptuous opulence. She has put her stamp on the homes, yachts and jets of private clients all over the world and now focuses on commercial projects. Her most recent launch took place on Shenzhen Bay, one of the most exclusive addresses in China.

Afroditi Krassa

Designer

Greek-born, London-based Krassa is the visionary behind some of London’s key hospitality venues including Curzon Cinemas, Dishoom, itsu and Heston Blumenthal’s The Perfectionists’ Café. She has a knack for eclectic, über-atmospheric spaces and never fails to bring out the personality of every project she undertakes. Bala Baya, Krassa’s first co-owned restaurant, sits under the arches in Southwark and is a bold and confident reflection of modern Tel Avivian living. With a background in product design, it’s also worth checking out AKollection, her signature series of mirrors, lights and tiles.

Martina Mondadori

Editor of Cabana Magazine

Anyone who’s anyone has a copy of Cabana on their coffee table, the biannual fabric-encased interiors style bible launched three years ago by Mondadori. Scion of an Italian dynasty that combined the fortunes of publishers Mondadori and home appliance giant Zanussi, Mondadori lives in Chelsea and is married to financier Peter Sartogo.

Marc Newson

Industrial Designer

From limited-edition bottles of Hennessy cognac to last year’s Christmas tree at Claridge’s, Australian-born Newson’s designs pop up everywhere. In 2015, his Lockheed Lounge chair sold for £2.4 million at auction, making it the most expensive object sold by a living designer. He loves racing vintage sports cars

Deyan Sudjic

Director of the Design Museum

As the long–term director of the Design Museum, London-born Sudjic has overseen its recent move to swanky new premises, designed by John Pawson at a cost of £83 million, in the former Commonwealth Institute. He continues to write books, most recently The Language of Cities.

Christopher Turner

Director of the London Design Biennale

The former Icon magazine editor now runs the London Design Biennale at Somerset House every other year, the next taking place in September 2018. He is also deputy director of the annual London Design Festival and author of Adventures in the Orgasmatron.

Rose Uniacke

Interior Designer

Known for her understated, elegant style — think floorboards and chandeliers — the former gilder shot to the top desirable decorator slot when she took over decorating the Beckhams’ home from Kelly Hoppen. Married to Harry Potter producer David Heyman, her own refurbed Pimlico home apparently cost £11 million.

Martin Waller

Designer

Andrew Martin company director Waller co-founded the Andrew Martin brand in 1978, setting up shop in Richmond. He now sells to 63 countries worldwide and many collections are inspired by his travels. Last November at the new Design Museum in Kensington, Waller launched the 20th Andrew Martin International Interior Designer of the Year Award, the only British global Interior Design award. His latest project is a collaboration with the National Gallery on bespoke digital wallpapers.

James Waterworth

European Design Director for Soho House

The launch of global empire Soho House’s interiors range is largely down to Waterworth, a protégé of design guru Martin Brudnizki and a graduate of KLC School of Design. His signature look is clubby, classy and comfy. Think cocktails in cut crystal with a twist.