The most delightfully painful past-time – window shopping – has taken on a new tone with Martino Gamper’s recently unveiled window displays for Prada. The adored fashion powerhouse led by Miuccia Prada, known for her active engagement with contemporary art and design, offers playful shopping-not-shopping experience with windows clad in various types of woods which explore the notion of perspective. The project can be traced back to Gamper’s beginnings and an initial project which explored the idea of corners as a geometric space where the three dimensions meet: “It’s a very underused space in the domestic environment. It’s a place where the dust collects. Or maybe it’s a space for a plant. It’s a meeting for the X, Y and Z in terms of the three dimensional and a very defined 90° space. I wanted to work with perspective and create a way that when you look into a shop window you create a new space,” says Gamper. Well, those who have always avoided stopping in front of Prada’s shops fearing its inaccessible prices, now have a good excuse to linger in front of window of wonders.

If you look throughout the history, you will find that not many designers have challenged themselves with designing a bookshelf. Rather, they have taken on simpler tasks, associating their names with chairs or lamps, and it is fairly easy to understand why. Differently form a chair, a sofa or a lamp, a bookshelf is more often custom made then brought home from some branded shop. It needs to fit exact needs in terms of space and form, often growing with our personal collections of books, objects and various knick-knacks. In fact, bookshelves can often be seen almost as a metaphysic piece of furniture more than a merely functional object, containing our personal stories, passions, dreams and inspirations.

This is precisely the narrative about designed objects that a new exhibition opening tomorrow at Serpentine Sackler Gallery tries to pinpoint. Titled “Design is a State of Mind” and curated by Martino Gamper, the irreverent master of design and craft, this exhibition presents a landscape of shelving systems, telling the story of design objects and their impact on our lives. Besides an extensive survey of shelving systems produced from 1930 until today, ranging from pieces designed by Gaetano Pesce, Franco Albini, Ettore Sottsass, Ercol, Gio Ponti and IKEA, the exhibition will also display personal archives and collections of Gamper’s friends and colleagues, among which Enzo Mari, Paul Neale, Max Lamb & Gemma Holt, Jane Dillon, Michael Marriott, Sebastian Bergne, Fabien Cappello, Adam Hills, Michael Anastassiades, Andrew McDonagh & Andreas Schmid, Daniel Eatock and Martino Gamper himself.

Rather than an exhibition about material qualities, form and function of a designed object, “Design is a State of Mind” should be viewed as an exploration of memories, emotions and interests hidden in the form an object. As Martino Gamper states: “There is no perfect design and there is no über-design. Objects talk to us personally. Some might be more functional than others, and the emotional attachment is very individual. This exhibition will showcase a very personal way of collecting and gathering objects – these are pieces that tell a tale.”

“Design is a State of Mind” curated by Martino Gamper will run at Serpentine Sackler Gallery in London from 5th of March until 21st of April 2014.

Tired of the usual design exhibitions, which show isolated pieces of furniture, lonely objects displayed on pristine white tables, totems or shelves, so far away from their daily use and, unfortunately, oh so common for design shows, Gamper has decided to try a different approach. Titled Tu casa, mi casa, this exhibition presents itself as what may appear like a typical Gamper-ish house: colourful tapestry, colour-blocking room dividers, geometrically sharp and yet somehow spontaneous and slightly goofy furniture. Yet, as we all know, appearances can deceive and you should know better than to think that Martino’s objects are designed through sheer chance and improvisation. In fact, the sheer number of different techniques used to produce the objects specifically for the show – Carpentry, glass blowing, enamelling, parchment work, joinery, bronze casting, wiring, fusing glass, moulding, wood turning and anodisation – demonstrate a deep knowledge of craftsmanship and technical ability.

For this very reason, we cannot but snark when reading Gamper’s work described as “infused by spontaneity” or “improvisational”, since “incorporating faithfulness to the history of Italian design”, showing an “interest in the psychosocial connotations of furniture and use of space” and creating a “homage to craft, design and domestic functionality”, requires much, much more than sheer good spirit, spontaneity and a free mind.

More than 150 years have passed since William Morris, the grand English designer, writer, poet, artist and socialist, has first expressed his repugnancy towards the industry and his praise towards traditional crafts. Since the industrial revolution, designers have often discussed their position towards mass production of industrial goods in opposition to the pleasures and values of transmitted by handcrafted objects. While the period following the end of Second World War has seen designers whole-heartedly embrace technology seen as a means of cultural and social renewal, the period after the digital revolution of the nineties and fascination with everything high-tech has seen designers take a step back in the process.

While re-discussing the issues of computer aided design and digital technologies, contemporary design seems to be currently taking a different shift. Even though many areas of design are strongly engaged with new technologies, the most traditional branches of design, like furniture and industrial design, are becoming more aware of the value of craftsmanship in the design process. As Paola Antonelli states in an article published by the magazine Domus “…here we are talking about designers getting their hands really dirty, which for some also means getting their consciences clean. The loaded history of crafts is once again timely, with its antagonism towards mass production, tinged with ethical implications, coupled with new conditions in the world and in the market—from a general awareness of the environmental crisis, to the attempt to price and sell design differently to appeal to art collectors.”

Hence, we are witnessing an actual ‘revival’ of a Morris-onian approach to design. It ranges from practices like the one pursued by Martino Gamper who works almost exclusively on limited edition projects designed with the help of handy artisans and sold in high-end design galleries. A more research-oriented approach like the one of the Italian duo based in The Netherlands, Formafantasma, who use craftsmanship as a method for sourcing new materials and modes of production. To end with the Dutch designer Hella Jongerius, who applies handcrafted details to industrially produced objects and furniture.

This new generation of contemporary artisans, whether they work inside the industry or in less institutionalized spheres of design practice, use craft as a method in developing projects that reflect both on the design discipline itself, as well as on the society, mass production, economy and the way we relate to the objects we use, in a constant dialogue between past and present, awareness and sensibility.