Image copyright of the M&S website
I can barely contain my excitement. I saw in a magazine that Sir Terence Conran is doing a furniture collection for Marks and Spencer. I have the same sort of butterflies in my stomach that I had when Orla Kiely did a diffusion range of bags for Debenhams in 2001 I think it was, and then later a homewares collection for Sainsbury’s.
Lovely, AFFORDABLE, design on the high street. It makes me feel like I’m getting a bargain. And then I remember that I’m not living in the UK anymore and Conran isn’t going to be on my High Street. It breaks my heart (just a little).
Apparently the collection will be launched in September (I’ve already checked the website just in case they had a few wee early surprises) and includes, furniture, kitchenware, bedding, and lighting. I’m already a sucker for bedding so I am almost certain that I’ll be buying some of that online.
Sir Terence Conran has been quoted across the press saying: “To work with M&S on this project is the opportunity of a lifetime. It gives us the chance to produce a truly democratic and British collection, something that I have been aiming to achieve all my working life. Everything that William Morris and the Bauhaus, both great inspirations to me, hoped to achieve. This is our chance at last.”
I’m not entirely sure what makes a “truly democratic and British collection” – democratic perhaps in that hopefully price-wise it’ll be available to a broader market, but I had thought that Terence Conran was essentially a British designer designing British collections. Ok though, perhaps he tries to make his designs have European appeal, but this quote seems a bit nonsense-like. Wasn’t that exactly what Habitat was all about? And that was way back in the ’60′s.
And we’ll not mention that the Bauhaus was eh… German, shall we? And probably didn’t dream of selling through M&S…
I’ve also just checked the John Lewis website as I know you when I lived in the UK that you could buy Conran bedding there – including the bedding with the tape measure design that I bought in the Conran store – so not exactly a diffusion line, but still the High Street. Anyway, turns out John Lewis have an exclusive ‘Content by Conran’ furniture range. It’s not massive (and if you look at my link you’ll have to pick your way through the Jasper and Sophie Conran pieces too), but it looks to me a bit like a democratic, British collection, or am I wrong?
You can view some of the Conran collection at M&S in the new M&S furniture catalogue available from the 21st July
Links:
Sneak sideboard peak on the Conran blog
