At the end of the Victoria line at the Walthomstow station, and then a 15 minute walk through some suburban streets with some lefts and at other times rights is an industrial estate. Through the gate and buried at the very end of the units where you are convinced you are lost and doubting it's existence at all is God's Own Junkyard. It's a worthy pilgrimage and actually sort of where you expect God would put a junkyard.
The warehouse is a monument to neon and the life works of the late Mr Neon, Chris Bracey. It's littered to the rooftop with cables, plug sockets and choice words with neon epigrams, the whole collection is stacked, I suppose how a junkyard of the sort would be. Full of sex, religion, americana, sci-fi and nostalgia that all blend together surprisingly well, It's a visual feast that you can take in with a coffee and an open mouth. It is a gem of a place.
It is really great.
Adrian Westaway
Co-founder & Director of Technology and Magic at Special Projects
Adrian is an inventor, engineer and experience designer on a mission to make the human-technology interaction meaningful and delightful.
As co-founder of Special Projects he harnesses technology, inclusive research and magic thinking to devise design propositions that feel familiar yet wondrous.
A self-taught magician since the age of 11 and full member of the Magic Circle, he relentlessly pursues his conviction that “designers should use magic thinking and try to introduce surprise, delight and fuzzy feeling in the things they create.”
After becoming the first ever James Dyson Fellow in 2007, and a Fellow of the Royal Commission of 1851, in 2010, for his work on interactive lighting systems, Adrian built a playground in Peru, had whisky with Derren Brown as a student in Bristol, and tried to make his teachers disappear.
His contagious passion for magic and engineering made him a beloved tutor and lecturer in Design & Innovation at Queen Mary University and the Royal College of Art, in London and a visiting faculty member at the Copenhagen Institute of Interaction Design. There he teaches ‘Magic and Design’, a nomadic workshop where students are introduced to methods of using design and technology to create enchanted products and experiences.
Grace Helmer is a Brighton-born, London-based illustrator and artist. She has put her paintbrushes to work for a range of clients, such as Apple, Google, Octopus Books and HarvardX.
Natural forms, people watching and a sense of adventure inspire Grace’s playful and colourful work. Her compositions capture the feeling of discovery when you visit somewhere for the first time, and celebrate the beauty in the everyday.
I am a filmmaker and photographer from London. In 2009 I exhibited my reportage America project 88 Days at Bloomsbury's Orange Dot Gallery. Having recently finished a 35mm 15-minute short, I am now writing a feature film.
I am also currently organising my next photographic exhibition, Sweet India, which I made last summer.