New Generation PizzaExpress

The new generation PizzaExpress in Richmond is a big project that I've been working on all year (I'm leading the creative team).

Our challenge? To come up with ideas for what PizzaExpress restaurants should be like in the future... oh, and then build it as a fully functioning restaurant!

Having had masses of ideas, we've now taken over the large PizzaExpress in Richmond (200 seats!), gutted the building and rebuilt it as an experimental space, to test ideas, try some brave new things and get lots of feedback from people. The plan is for other PizzaExpress restaurants to follow in its footsteps, if people like it.

The brief was to celebrate the skill of authentic handmade pizza and also expand the concept of feeding great conversation. We're trying to reconnect with the pioneering spirit of the founder Peter Boizot who opened the first PizzaExpress in Soho in 1965, and who worked with lots of the artists, musicians and designers of the sixties (like Peter Blake and Enzo Apicella). Throwing some pretty amazing parties by all accounts!

We're an eclectic team. The brilliant Ab Rogers is leading the design (of the Tate, Comme de Garcons and The Rainbow House fame), and in addition to the PizzaExpress team, we've formed a collective of contemporary creative talent.

It includes: italian chef Antonio Romani; singing baker Liliana (who runs the Food Lab); fashion Designer Matthew Miller (juggling us with London Fashion Week); professor of accoustics Sergio Luzzi from Florence; theatre director and conversation expert Karl James; graphic designers GTF (also working on all the graphics for Frieze at the moment); Mumsnet co-founder Carrie Longton; DJ Nick Luscombe (Radio 3 & Resonance FM); games designers Spiral; film and soundscape artist Dominic Robson; Writers Rob & Molly (who have just set up We All Need Words); and artist and designer Enzo Apicella. Enzo, now 88, designed the original PizzaExpress in 1965 and the famous logo. He's painting a huge mural for us (ably assisted by Tom Saunders). I feel very honoured to be working with such diverse and creative bunch of people.

It's definitely NOT the normal corporate way of doing things!

It's been a huge project, and has covered re-looking at everything from design and furniture, crockery and acoustics, opening hours and uniforms, to all the food, wine and service.

We've created a kitchen that's more like a stage. With all the ingredients on show, and pizzaiolos who do acrobatics with the dough (if you flirt with them enough). The restaurant's full of cutting edge accoustics, including conversation booths with domes designed for to create the perfect audio enviroment for talking to one another. Inside you can dim the lights, play your own music by plugging your ipod into the docking station, and if you need serving you just press a light and the dome glows - so no more trying to flag down the waitress to get your bill. Lots of new things on the menu too... personal favourites include breakfast pizza, dough balls with nutella, skinny grape bread, and a seriously hard-core Negroni cocktail (gin, campari & martini rosso on the rocks). [I blame these for the brilliantly insane press night party that didn't finish until well after 4am].

Projections play at either end of the restaurant (currently silently screening a series of 1960s italian films), and a soundscape plays in the loos. The new playlist features artists that explore the boundaries of jazz with other genres - check out Stac for example - and we're planning late night music nights there. We've got a whole new graphic style - including taking the idea of the stripes of the pizzaiolo's shirts and using it in suprising ways (like on our italian cycling caps), and we've created a new typography based on old newpapers which ironically feels much more contemporary. There's an creative area to keep kids happy and quiet (!) with a big shared drawing table, books and interactive games to help teach them about food and ingredients.

The list goes on...

If you want to know more you can see more photos, video clips etc on the project blog:

http://futureexpress.co.uk/

Please do come down to Richmond now it's open, to see what we've done. I'd love to know what you think.

PizzaExpress Richmond, Red Lion Street, TW9 1RE. Open from 8.45am. Free Wi-Fi.

Here are a couple of clips about the project for a film made about it:

Opening night:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ks2Q_Nf6oA&feature=mfu_in_order&list=UL
Nick Luscombe:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5NaNsNKVplY&feature=mfu_in_order&list=UL
Karl James:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-g6Jwi6Vt4o&feature=mfu_in_order&list=UL
Jess Blandford:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R3n-W_YOwCo

Liverpool Road Project

100 meters of bunting made from triangles of fabric donated by residents of the Liverpool Road Estate, displayed at the celebration street party to mark 100 years since it was built.

Bunting has long been used for celebrations. There are evocative pictures of the opening party at Liverpool Road, with bunting strung between the buildings and when invited to take part in this project, it seemed only right to create a contemporary version for 2010.

The bunting was made from pieces of fabric collected from current residents. Over 500 triangles were donated, as the community got behind the project.

The patterns, colours and textures of the textiles we are surrounded by, literally make up the fabric of our everyday lives. They are such a part of the way that we live that we stop noticing them, yet when we come across an old familiar fabric (like the pattern from a material you wore as a child) the jolt of recognition can be a very powerful emotion.

In this work, fabrics with different histories sit alongside one another. Because they are all cut into triangles, their original function is obscured. An old apron might sit next to a cushion cover, pyjamas next to a table cloth. All become equal. Fragments of people's lives are jumbled up, yet connected through the formal structure.

We're so used to throwing away stuff, that it's not often we find new purposes for old things these days. I hope people enjoyed spotting the triangles they donated and found it satisfying giving something they no longer use, a second celebratory life.

A project by Tall Tales

Other artists included:
- Christian Nynmpeta
- Davina Drummond
- Alan McGee
- Damian O'Connel

See link to Guardian Society for a picture gallery of the event:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/gallery/2010/oct/13/liverpool-road-estate-centenary-pictures#/?picture=367191268&index=0

Liverpool Road Estate

I am currently working on a project creating bunting from fabric triangles collected from the residents of the Samuel Lewis Estate at Liverpool Road. The work seeks to turn textiles that form the fabric of our everyday lives into strings of bunting for the 100 year celebrations of the estate. The project is in association with Tall Tales (the team behind the Market Estate) but with a very different feel as the Samuel Lewis Estate is a shining example of successful social housing, with a community of people (many who have lived there for generations) who are keen to collaborate.

The celebration event will be held on Sunday 5th September for the residents of the estate.

If anyone would like to donate a triangle the template is here for you to do so!

Latitude 2010

Last weekend saw my 4th year at Latitude working with The Dialogue Project to present Intimate Conversations at the festival. Karl James pre-records a series of intimate conversations with ordinary people talking about extraordinary experiences. We offer festival goers the chance to listen to these beautifully edited works on ipods in the woods. Each year Karl has chosen a different theme for his sound pieces, and this year the subject was sex (previous years include friendship and pain). Although some of the subject matter is quite tough, and many are graphic (although not pornographic), the conversations revolve as much around themes of loneliness, hope, confidence, and intimacy as they do sexuality. Perhaps because the pieces were longer this year, and so we spent more time with people while they were waiting, it felt like an even more participative and collaborative event this year. People who came to listen generously shared their experiences (of similar stories, of the festival as they were discovering it, of their responses to the work) and as such it felt like we really were adding a small layer of personal intimacy to a festival of 35,000, a far cry from the arena crowds, in the Faraway Forest, somewhere near a lake in Suffolk.

Thank you to everyone who came to listen.

If you'd like to listen to the works go to:
http://www.thedialogueproject.com and click on Intimate Conversations.
I strongly recommend listening on headphones.

PRAXIS prints

paper, collage & gouache, framed
20cm x 19cm
Jess Blandford, June 2010

PRAXIS paintings

acrylic on canvas,
30x30 cm
Jess Blandford, June 2010

//PRAXIS////

"it's doing something, and then only afterwards finding out why you did it".
Tony Wilson, Factory Records

Market Gallery is an artist-run project space in a former shop in Bermondsey. Supported by ACAVA and Southwark Council, this summer it hosts a series of exhibitions by the artists who work in studios at the old Peek Frean Biscuit Factory in Bermondsey.

Windows removed

They've started the demolition of Market Estate. So far they've removed the windows of Tamworth Building, exposing the colours inside each room, so it looks like a patchwork or a dolls house.

Demolition begins

Photographs taken by Josh Surtees

Antony Gormley in Fluorescent Yellow Room

This blurred phone photo makes it onto the blog for the pure comedy of our starstruck gazes! At the end of the show we raced into our Fluorescent Yellow Room to save a few momentos from the bulldozers, to discover Antony Gormley inside taking photos on his mobile and saying how much he liked the work. A truly surreal highlight of the whole brilliant experience..!

Both the Islington Gazette and the Islington Tribute featured pictures of Antony Gormley in Fluorescent Yellow Room.

http://www.islingtontribune.com/news/2010/mar/condemned-building-explodes-riot-colour-and-light

http://www.islingtongazette.co.uk/content/islington/gazette/news/story.aspx?brand=ISLGOnline&category=news&tBrand=northlondon24&tCategory=newsislg&itemid=WeED09%20Mar%202010%2014%3A18%3A28%3A140

Independent - make art before the bull dozers roll in

Click on title or link below to read full article

http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/art/features/make-art-before-the-bulldozers-roll-in-1916209.html

Film: The Guardian - Dereliction of Beauty

Click on title or link below to see the film about the Market Estate Project by Shehani Fernando

http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/video/2010/mar/05/artists-london-market-estate


Also for an audio account of the project see:
http://lovesoflondon.blogspot.com/2010/03/london-lovesart.html

Fluorescent Yellow Room

Fluorescent Yellow Room
by Jess Blandford & Joe Morris

An Installation in Flat 18, Tamworth Building
Market Estate Project

It will be open to the public for 1 day only on 6 March 2010 (2-10pm) before the estate is demolished.

photographs courtesy of Tom Willcocks

Joe Morris

Fluorescent Yellow Room was made in collaboration with Joe Morris.

To find out more about Joe's work see http://www.joemorris.eu

Thank You

A huge thank you to everyone who helped us to make Fluorescent Yellow Room possible including: Tom S, Luke, Dougal, Izzy, Roger, David, Nicky, Sarah, Mick, Rupert, Clara, Tom W, and all of the Tall Tales team who have curated and organised the Market Estate Project.

But most of all we'd like to thank the generosity of HMG Paints Ltd who kindly donated 25L of amazing Fluorescent Yellow Paint to make the work possible.

Dazed & Confused

Our work featured in Dazed & Confused. Click on title to see the full article.

Kluster described the Market Estate as their 'fave project of the year'.
http://blog.kluster.com.au/category/art.aspx

Market Estate Project

Great News! Joe and I have been selected for the Market Estate Project.

http://www.marketestateproject.com

It's a fantastic community art project. Market Estate is a 1960s housing estate (with a lot of social problems) near Caledonian Road. It's being demolished and rebuilt for the community. But before the bulldozers move in they are inviting 50 artists to take over the flats and make a 'creative playground' of the empty flats, facades and public spaces.

Over 350 artists applied and the proposal that Joe (my studio-mate) and I submitted has been selected to the top 50.

We're proposing to make an installation that explores the relationships between colour, memory, danger and notions of home as a response to the particular kind of domestic setting of the building's location and the period in which it was built.

We aim to re-create a 1967 living room, but paint everything in the space (including the walls, floors, ceiling, fixtures & fittings, domestic objects, personal items) with fluorescent yellow paint. Like Denis Severs' House we intend the space to feel as if it is inhabited but the resident has temporarily left the room. There will be mundane objects such as a half-eaten piece of toast for example, and a cup of tea that will signify this presence - all coloured fluorecent yellow.

We've decided to use fluorescent yellow because of the many things it is used to represent in everyday life: safety, danger, authority, rebellion and hope. These themes were prevalent in the 1960s: the hope and safety of utopian housing schemes, the uncertainty and danger of the atomic bomb, the changing form of antiquated authority and the rebellion against authority by young and student movements.

These themes can be seen to resonate with concerns arising once more in today's society as well as the imminent demolition of this building. Furthermore, the colour can be read as a caricature of the nuclear age due to its violent glow. Like the 'space city' architecture of the Market Estate building, nuclear power was supposed to herald harmony and prosperity, instead results yielded unforeseen, sometimes catastrophic, side-effects. It's our aim that the ubiquitiousness and luminosity of the colour will alter the viewer's perceptions of time, space and the formal nature of the objects in the room. We hope the environment will become an uncanny immersive reality.

We hope the work will be reflect a sense of hope and optimism but be unnervingly saturated. We intend to evoke both a nostalgia for the utopian idealism of the 1960s (a paradise lost) but also question whether in the context of the Market Estate it could rather be seen as a promise gone sour.


If anyone has 20L of fluorescent yellow paint they could spare... we'd be very grateful!!

New Studio

I'm hugely pleased to be able to announce that I've finally moved into a studio. It's a brilliant space in The Old Biscuit Factory in Bermondsey.

Bermondsey used to be known as 'Biscuit Town' because of the smell of the biscuits baking and the fact that 4,000 people living here worked in this factory. It was built in 1866 and only closed in 1989. Peek Freane not only invented the humble Bourbon and Garibaldi biscuits here, but in the 1930s (at the height of the 'cocktail age', so they claim) our studio was the birthplace of the mighty Twiglet. No doubt with such an inspiring spirit in the walls great things shall be created here!

I'm sharing a 370 sq ft space with Joe Morris (a fellow painter from Camberwell) and there are 18 other young artists with studios here. It's a beautiful building with high ceilings and big windows. It has roughly put up wall divisions so it feels very communal. The Biscuit Factory are trying to fill our building with arts organisations. So far, our neighbours include: The Royal Court, Shunt, some sculptors and a temporary gallery space. As well as a great cafe (scampi & chips highly recommended), there is a printers on-site and a strong sense of community.

We can't really believe how lucky we are! ACAVA have negotiated an 18-month contract for us and we all moved in 2 weeks ago so have been busy painting walls, moving in furniture and getting to know one another.

If you're interested in visiting, please do get in touch. We love to show people around and we make a mean cuppa tea.

Watch out for details of Open Studios in the New Year.

For information on ACAVA studios see: http://www.acava.org.uk

FROL-IK Masquerave

SHOWPONY have been asked to create a series of artist-designed masks for the FROL-IK (an East London based DJ Collective) Masquerave night on the 20th January 2010, at The Miller in Borough.

My design is based on modernist architecture and 1950s design.

SHOWPONY. Stimulates. Creative. Collaboration.

One of the things I've been working on has been setting up SHOWPONY.

SHOWPONY is an artist-led collective of four female graduates of University of the Arts. Formed in Peckham in September 2009 by Jess Blandford, Grace Schofield, Charlotte Settle and Amy Woodward.

SHOWPONY stimulates creative collaboration. We hunt out creative opportunities to make and showcase contemporary fine art, and stimulate lively critical discussions and interactions.

We believe in building strong creative alliances to support avant-garde art making and pride ourselves on our approachabiltiy, integrity and our get-stuck-in attitude.

We are curating a series of art-related events including: exhibitions, talk nights, art tours and collaborative projects with other creative organisations.

We will also be hosting an emerging artist's community forum on our website.

We've been busy over the last few months. Some of our recent and current projects include:

'Through the eyes of an emerging artist' tours of Frieze Art Fair 2009; mural commission for Marmite Pop-Up Shop; digital collaboration with Id&Ego; Lucky Pages Directory with LuckyPDF; design project with FROL-IK; Cambridge-Peckham Ideas Exchange; 100 books for young artists project.

See SHOWPONY on-line for more details:

http://showponyart.blogspot.com

or follow us on twitter:

http://twitter.com/Showponyart

We're always interested in creating stimulating collaborative projects with other artists or creative organisations. To get in touch with an idea please email us at: showpony.art@gmail.com