Design pop-up shop, Product, opens at Bar Lane Studios in York (From York Press)

Design pop-up shop, Product, opens at Bar Lane Studios in York

3:07pm Friday 2nd December 2011 in Exhibitions

BAR Lane Studios and York St John University will give York its first design pop-up shop in a new partnership project to boost opportunities in the city for graduate artists.

Snappily entitled Product, the shop will be launched at the studios at a preview night on Thursday, sponsored by Hotel du Vin, and will showcase designers who have graduated from St John, alongside designers and makers from national and international design houses, enabling them to exhibit, sell and market test their products.

Work produced by students on the Product Design BA Honours course at the university will be displayed for sale too.

“This new partnership not only brings York St John University into the city, it brings national exposure to York,” says studios manager Ben Clowes.

Bar Lane Studios already provides affordable studio space for creative businesses in York. It also runs a creative and business mentoring scheme with the university, under which eight graduates have been given internships at the studios and 26 businesses have benefited from the scheme. A second intake has just come on stream.

Now, Product will re-use space at the Micklegate front of the studios as a temporary shop and provide ad hoc headquarters for designers, artists and creative businesses.

Known as pop-up retail, these initiatives usually appear unannounced, draw in the crowds and then morph into something else. Product aim to take this concept further.

Jenny Hall, creative business development manager at York St John, says: “If new products can come and go, why can’t the stores that display them do the same?

“The concept of pop-up shop adds to retail the fresh feel, exclusivity and surprise that galleries have been using for years.”

While pop-up shops may come and go, Bar Lane Studios and York St John’s partnership will have a longer shelf life.

Product is the first of a series of events planned by the university and studios over the next ten months, when not only art, performance and design talent emerging from York St John will be shown.

In tandem with the new venture, four core joint exhibitions will run in the main gallery, next to Product, and these will include names from the film industry, contemporary fine art, performance/dance and design.

Former York St John student John Green, highly commended in the Product of the Year category of the 2011 Grand Designs Awards, will be the curator for Product for the first ten months.

Among the designers on show will be Designmade, from Yorkshire; Makers United, based in Liverpool; Deadgood, from Newcastle; Black & Blum, from London; and former York St John student Priestman Goode, from Yorkshire. Turner & Harper will be selling products for the home, furniture and Christmas decorations.

On Saturday, December 17, experienced and novice designers have the opportunity to develop their own Christmas decorations, using the latest portable laser-cutting technology provided by The Pod. To book, phone Bar Lane Studios on 01904 635563.

Meanwhile, one of the first eight York St John graduates on the internship scheme, Susanne Davis, has won a commission in the new City of York Council building.

For more information about Product or to buy online visit yorksj.ac.uk/creativebusiness