Design for life

What links a British road sign, a biodegradable chair and a book of Kim Kardashian’s selfies?

All are on display at the V&A’s permanent new ‘Design 1900 – Now’ exhibition, which asks how design affects the ways we live, work, travel, communicate and consume. Housed within the museum’s former 20th Century Gallery, it features everything from football shirts to Philippe Starck’s aspirational lemon squeezer, plus prized acquisitions like the very first sketch mapping out the London Underground. Many of the objects were snapped up as part of its Rapid Response Collecting strategy – the swift acquisition of items relating to newsworthy moments – so expect plenty of pandemic-related innovations (vam.ac.uk).

Left V&A’s new gallery space features 250 objects, including (clockwise from below) Marcel Breuer’s ‘B33’ chair for Thonet; ‘Progress Pride Flag’ by Daniel Quasar; Virgil Abloh’s ‘Sculpture’ bag for Ikea; Philippe Starck’s ‘Juicy Salif’ for Alessi; British road signage system designed by Margaret Calvert and Jock Kinneir in the 1960s