out and about :: pennies from heaven

Not willing to concede the end of London Design Festival quite yet; I swung by Paul Cocksedge’s Drop installation on the terrace of the Royal Festival Hall tonight.

The highly magnetic brass metre-high ‘coin’ supposedly “fell to Earth from a giant’s palm.” The idea is that as people add pennies to the surface, it becomes textured copper and raises some money for Barnardo’s in the process.

I really like the use of design in this piece; the idea of getting people to give to charity by engaging them with the way their money interacts with the properties of the material the sculpture is made of, rather than using reason or logic to persuade them to part with their cash.

I also loved the fact that this simple mechanic really brought out the creativity in everyone – instead of just applying their pennies randomly, people were putting thought and ideas into the shapes and patterns they made with them.

A lovely addition to the Royal Festival Hall terrace; it’s there until October 17th.

Further reading for the especially geeky:

• paul cocksedge: a gust of wind (designboom.com)