Also at Somerset House this week GDP saw another exhibition called Forgotten Spaces, that dealt with the re-use and reclaiming of usually urban bits of space that had fallen into neglect. Not only was this a worthy enterprise in itself, but the visualisation of the projects was fascinating. Somerset House had very cleverly housed this exhibition in their own “forgotten space” of the old coal and candle stores. Each project was in a small store room marked by a black plastic-clad door (that creepily closed behind you!).

The projects themselves included an old station being turned into a farm, a fish ladder and a couple of projects to help endangered bees find homes. The Bee Project had particularly jolly visuals of a kind of utopian suburban land with orchards. And the Social Behaviour Proposal encouraged everyone to join in and make houses for bees.

This exhibition sums up the recent shows at Somerset House, where we at GDP are always pleasantly surprised and intrigued by the staging of the shows as well as the design content itself. Forgotten Spaces is a worthy attempt to highlight what can be done with disused places and how design can help show people how to do it. This show links well with our Garden project in which you can design a community space – or reclaim one – and make designs to visualise your plans. Or if you know of a project like this you could document it using our This Place magazine project.

This exhibition is also on until Jan 29^th and is free. More information can be found at Somerset House’s website at http://www.somersethouse.org.uk/visual-arts/forgotten-spaces.