Design: Marten van Middelkoop, Plasticiet
Industry: Collectible Art
Application: Decorative benches
Bank of England Museum.
Material: Bespoke
Photography:
Location: London, United Kingdom
Our starting point was to explore the architectural, functional, and symbolic potential of this unusual material. The forms reference the neoclassical and baroque architectural language surrounding the Bank, echoing its sense of gravitas and permanence. Rather than reproducing these references directly, we chose to distort them through a playful, contemporary lens, creating curved elements that feel both monumental and slightly unexpected.
At the same time, we wanted the design to allow the material to reveal its former life. The shredded banknotes remain quietly present in the surface, visible through their distinctive colors and fibrous texture. These traces make the origin of the material unmistakable and add another layer of meaning to the pieces.
The design ultimately became a modular system that can be rearranged depending on the space. When the elements are composed together, the configuration subtly traces the outline of the pound symbol when viewed from above. In this way, the installation becomes both furniture and spatial gesture, a reflection on transformation, where value shifts from currency to material.
For Reconstructing Value, presented during the London Design Festival at the Bank of England Museum, we were invited to reflect on a simple question: what happens when money loses its value? In collaboration with Surface Matter and supported by Cheapside Alliance, we created a sculptural furniture installation from £2.5 million worth of decommissioned banknotes.
We received shredded British pounds that had been removed from circulation by the Bank of England. Once a symbol of economic permanence, the currency had become obsolete destroyed and reduced to fragments. Reconstituted into sheet material, it presented an interesting paradox: something that once represented value now existed purely as matter.
