Barbie summer is here to stay! Three playful installations celebrating Barbie’s DreamHouse have arrived in Central London’s new Strand Aldwych pedestrian plaza, just in time for the 22nd annual London Design Festival.
London-based Danish designer Nina Tolstrup created these interactive public artworks to mark Barbie’s 65th anniversary. Titled “Pavilions of Wonder,” the installations complement a major Barbie exhibition at London’s Design Museum and follow last year’s blockbuster film directed by Greta Gerwig and starring Margot Robbie as Barbie.
Barbie’s DreamHouses, inspired by mid-century modern design, have been a staple since their 1962 debut. The Southern California city of Palm Springs, known for its mid-century modern architecture, heavily influenced these designs. In preparation for “Pavilions of Wonder,” Tolstrup toured Palm Springs to draw inspiration from its iconic buildings.
Tolstrup’s pavilion “Dream: Infinity Garden” features a mirrored interior that transforms a ring of succulents into an infinite desert landscape, drawing on the design of E. Stewart Williams’s Coachella Valley Savings and Loan Bank. Her “Discover: Design Stories” pavilion honors the distinctive waterslides of recent Barbie DreamHouses, offering charming vignettes through peepholes. The third installation, “Reflect: Playful Pauses,” presents a geometric grid design inspired by Albert Frey’s 1952 Palm Springs City Hall and the 2023 Barbie DreamHouse.
These installations, which blend mid-century modern architecture with Barbie’s whimsical design language, will be open to the public for free from September 14–22, 2024. Other highlights of this year’s festival include a suspended sculpture by Turkish artist Melek Zeynep Bulut at the Old Royal Naval College and a performance centered around making West African fufu at the V&A.
Sayart / Amia Nguyen, amyngwyen13@gmail.com
