London’s largest industrial district is set to become the city’s newest cultural destination this September with the launch of Manufactory, a festival bringing together artists, designers, manufacturers, and makers across workshops, warehouses and factories rarely open to the public.
Taking place on 11th–12th September 2026, during the opening weekend of the London Design Festival, Manufactory is the inaugural festival from Park Royal Design District (PRDD). Through exhibitions, site-specific installations, performances, talks, workshops and open studios, the festival explores the relationship between contemporary artistic practice, industrial production and the built environment.
Occupying spaces usually hidden from public view, the festival transforms Park Royal’s active industrial landscape into a platform for interdisciplinary art. The area, which produces around a third of London’s food and is home to more than 400 artists, designers, architects, filmmakers and makers working alongside manufacturers and engineers, provides the backdrop for a programme rooted in production, material experimentation and collaboration.
Developed by the nonprofit Park Royal Design District, Manufactory builds on five years as London’s largest Design District within the London Design Festival while establishing a new platform dedicated to the intersection of art and industry.
The inaugural edition is curated by newly appointed Programme Director Mazzy-Mae Green, bringing together artists working across performance, installation, sculpture, sound, moving image and design, united by an interest in making, material processes and the social dynamics of industrial space.
Among the festival highlights, Vida Voji? will present a new performance inspired by the writings and music of Hildegard of Bingen, transforming the industrial spaces of 57 Gorst Road through ritual, movement and voice.
Across both festival days, Lucy Algar and Chihiro Kawasaki will present Reflecting Movement, a site-responsive performance installation combining choreography, projection, drawing and light, while Abbas Zahedi and Bill Daggs, working with Meet in The MIDI, will stage a new performance exploring sound, care and collective experience before a live set by Karim Bitar.
The festival’s principal exhibition, Site Conditions, occupies the industrial spaces of 57 Gorst Road and features works by Dan Mauz & Esther Kehinde Ajayi, Donald Baugh, Jermaine Francis, Henry Krokatsis, Jo Chate, Linn Phyllis Seeger, Ocean Baulcombe-Toppin and Fernando M. Romero. Additional exhibitions and installations will unfold throughout workshops, studios and warehouses across Park Royal.
Beyond the exhibitions, visitors will have the opportunity to explore Park Royal through a programme of open studios, artist talks and hands-on workshops. Highlights include Bill Amberg Studio, where the designer will demonstrate his innovative Stack Table, made by compressing leather offcuts into a structural material, alongside a conversation with choreographer Russell Maliphant OBE and practical workshops ranging from brickmaking to decorative foiling.
A curated food market will also celebrate Park Royal’s reputation as one of London’s most significant centres for food production.
Rather than simply presenting art within industrial buildings, Manufactory positions the industrial landscape itself as both subject and collaborator. Artists, designers, manufacturers and researchers occupy the same spaces, testing new ideas, materials and technologies while exploring how contemporary culture and production can shape one another.
As Park Royal Design District launches its flagship festival, Manufactory proposes a new model for interdisciplinary practice—one where making, industry and artistic experimentation are inseparable.
Manufactory takes place across Park Royal, northwest London, on 11th–12th September 2026. MORE
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