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A new talk series at Sir John Soane’s Museum, in partnership with Luke Irwin, in which leading figures from across the world of design discuss their practice through a single object. In the first of the series, Will Gompertz talks to artist and designer Peter Saville.

In this new series, Sir John Soane’s Museum invites a range of practitioners from various design disciplines to select an object that has inspired them in some way, and through it discuss and dissect their own design practice. Inspired by Sir John Soane’s own extraordinary collection, and co-hosted by Will Gompertz, Arts Editor at the BBC, and Alice Rawsthorn, design writer and critic, the series will reflect on the power of objects – large or small, mundane or exceptional, aesthetic or utilitarian – to spark new ideas, and act as a spur for different forms of creativity. Speakers include Peter Saville, Martino Gamper, David Adjaye, Es Devlin, Edmund de Waal and Olga Polizzi.

Doors open at 6:30pm, allowing visitors the chance to explore the Museum after hour, before the talk begins at 7pm in the iconic Library-Dining Room. After the talk and questions, enjoy a glass of wine in the elegant South Drawing Room.

Peter Saville is an artist and designer whose contribution to culture has been unique. As a founder and art director of the legendary independent UK label Factory Records he accessed a mass audience through pop music, best exemplified in the series of record sleeves he created for Joy Division and New Order between 1979 and 1993. His recent work straddles design, art and culture and since 2004 Saville has played a leading strategic role in the economic regeneration and cultural renaissance of his home city Manchester: as well as advising the city on perception and communication, he is artistic advisor to the critically acclaimed Manchester International Festival. His achievements were celebrated in The Peter Saville Show at the Design Museum in London in 2003. His first major show in a contemporary art museum was at the Migros Museum in Zurich in 2005.

Will Gompertz is the BBC's first Arts Editor, a senior journalistic role he took up in 2009. As well as regularly reporting on the arts for the main BBC News bulletins, Today Programme and numerous other outlets, Will hosts his own radio show on BBC 5-Live, and has written and presented numerous primetime series fir television and radio. Before joining the BBC Will spent 7-years as a Director at the Tate Galleries where he was responsible for its BAFTA-winning website, and the UK's first Performance Art festival. Will is the author of What Are You Looking At?, 2012 and Think Like an Artist, 2015 and has written for the Times, Guardian, and Vanity Fair among many others.