The Design Museum has unveiled its exciting exhibition programme for 2026, featuring a dynamic lineup of temporary exhibitions including NIGO: From Japan with Love, showcases by renowned artist Es Devlin, and The Nue Black Aesthetic. Alongside these headline events, the museum will also present a variety of free displays, offering visitors a rich and diverse experience throughout the year.

London-based artist Es Devlin, renowned for her immersive art installations and monumental stage creations for celebrated musicians, Olympic ceremonies and Superbowl halftime shows, will take centre stage in an exhibition giving visitors a look behind the curtain at some of her iconic designs as well as new large-scale sculptures and installations conceived especially for this landmark retrospective exhibition.

Japanese creative director NIGO, the mind behind some of the most influential designs, ideas and trends in streetwear, will have his first ever museum retrospective and exhibition outside of Japan. The exhibition will chart his career from the 1990s in Harajuku, and the founding of streetwear brand A Bathing Ape, to his current role as Artistic Director at KENZO.

Landmark exhibition guest-curated by Charlene Prempeh, author of Now You See Me: An Introduction to 100 Years of Black Design, will bring together a group of contemporary Black designers to uncover the lasting impact of Black design on the contemporary design industry.

Also returning for its second year, PLATFORM will present the works of London-based designer Simone Brewster for her first museum show. Both architectural and sculptural in her practice, Brewster layers references from palaeolithic fertility deities to African diasporic traditions within her work, which will be explored in this monographic display examining the evolution of her creative practice.

Tim Marlow, Director and Chief Executive of the Design Museum says: “2026 is set to be a ground-breaking year for the Design Museum, with an expansive programme of design talent featuring in a museum context in the UK for the first time. The work is creative, disruptive, visionary, boundary-blurring and game-changing across fashion, furniture, stage design, installation art and architecture and I’m confident it will continue to attract new audiences for contemporary design and build on the creative momentum here at the Design Museum.”

Major Exhibitions

NIGO: From Japan with Love
1 May — 4 October 2026

From the back streets of Harajuku, Tokyo, to the global stage, this is the first ever museum retrospective and exhibition outside of Japan that will chart the career and life of the Japanese creative director, NIGO.

Working across street style, fashion, music, and more, NIGO has been behind some of the most influential designs, ideas and trends in recent streetwear and fashion history. From founding his first fashion brand, A Bathing Ape, in the ‘90s to currently leading KENZO as the fashion house’s artistic director, the impact of his career remains as wide-reaching and relevant as ever.

The exhibition will give visitors a glimpse into NIGO’s world, from his own personal collection of vintage clothing and Americana ephemera to his close network of collaborators. It will showcase his practice of and ability to sample from wide-ranging disciplines and cultural references which have given rise to some of the most iconic brands.

Es Devlin
18 September 2026 — 11 April 2027

This is the first museum show in the UK dedicated to Es Devlin’s work, revealing the story behind the artist’s extraordinary 30-year practice spanning kinetic stage sculptures to monumental art installations.

Devlin has developed her understanding of the audience as a temporary society through collaborations in theatre and opera as well as Olympic ceremonies, Superbowl half-time shows and monumental stadium sculptures in collaboration with some of the world’s most celebrated musicians. For the past decade her practice has focused on public choral installations at museums and galleries including the Serpentine and Tate Modern.

Developed in close collaboration with the London-based artist, this luminous monographic exhibition will showcase rare maquettes, sketches, annotated texts and process materials as well as new large scale new projection-mapped sculptures and kinetic installations, conceived especially for this landmark retrospective exhibition.

The Nue Black Aesthetic
6 November 2026 — 8 August 2027

Nue Black Aesthetic is a landmark show celebrating the work of contemporary Black designers whose practice shapes the contemporary design industry. Spanning furniture, architecture, fashion and installation, the exhibition will unpack the multifaceted practices of designers who draw directly from identity and culture, build community and those who are redefining design systems far beyond the Black community.

Including works by Ini Archibong, Nifemi Marcus Bello, Samuel Ross, Bianca Saunders and Giles Tettey Nartey, this thought-provoking show will invite visitors to consider how the Black experience today is central to a designer’s practice and to rethink assumptions about what Black design looks like and who gets to shape design culture.

The exhibition title evolves the legacy of the Black Aesthetic movement of the 1960s and the New Black Aesthetic of the 1980s. The ‘Nue Black Aesthetic’ reflects this contemporary era of Black design – one that is defined by the myriad nuances in the expressions of the Black experience today. The term ‘Nue’ derives from the Middle French word ‘nuer’, meaning ‘to make shades of colour’, which gave us the word ‘nuance’.

This exhibition is guest-curated by the founder of A Vibe Called Tech and author of Now You See Me: An Introduction to 100 Years of Black Design, Charlene Prempeh, in collaboration with the Design Museum.

Free Displays

PLATFORM: Simone Brewster
13 February 2026 — January 2027

PLATFORM is an annual initiative at the Design Museum to expand our exhibition and displays programme with free, year-long displays showcasing the work of a designer or studio who are making an impact on contemporary design discourse. The second iteration of PLATFORM presents the work of London-based designer Simone Brewster for her first ever museum show.

Simone Brewster is a designer whose work plays with form, working across scales and disciplines, defying a quick categorisation. She employs a visual language that is architectural and sculptural, rich with material histories and layered with references from palaeolithic fertility deities to African diasporic traditions. Brewster’s monographic display will centre on the fluidity of her interdisciplinary practice. Visitors will see the range of her design practice, from jewellery, furniture, sculpted forms to public architecture.

Design Researchers in Residence: Mineral
June — September 2026

Design Researchers in Residence was established to support emerging design thinkers whose research responds to the climate emergency, building upon the museum’s Designers in Residence programme that ran from 2007 to 2020. The residency forms part of the Design Museum’s Future Observatory, delivered in partnership with the UKRI Arts and Humanities Research Council.

The 2025/6 residents will respond to the theme of ‘Mineral’ and will support projects that interrogate intersecting mineral landscapes in the UK – geological, ecological and urban – through case studies, field research, and by building human and non-human relationships.

The programme will culminate in a publication and free public display at the museum in June 2026, through which visitors will learn about a range of impactful new thinking that centres design in the green transition.

Source: The Design Museum announces its 2026 programme

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