A playful art installation in a London nursery school, The Cabinet of Veganosity is the world's first ethical Cabinet of Curiosity, in collaboration with Miss Hart, The Vegan Taxidermist

Eaton Square School came to us wanting to develop an engaging reception area for their Grade II-listed Belgravia site, as well as a brand identity that could carry over to their other buildings. 

Their current reception area - a standard white, boxy room with a tall, brown, uninspiring desk - was doing nothing to beckon guests in from the outside, and this quickly became a challenge that, of course, House of Kin were all too keen to accept.

Curiosity, ethically reimagined

Having long been fascinated by the taxidermy collections and cabinets of curiosity that pepper the world's great institutions, and inspired by the school's setting in Eccleston Square, where the wealthy classes of the 1830s no doubt displayed their own taxidermy and curiosities, we set out to create the world's first ethically made cabinet of curiosity. 

We wanted to modernise the concept, thinking about what this type of display would look like in today’s world, where we are more conscious of the planet and all its inhabitants. 

And so we created a sustainable spectacle where every oddity, artefact and magical addition comes from the hands of a maker, not a taker. 

The Cabinet of Veganosity was born!

The Vegan Taxidermist

Working with textile artist Miss Hart, known as The Vegan Taxidermist, every item in the collection was crafted from sustainable felt made from recycled plastic bottles. 

The result is an eclectic 50-piece collection of handcrafted objects and artefacts, housed in a 4-metre-long cabinet made with museum-quality joinery.

We designed the joinery to be deliberately understated. Functional and beautiful, just like any display cabinet you'd find in a museum, allowing the individual pieces to do the talking and drawing curious children and their parents ever closer to the glass.

Look a little closer

By making everything out of felt, we softened what could have been an intimidating collection of oddities! 

And at first glance, the installation does echo a genuine Victorian collection. 

But look a little closer, and you discover a soft, fuzzy world within, with every item telling a unique story.

The cabinet is thoughtfully curated in an age-appropriate height order, with the lower shelves populated with pieces that depict the life cycle of a frog, Charlie’s (and the Chocolate Factory) Golden Ticket, and a puffer fish. 

While the upper shelves hold a Suffragette's sash, Barack Obama’s campaign artwork and a fertility goddess. 

The intention is that the older and taller you get, the more complex the items and their story become.

Our thought behind this is that the installation engages the students in thinking about the planet and recycling in a new way, without making it feel like another one of life’s hard lessons.