Design studio Pearson Lloyd is turning the former Yorkton Workshops, which once housed milliners and doll-makers, into an archive, studio and gallery.

From trimmers and turners to gilders and framers, Hackney has a rich tradition of supplying crafts for the timber trade.

For the past two hundred years, workshops across the borough have made furniture, musical instruments and architectural joinery for customers around the globe.

Now design studio Pearson Lloyd is opening a new base in converted former Victorian workshops that once housed the makers of hats, tools, dolls and chairs.

The dilapidated workshops have been transformed into meeting rooms, event space, workshop and archive, reusing and retaining original bricks and timbers where possible.

And the reconfigured Yorkton Workshops will be open to visitors this month with an exhibition about making in Hackney.

Making Design: people, place, product is part of Open House, the London Design Festival and the Shoreditch Design Triangle.

Pearson Lloyd will be sharing some of their archive, design process and the objects that inform their work from 10–5pm September 18–20 at 1-3 Yorkton Street.

pearsonlloyd.com