Ben Farleigh is a London-based artist and product designer. He is also creative director of streetwear brand Yes No Maybe.

His 'Toytem' collection is currently on display in the wee gallery space located in our reception desk. Toytem is a range of pop art pieces: toy + London brick sculptures… "a volcanic marriage inspired by childhood icons, the suburbs lived in, and the city playground."

The artist says:

Bricks – most specifically 'London Brick' – are something I have found and collected over time. (They are) a perfect symbolic unit of measurement. (Their) proportion, geometry and functionality are key to their beauty. I would like to consider myself a 'London Brick.'

Fast food 'happy meal' toys and action figures are key to the Toytem collection. Sourced from personal collections, boot sales, eBay and charity shops, they remind me of our disposable culture.
Broadly considered junk, (landfill) each has been beautifully designed, crafted and moulded and manufactured in the hundreds of thousands, to high safety standards and painted with skill by hand, then marketed and distributed to sell more food, or cinema tickets, or computer games to kids.
These used toys still have beauty; 'Toytem' is an appreciation of the minute attention to detail and exquisite skill involved in toy-making. This is highlighted by conglomerations of toys painted a flat colour to reveal their form.