The Biodesign Here Now Festival Comes to Shepherd's Bush Market
Biotech hub Open Call will host six day event showing off latest inventions
Open Cell, the new Biotech hub in the Old Laundry Yard in Shepherd's Bush Market is hosting the Biodesign Here Now festival from 18 - 23 September.
The festival will invite the public to see the latest biotech inventions being created in our borough.
One of London’s most affordable biotech hubs, Open Cellwill host the event in partnership with H&F Council and U+I PLC. It will feature 70 experimental studios in the Old Laundry Yard's shipping containers including the first open access bio lab and biomaterial lab in London.
There will be exhibitions, performances, workshops, documentary screenings and talks throughout the six day festival.
It will be the first time that part of the London Design Festival has been staged in Shepherd's Bush.
The Open Cell space was launched in June by co-founders Dr Tom Meany and Helene Steiner, pictured below, with space within 45 shipping containers in the yard, just off Goldhawk Road.
With space priced at just £4 per sqft, the hub has attracted an impressive line-up of new start-up businesses, who have turned the containers into labs, workshops and offices.
Now the hubs is hosting innovative start-ups doing everything fom making bespoke furniture from potato skins to training flies to better pollinate flowers.
"There is little or no infrastructure available to help talented scientists, designers and early stage biotech businesses to take their concepts to the next stage,"
said Open Cell co-founder Tom.
"Open Cell is a meeting place for anyone in the sciences or design disciplines to contribute to the burgeoning biotech sector in London with Hammersmith & Fulham leading the way."
The Old Laundry Site sits between Shepherd's Bush Market and Pennard Road and has been unused for many years.
Among the innovators at work in the yard are:
Some of the exciting start-ups at the Open Cell in Shepherds Bush include:
Co-founders Rowan Minkley and Rob Nicoll are developing a replacement for MDF boards using waste potato scraps for a fraction of the price.
Biohm
Biohm is revolutionising the construction industry as they develop bio-based materials, which will significantly reduce the time to build, costs and the carbon footprint of new buildings.
Olombria
Royal College of Art graduates Tashia Tucker, Louis Alderson-Bythell, and Greg Orrom Swan are attempting to solve the international problem of declining bee populations by training flies to become better pollinators.
BYBI Beauty produces vegan, plastic-free skincare with no synthetic ingredients, which has not been tested on animals. Even the packaging is biodegradable and 100 per cent recyclable.
BYBI Beauty founders Dominika Minarovic and Elsie Rutterford.
H&F Council says the Hub forms part of Upstream – its latest partnership with Imperial College London – to make the borough one of the leading destinations in the country for the biotech, digital and creative industries.
Find out more at Open Cell
September 14, 2018
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