Every May, the design world descends on one corner of East London. Here’s why Clerkenwell Design Week matters and what it means for your bathroom.
There is a particular kind of energy in Clerkenwell every May. Architects, interior designers and the brands they love most converge on EC1 for three days of product launches, open showrooms, installations and the kind of conversations that shape what luxury interiors will look like for the next year or two.
We love it. And we think you should know about it.
Clerkenwell Design Week – CDW – runs 19–21 May 2026 and this year marks its 15th edition. It’s where the industry goes to see what’s genuinely new: new finishes, new collections, new ideas about what a beautiful bathroom can be. For a team like ours, who spend every day talking to clients about brassware, sanitaryware and surface design, it’s essential.
The audience at Clerkenwell isn’t the general public – it’s the architects and interior designers specifying luxury projects months, sometimes years, ahead. Which means the products and finishes that generate excitement at CDW in May are the ones our clients start asking for by Christmas.
This year, some of the biggest names in the bathroom world are there. Dornbracht – whose precision-engineered brassware we rate enormously – are exhibiting. TOTO, the Japanese sanitaryware brand behind some of the world’s most sophisticated bathroom technology, is opening a newly refurbished Clerkenwell showroom during CDW week itself. When brands like these show their hand at CDW, we pay attention.
A few things are standing out for us ahead of the 2026 edition:
Finishes, finishes, finishes. The Interior Hardware exhibition at CDW is dedicated entirely to architectural hardware and finishes: tapware, fittings, the details that define a bathroom’s character. This is the show within the show for us. We have watched unlacquered brass and PVD-coated finishes build from a CDW conversation into a mainstream client request over the past few years. We will be watching carefully to see what’s next.
Surfaces with texture and soul. Flat, uniform tiles are giving way to relief, texture and artisanal detail and the Italian ceramic brands at CDW always push this furthest. It feeds directly into the bathroom wall and floor design conversations we are having with clients right now.
Sustainability done properly. Not greenwashing – real material innovation. Longer-lasting finishes, recycled content, products designed to age beautifully rather than need replacing in five years. This is a direction the industry is moving in seriously, and we are here for it.
If you are planning a luxury bathroom renovation in Surrey or South West London, this is the moment the industry refreshes its thinking. The products and ideas that excite specifiers at CDW in May tend to shape what clients are asking for by autumn.
At Kallums, our showrooms in Putney and Guildford are stocked with brands that sit at the heart of this conversation – Gessi, Graff, HIB and more. When you come in for a design consultation, you are not just browsing what’s on the shelves. You are drawing on a team that follows where the market is heading, informed by exactly the kind of industry insight that CDW provides every year.
We would love to talk about what your bathroom could be.
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