Bardware
By hands for hands

Bardware is Bard’s third anniversary exhibition celebrating the power of tactility in functional objects for the home, opening 7th November 2025.

Bardware is a new group exhibition at Bard, demonstrating the weird and wonderful power of tactility in objects for domestic endeavour and devotion. 23 craftspeople, designers and artists from all over Scotland (and two errant Scots, working in Sweden) are presenting new work for Bardware, which run until 23rd December.

We invited a group of Scottish practitioners to respond to our callout for works that awaken and enliven human senses through daily use in the home. We were interested to make passive actions become something more conscious. To touch something made my hand encourages a deeper connection, not just to the surface or object itself, but to the manifest skill and the embodied knowledge of the soul who made it.

We counted the number of things we touched in a fairly average fifteen minutes. It was 110. Over a 16-hour waking day that amounts to more than 7,000 fingertip interactions. Another study suggests we touch our phones upwards of 2600 times a day. With evermore time spent swiping touchscreens, we need to reawaken our senses through sensory engagement – and this is one of craft’s superpowers. It’s a touchy subject.

Bardware is a riff on our love for hardware stores, the archetypal destinations and services selling household goods for home improvement. One of the greater areas of home improvement today requires a haptic re-engagement with crafted matter in our domestic lives; small, significant touch points for daily use that are elevated by the presence of craft.

Exhibitors

James Rigler, Jess White, Studio Viv Lee, Clement Knives, Oliver Spendley, Claire Henry, LAKRISTA, David Taylor, Juli Bolaños-Durman, Ceramics by Joshua Williams, Araminta Campbell, Jonnie Crawford, Eve Eunson, Ingot Objects, Morven Mulgrew, MANIFESTO, All About Willow, Jack Brindley (Pavilion Pavilion), Nick Ross, Cara Guthrie, Oisín Gallagher (Studio Settle), The Glaziers Arms, The Bumbling Basketeer, Giulia Gentili.

View the objects