Dezeen Magazine

Architects and designers share Brexit anger with protest Instagrams

Brexit crisis: British architects and designers were among tens of thousands of people to protest against a UK exit from the European Union in London on Saturday.

Organisers put the number of attendees at the demonstration at 50,000, while the Metropolitan Police's estimated it was closer to 30,000.

The Venice Architecture Biennale's British Pavilion curator Jack Self, architect and Harvard professor Farshid Moussavi, London Design Guide editor Max Fraser, jewellery designer Hannah Martin and photographer Edmund Sumner shared their anger and creative sloganeering on their Instagram accounts.

"If you voted to Leave you have been deceived," Self captioned an image of protesters at Parliament Square. "You won't get what you want, and we will all be much worse off. We must now unite and try to avoid a #Brexit catastrophe."

A photo posted by Jack Self (@j_self) on

Protesters gathered in Park Lane from 11am and marched to Parliament Square, which was was completely full by 2:30pm.

A photo posted by Jack Self (@j_self) on

Moussavi, the founder of Farshid Moussavi Architecture, was also among the throng. She shared an image of herself holding a placard that read "love not leave".

A photo posted by @farshidmoussavi on

Other slogans captured on Instagram included "EUryone welcome", "The people have the power to redeem the work of fools" and "Stop playing with our future".

A photo posted by @farshidmoussavi on

Fraser, a design commentator and author, shared images of a banner painting session as well as the protest itself. "So proud of my gang," he captioned one image with the hashtags #marchforeurope and #bettertogether.

The UK voted 51.9 per cent in favour of a British exit from the EU and 48.9 per cent to remain at a referendum on Thursday, 23 June 2016.

London, Scotland and Northern Ireland all voted in favour of remain, as did all of the British designers and architects who spoke to Dezeen about the issue.

A photo posted by @awinst on

Designer Nelly Ben Hayoun urged fellow creatives to join a demonstration in central London last week, which was eventually cancelled on safety grounds after more than 50,000 people RSVPed to a Facebook invite.

Meanwhile, membership body the Creative Industries Federation is organising a series of emergency sessions to decide on a tactical course of action for the sector.