The Royal Parks Foundation is a registered charity established in 2003 (registered charity number 1097545). It is the charity that helps support London's eight London's Royal Parks for everyone to enjoy, now and in the future. The charity's patron is The Prince of Wales.
As part of its annual fund-raising efforts, the Foundation promotes Deckchair Dreams, through which artists donate individual works of art for the canvases of deck chairs which are reproduced and distributed through the Parks.
Among the artists and celebrities who have contributed to the scheme are Damien Hirst,[ citation needed ] Will Young, Antony Worrall Thompson, Tracey Emin, [1] Alexander McQueen, [2] and Raymond Briggs.
Deckchairs from the 2008 collection were recycled into sling bags, made by designer Bill Amberg. [3]
The 2010 collection of deckchairs draws on themes of nuts, fruits and seeds in the parks, and represents a partnership with the Shanghai Botanical Gardens, including designs by British and Chinese artists. [4]
British designers include the milliner Philip Treacy, Rob Kesseler, cartoonists Ronald Searle and Alexander Williams, and the wildlife sculptor Simon Gudgeon. [4] Treacy's design features an illustration of model Linda Evangelista wearing one of his hats. [4]
Around 700 chairs have been made available across Kensington Gardens, Hyde Park, Green Park, St. James's Park and Regent's Park. [5] Sara Lom of the Royal Parks Foundation said it had been "wonderful to partner with Shanghai" on the project. [4]
Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex, is a member of the British royal family. As the younger son of Charles, Prince of Wales, and Diana, Princess of Wales, he is sixth in the line of succession to the British throne.
Diana, Princess of Wales, was a member of the British royal family. She was the first wife of Charles, Prince of Wales—the heir apparent to the British throne—and mother of Prince William and Prince Harry. Diana's activism and glamour made her an international icon and earned her enduring popularity as well as unprecedented public scrutiny, exacerbated by her tumultuous private life. Her legacy has had a deep impact on the royal family and British society.
Prince William, Duke of Cambridge, is a member of the British royal family. He is the elder son of Charles, Prince of Wales, and Diana, Princess of Wales. Since birth, he has been second in the line of succession to the British throne.
Kew is a district in the London Borough of Richmond upon Thames, 1.5 miles (2.4 km) north-east of Richmond and 7.1 miles (11.4 km) west by south-west of Charing Cross; its population at the 2011 census was 11,436. Kew is the location of the Royal Botanic Gardens, now a World Heritage Site, which includes Kew Palace. Kew is also the home of important historical documents such as Domesday Book, which is held at The National Archives.
Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall, is a member of the British royal family. She is the second wife of Charles, Prince of Wales, heir apparent to the British throne. A second marriage for both of them, they married on 9 April 2005. Despite being entitled to be known as Princess of Wales, she uses the title Duchess of Cornwall, her husband's secondary designation. In Scotland, she is known as the Duchess of Rothesay.
Tracey Emin, CBE, RA is an English artist known for her autobiographical and confessional artwork. Emin produces work in a variety of media including drawing, painting, sculpture, film, photography, neon text and sewn appliqué. Once the "enfant terrible" of the Young British Artists in the 1980s, Tracey Emin is now a Royal Academician.
Princess Beatrice, Mrs Edoardo Mapelli Mozzi is a member of the British royal family. She is the elder daughter of Prince Andrew, Duke of York, and Sarah, Duchess of York. She is tenth in line of succession to the British throne, followed by her sister, Princess Eugenie.
Philip Anthony Treacy is an Irish award-winning haute couture milliner, or hat designer, who has been mostly based in London for his career, and who was described by Vogue magazine as "perhaps the greatest living milliner". In 2000, Treacy became the first milliner in eighty years to be invited to exhibit at the Paris haute couture fashion shows. He has won British Accessory Designer of the Year at the British Fashion Awards five times, and has received public honours in both Britain and Ireland. His designs have been displayed at the Victoria and Albert Museum and the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Marc Quinn is a British contemporary visual artist whose work includes sculpture, installation, and painting. Quinn explores "what it is to be human in the world today" through subjects including the body, genetics, identity, environment, and the media. His work has used materials that vary widely, from blood, bread and flowers, to marble and stainless steel. Quinn has been the subject of solo exhibitions at Sir John Soane's Museum, the Tate Gallery, National Portrait Gallery, Fondation Beyeler, Fondazione Prada and South London Gallery. The artist was a notable member of the Young British Artists movement.
Lee Alexander McQueen, CBE was an English fashion designer and couturier. He founded his own Alexander McQueen label in 1992, and was chief designer at Givenchy from 1996 to 2001. His achievements in fashion earned him four British Designer of the Year awards, as well as the CFDA's International Designer of the Year award in 2003.
Isabella "Issie" Blow was an English magazine editor. As the muse of hat designer Philip Treacy, she is credited with discovering the models Stella Tennant and Sophie Dahl as well as propelling and continually advocating the career of fashion designer Alexander McQueen, beginning when she bought the entirety of his explosive premier show inspired by Jack the Ripper. She died by suicide using the herbicide paraquat in 2007.
Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge, is a member of the British royal family. Her husband, Prince William, Duke of Cambridge, is second in the line of succession to the British throne, making Catherine a likely future queen consort.
The Victoria Medal of Honour (VMH) is awarded to British horticulturists resident in the United Kingdom whom the Royal Horticultural Society Council considers deserving of special honour by the Society.
Christopher Paul Bailey CBE is a British fashion designer who was president and chief creative officer of Burberry. In May 2014, he took up the role of chief creative officer and president, following the departure of former CEO Angela Ahrendts. In February 2018, he was succeeded as chief creative officer by Riccardo Tisci.
Alexander "Alex" Williams is an English film animator and cartoonist. He is the son of animator Richard Williams. He has worked on many animated films, and is the author of the Queens Counsel cartoon strip in The Times, for which he was awarded the Cartoon Art Trust Award for Strip Cartooning in October 2017.
Alexander McQueen is a British luxury fashion house founded by designer Alexander McQueen in 1992. Its current creative director is Sarah Burton.
The wedding of Prince William and Catherine Middleton took place on 29 April 2011 at Westminster Abbey in London, United Kingdom. The groom, Prince William, was second in the line of succession to the British throne. The bride, Catherine Middleton, had been his girlfriend since 2003.
Sir Michael Lawrence Davis is a British politician and former South African businessman, former Chief Executive and Treasurer of the Conservative Party and the chief executive (CEO) of Xstrata plc, an Anglo-Swiss multinational mining company, until its merger with Glencore in 2013. After leaving Xstrata, he formed the mining venture X2 Resources and, after making substantial donations, became the CEO and Treasurer of the British Conservative Party – a post he held until 24 July 2019.
Thomas Richard Stephen Peregrine Stuart-Smith is an English landscape architect, garden designer and writer. He specialises in making gardens that combine naturalism and modernity.
Deborah Milner is a British fashion designer active since the 1990s. Since 2000, she has focused on ecologically aware design, founding Ecoture, her ecological couture line in 2005. In the early 2010s she was head of the Alexander McQueen couture studio.