The prestigious V&A/RCA History of Design MA programme is widely recognized as much more than a standard postgraduate academic course. Over the years, it has established itself as an inspiring and impactful community of emerging leaders across various cultural sectors, including major museums, cultural organizations, universities, and the wider creative industries. At the heart of this renowned programme’s ethos lies a deep commitment to collaboration and active engagement.
Every single year, the master’s students come together collectively to organize a public symposium and a dedicated publication. These student-led initiatives serve as a vital platform for sharing the very best of their rigorous dissertation research, while powerfully reminding the public of the profound ways in which design and everyday objects shape human lives and historical narratives.
On July 14, 2026, in a vibrant celebration and formal recognition of their collective and individual academic achievements, this year’s graduating cohort of the V&A/RCA History of Design (HoD) programme hosted their much-anticipated symposium and publication launch. Held in the Lydia and Manfred Gorvy Lecture Theatre at the Victoria and Albert Museum (V&A) in South Kensington, the event was titled Pencils Only.
Because the HoD symposium and publication are entirely organized, funded, and produced by the students themselves, each year’s event remains completely unique to its specific cohort. This hands-on, self-directed production process mirrors the entrepreneurial and collaborative spirit required in the modern cultural sector, testing the students’ abilities to translate academic research into public-facing cultural experiences.
The wide variety of research topics pursued by the 2026 cohort presented a unique yet welcome challenge: how to effectively highlight individual scholarly achievements while simultaneously presenting them in a cohesive, engaging manner to the broader public. Rather than viewing this diversity as a hurdle, the cohort embraced it as a genuine invitation to collaborate. They set out to create an event guided equally by their mutual investment in one another and the fascinating material culture they spent the year studying.
Reflecting on this complex process as a symposium co-organiser and the evening’s master of ceremonies, 2026 graduate Liv Curnen noted that the entire creative journey began, appropriately enough, with a simple name.
What’s in a name?
Like many great academic and creative ideas, the overarching theme Pencils Only came into being among friends during casual conversations in the Royal College of Art (RCA) ArtBar. The concept emerged as a playful, affectionate nod to a familiar rule frequently encountered by researchers. In most historical archives and special collections where fragile old manuscripts and rare objects are preserved, scholars are strictly reminded that they are allowed to bring "pencils only" to prevent accidental ink stains and permanent damage to historical documents.
Given the 2026 cohort’s collective academic investment in challenging, questioning, and expanding the traditional institutional structures that have long guided the study of objects, the pencil quickly revealed itself as a deeply unifying symbol for their work. Beyond its practical archival function, the pencil came to represent impermanent mark-making, the fluidity of historical interpretation, and the ultimate inevitability of change.
Following a series of fruitful brainstorming sessions at the ArtBar, the proposal for Pencils Only was brought before the entire student cohort. It was democratically selected over several other strong proposals, which included Ex-Libris—derived from the Latin phrase meaning "from the books of"—and Impressions. While each of these alternative themes held strong potential to unite their diverse research interests, the cohort found it difficult to beat the resonance of a humble yet powerful writing instrument.
This sentiment was highlighted by Dr. Sarah Cheang, Head of Programme at the RCA, during her opening remarks at the symposium, where she praised the students for choosing a metaphor that speaks directly to the mechanics of historical research and the fragility of historical record-keeping.
Designing our ‘look’
Once the thematic framework of the event was firmly established, the cohort’s next major operational task was to design a comprehensive visual identity to match the spirit of Pencils Only. While the demanding nature of the postgraduate term meant that not every student could directly contribute to the graphic design phase, those with specialized graphic design experience found innovative ways to embed the core principles of collectivity into the visual identity itself.
Designers Lauren Pencil and Sally Holditch ingeniously found a way to include as many of their peers as possible directly into the symposium’s primary poster design. They achieved this by creating a striking composite graphic that spelled out the words Pencils Only using individual letters drawn from the actual handwriting of twelve different HoD students.
This subtle yet powerful design element offered a tangible visual representation of the pencil’s unifying influence across the cohort. Although both the live symposium event and the accompanying publication would ultimately feature more than 20 distinct scholarly compositions and presentations, balancing individual academic voices with a cohesive group identity remained a top priority. The thoughtfully crafted visual identity played a crucial role in helping the students achieve this delicate balance.
History of Design in conversation
From the outset, it was crucial for the 2026 cohort that the Pencils Only symposium would do much more than simply showcase isolated student projects in a linear succession. Instead, the event was carefully structured to actively embody the critical, challenging questions that the students had been interrogating throughout their entire year of study.
To accomplish this ambitious goal, the students established unique, discursive groups and thematic pairings. They used the specific perspectives of their own individual research projects to interrogate and converse with their peers’ thought processes, breaking down academic silos in the process.
For instance, Carolina Sánchez Rojas and Karima Grillo combined their respective decolonial perspectives to critically re-evaluate global contemporary museum practices. Together, they emphasized the vital importance of active community involvement, institutional repair, and radical joy within modern cultural spaces.
In another session, Narin Keitikul and Sally Holditch drew upon their extensive experiences conducting digital design histories to challenge the audience. They urged listeners to fundamentally reconsider traditional definitions of an "artefact," particularly in an era where human lives, identities, and cultures are increasingly lived out and recorded digitally.
Meanwhile, Elizabeth (Xinyi) He and Çağla Kazanlı shed fresh light on the complex relationship between global cultural exchange and the traditional concept of modernity. They achieved this by creatively placing the design history of late 19th-century Ottoman clocks into an illuminating dialogue with the historic travel diaries of Henry Cole, the founding director of the V&A.
In true History of Design fashion, these dynamic conversations pushed far beyond conventional academic boundaries. They directly interrogated the core premises of the Pencils Only theme, asking probing questions about what has been written into history, what has been systematically erased, and what might eventually be re-written if scholars are equipped with the right critical tools.
Reflecting on the culmination of their hard work at the Pencils Only event, Liv Curnen noted that the ultimate success of the symposium was fundamentally underpinned by her colleagues’ profound ability to remain genuinely inquisitive about each other and their respective ideas.
The rigorous process of planning, writing, and designing was continuously strengthened by a shared willingness to question not only how a peer’s research might enrich the broader event, but also how their distinct perspectives and individual skills as scholars would carry the entire group across the finish line.
By actively recognizing each other’s individuality as a vital support system for collective intellectual labor, the 2026 History of Design cohort successfully modeled the exact kind of collaborative leadership, critical inquiry, and deep camaraderie that will undoubtedly serve them well as they step forward to become the newest members of the active V&A/RCA History of Design alumni network.