The Festival of Stuff 2026

As an ode to UCL’s bicentenary, we planned this year's Festival of Stuff around the theme of measurement. As the University measured a historic 200 years of education, we considered how measurement affects materials, making and play, from the micro to the macro.  

Together we manually bent aluminium using a giant jig, measuring how much weight the material could handle before breaking. We delicately manipulated copper with pliers to discover its strength and flexibility, creating a large communal chain link by link. We gauged time like a palaeontologist using ancient fossils, and then measured our own timing and calculation skills through a series of bespoke guesstimation games – complete with participation collection stickers. Squishiness was put to the test as we crushed everyday items with a compressor. Pocket-sized A-boards, stools and fire bins were assembled. People played in a forced perspective photography shoot, looming over a minuscule Materials Library. Physical heights were measured. Air dough was squashed, rolled, moulded, pressed and shaped into abacus beads. Miniature microscopic worlds were revealed through atomic colourful chemical reactions. And to celebrate UCL’s bicentenary, wax birthday candles were dipped; their burning times measured. 

In the far corner of the Festival, ancient bog oak was milled. Guests watched on as the oak's ancient trunks were transformed into slices of rich, dark, useable timber, discovering how the trees’ age is deciphered through growth rings. Once planed, visitors were able to personalise their very own piece of this precious matter, exploring the silver inlay process by learning how to drill, set and finish silver embellishments in the dark wood. And our bog oak fascination didn’t end there. During the Festival planning stages we discovered the mysterious phenomenon of bog butter, which is likely thought to be an old method of making and preserving butter. After this discovery, we created our very own butter in a bog - lovingly named ‘bogerella’ - and invited visitors to churn, create and taste their own fresh buttery creations in her honour.

The Materials Library welcomed guests inside to marvel at its treasures, allowing visitors to wobble, smear, scrape and sniff their way around a special selection of matter. With a focus on aluminium, visitors basked in the reflective power of a highly polished aluminium parabolic reflector, and tried their hand at aluminium stamping, taking home a malleable metal imprint of a genuine Materials Library object.