Ever fancied relaxing on the floor of the V&A and contemplating the artworks? That’s exactly what visitors will be encouraged to do during this year’s London Design Festival.

French design duo the Bouroullec Brothers will cover the museum’s Raphael Gallery with a coloured foam and textile installation.

“It’s a really huge installation,” said Erwan Bouroullec. “I was born in the countryside so it’s a textile field. It’s quite soft so people will walk and lie on it.”

Other highlights of the festival include:

• A dramatic new installation at the entrance to the V&A
• Power of Making, a V&A and Crafts Council exhibition aiming to bring visitors closer to the process of making things
• Reddress, an enormous dress made from 550m of fabric, which will be worn by a performer and fit an audience of 238 people inside its folds
• A workshop where you’ll be able to create your own prints designed by Israeli illustrator Noma Bar using a giant hole punch
• A Swarovski crystal installation by John Pawson in a tower of St Paul’s Cathedral that’s is normally closed to the public

In total, there are expected to be around 250 events across London. “Every year we try to be different and better and more inspiring,” said festival director Ben Evans.

London Design Festival runs from 17 to 25 September. For more details visit www.londondesignfestival.com

The Royal Academy’s Treasures from Budapest: European Masterpieces from Leonardo to Schiele opens on Saturday and I went along for a sneak preview.

The stunning exhibition is composed of work from one of the finest art collections in Central Europe, The Museum of Fine Arts in Budapest, along with loans from the Hungarian National Gallery. Many of the pieces were collected by the Esterházy family, who’s various generations developed the collected works.

The tremendous breath of work includes religious painting, mythological work, landscapes and contemporary masterpieces. Among the 200 works are paintings by Leonardo da Vinci, Raphael, Claude Monet, Egon Schiele, Rembrandt and Pablo Picasso, covering treasures from the sixteenth to the twentieth centuries.

Standing in front of a wall which sees Pierre-Auguste Renoir’s Bridge at Argenteuil, and Monet’s Three Fishing Boats next to Hungarian artist Mihály Munkácsy’s Dusty Road II, curator Professor David Ekserdijan said:

“The relationships between artists most of us are very familiar with, such as Monet, Renoir, [Eduoard] Manet and [Camille] Pissarro, and the Hungarian artists will prove very fascinating for everybody.”

This statement sums the exhibition up to a tee. It’s a captivating mix of work by the Old Masters, latter-day European greats, and Hungarian artists who have incorporated the styles of these artists into their own work. For example, you only need to glance at Munkácsy’s Dusty Road II to see the J.M.W. Turner influences.

Highlights of the exhibition include the striking Peter Paul Rubens’ Mucius Scaevola before Lars Porsena, Schiele’s erotic Two Women Embracing, and detailed chalk sketches by Leonardo da Vinci. Arguably the greatest work, however, is Raphael’s Esterházy Madonna, a stunning example of Renaissance painting at its finest.

Treasures from Budapest: European Masterpieces from Leonardo to Schiele opens on Saturday until 12 Dec.