London Design Festival 2016: the organisers of the London Design Festival have scrapped plans for a designer crazy golf course in Trafalgar Square following the failure of its crowdfunding campaign.
Billed to include contributions from Zaha Hadid, Paul Smith and Tom Dixon, the project had only raised £23,083 of its £120,000 target when the Kickstarter campaign ended at midnight last night.
London Design Festival organisers today issued a statement confirming that the "highly ambitious" Visionary Crazy Golf project would not go ahead due to lack of funding.
"We are obviously disappointed that we won't be able to achieve it through Kickstarter, which was a new funding model for us," said London Design Festival director Ben Evans.
"Installations in Trafalgar Square are complicated and expensive to realise, but we hope that we might find another way to have Visionary Crazy Golf financed, and may well revisit the idea in the future."
Faults in the project's funding strategy were pointed out by users on the Kickstarter page, with many commenters saying the goal was too high.
"Between the high goal and the expensive rewards, people are passing on it," said one user.
"I am wondering if the £50 price for two tickets is the reason for the lack of interest?" questioned another. "I must admit that I thought it steep but really wanted to get involved. Maybe a relaunch with a rethink on pricing might help, allowing more people to afford the experience."
Others seemed confused by the offered rewards – a tool used by Kickstarter campaigns to encourage backers.
"I think your problem is you have too many rewards, and these cannot be combined," said another user. "I wanted socks and a round but I'm not going to create another Kickstarter profile. You need to offer the gifts as an addition."
Had it been reached, the £120,000 target would have been matched by sponsors to allow the nine-hole course to be constructed.
Furniture designer Tom Dixon, fashion designer Paul Smith and the late architect Zaha Hadid had all planned courses for the project.
Other designers involved included artist Mark Wallinger, printmaker Camille Walala and architecture studios Atelier Bow-Wow, HAT with Tim Hunkin, NEON and Ordinary Architecture.