Last weekend I visited The Wapping Project for the first time. Built in 1890, this extraordinary and beautiful building was originally the Wapping Hydraulic Power Station, but is now a restaurant and contemporary art space. Some of the machinery from the original power station is still in situ in the very tempting-looking restaurant, which unfortunately I didn't get chance to sample on this occasion, though I'm looking forward to going back to try it another time. As well as the restaurant, the venue houses the Boiler House - an exhibition/installation space - and an art bookshop housed in a greenhouse,as well as outdoor artworks.

The installation currently in the Boiler House is no less extraordinary than the building itself. Yohji Making Waves is a single-piece, site-specific installation created by fashion designer and artist Yohji Yamamoto, in collaboration with scenographer Masao Nihei. In this work, the cavernous, darkened Boiler House space is flooded with water, and a beautiful, oversized silk wedding dress (an iconic piece taken from the designer's autumn/winter 1998 collection) is suspended above it, reappearing as a ghostly reflection in the dark, rippling waters. The space is lit by a string of bulbs sending glimmering light out across the water, a haunting soundtrack plays, and visitors can take a closer look at the dress by clambering aboard a small boat, which a boatman rows around the flooded gallery at regular intervals.

There's something both mesmeric and meditative about this atmospheric installation. But although there's an eerily beautiful quality to the black depths of the water, and spectral floating dress, there's also something hugely fun and anarchic about the very idea of flooding a gallery and rowing around it in a boat. In this way, as well as being contemplative, this is an enchantingly playful installation: it's little wonder that our fellow gallery visitors were beaming with delight as they hopped aboard the little boat and set off across the water.

The installation is the third element of a series of exhibitions devoted to Yamamoto's work in London this summer: the others, which I haven't had chance to visit as yet, are Yohji's Women, an exhibition of photographs at The Wapping Project Bankside, and of course Yohji Yamamoto, a major solo exhibition at the V&A. However, whether or not you're a fan of Yamamoto, I'd highly recommend visiting this installation: one of the most imaginative and appealing pieces of contemporary art I've seen for some time.

It's surprisingly difficult to find details of the installation online, but it is open daily -  Monday - Friday from 12 noon - 10pm and Saturday-Sunday from 10am. Boat rides take place every 15 minutes. The installation is free to enter but a ticket is required for the boat.

Yohji Making Waves is at the Wapping Project until 10 July 2011.

[Image by Madeline Graham via Flickr used under Creative Commons]

The Barbican's Future Beauty is an appropriately stylish and well put together exhibition, surveying contemporary Japanese fashion from the 1980s to the present day, focusing on the avant-garde work of ground-breaking designers like Yohji Yamamoto, Rei Kawakubo of Comme des Garcons and Issey Miyake. These are designers who brought about a revolution in the fashion landscape, mounting a challenge to accepted Western notions of feminity and beauty, and changing irrevocably the way we dress.

Here, their work is carefully presented in a space divided by translucent drapes that hang from floor to ceiling. The gallery makes the perfect backdrop for these garments, with their origami-like folds and unfinished hems, themselves as much sculptural art objects as they are items of clothing, as Naoya's Hatekeyama's extraordinary photographs of Rei Kawakubo's flat garments makes clear. Issey Miyake's A-POC is far more sci-fi art installation than it is conventional ready-to-wear.

It's helpful then, that this exhibition is organised along thematic, rather than chronological lines, allowing us to follow the thread of an idea or style as it evolves through different interpretations. Exploring concepts such as wabi-sabi (the beauty of imperfection) and ma (the notion of spaces between objects) this curatorial approach allows us to understand some of the complex and challenging thinking that lies behind these apparently simple, minimal and often startlingly beautiful constructions, as well as the furore they created when they first appeared on the catwalk.

The exhibition is supported by a wealth of fascinating film and video content, including catwalk shows and documentaries, most notably Wim Wenders' classic documentary on Yamamoto, Notebook of Cities and Clothes, which will leave you forever in thrall to the power of the black polo neck. A perfect introduction to Japanese fashion in advance of Yamamoto's upcoming solo exhibition at the V&A it may well be, but Future Beauty is more than that, standing up in its own right as an ambitious and inspiring exhibition, not merely for those who love fashion, but for anyone with an interest in contemporary visual culture.

Future Beauty is at the Barbican Art Gallery until 6 February 2011.

[Images from Future Beauty: 30 Years of Japanese Fashion, 15 October 2010 – 6 February 2011 at Barbican Art Gallery, London. Photocredit: Lyndon Douglas]