You must go - there’s a gorilla made of coat hangers." Thus spoke a friend encouraging me to attend the current Power of Making exhibition at the V&A.  I followed her advice and was rewarded; metal hooks curved sinuously to create a form both delicate and bestial. Similarly incredible were the six-necked guitar and giant blond lips made entirely of human hair.

The problem the V&A had with representing ‘making’ is how much we do of it. Our use of the verb is indicative of the problem: we can make toast, or love, or a pair of hair wrapped lips. This issue of variation was the point but also the downfall of the exhibition.

Instead of a genuine representation of the human power to create, the show read as a random selection of bizarre luxury objects. The pieces on display were largely chosen to shock and amaze, and they did.I couldn’t help thinking that the way in which your average jelly or bar of soap was made was probably quite interesting. The ordinary felt uneasy and neglected.

The show was most successful when viewed as a testament to the genius of the individual as maker. Sabrina Gschwandther’s quilt woven from film negatives of and by women used the creation of a beautiful object as a way of discussing past and present ‘femaleness’. A wooden textile by Elisa Strozyk played with ideas of materiality, as well as suggesting the valuable role creating the useless and implausible can have.

Go, because there is much to be amazed by and enjoy. Stone books, fingernail art and replica food are all really great. I am no closer to discovering the place of craft in modern life but I had a lot of fun.