The worth of design weeks
With the creative community planning its calendars around annual design events, there is more to these weeks than forecasting the season’s must-haves
Let’s not kid ourselves; the design season only ever truly begins in April, with the preordained pilgrimage to Milan, come Salone del Mobile. While there are many design capitals in the making — Toronto, Singapore, Shanghai, Dubai — the Milanese design week is ‘the’ place where every designer wants to present, and where every design professional and Instagram ‘influencer’ wants to be mid-April.
Having barely recovered from Maison & Objet (Paris) and the Stockholm Design Week, I too am looking forward to Milan, but other commitments mean that this year I will only experience it from afar.
No doubt it will be a stellar edit yet again, but with every design brand already claiming its right over the next big design trend for 2018 and beyond, it’s put in me a ‘taking stock’ mode.
Are design weeks just well oiled commercial or promotional vehicles? What do they mean for people outside of the creative bubble? And why should we care?
Truth is, design weeks train global attention on the act of creation. In doing so, they allow for the sustainability of the inquisitive mind, livelihoods, the crafts and continued investments in technology and infrastructure.
In bringing together a global network of designers and creatives, these events become something bigger than the marketing ploy. They truly build communities.
In putting together diverse streams of design and presenting established and emerging designers on the same platform, these annual events set new generations of designers on the path of success, year after year. Design weeks are happy to share the glory too — they support satellite economies of the host city. Dubai, for example, has some of the highest hotel occupancy rates during Dubai Design Week. Not to mention the millions that are pumped into the economy via sponsorships, parties and even Uber rides.
Salone del Mobile will engage Milan with the global design community from April 17-22, but here are some other design weeks that you simply shouldn’t miss out on.