Design fest co-founder is crowned Future Face
THE co-founder of a festival which celebrates Birmingham’s design sector has been crowned the city’s Future Face of 2019.
Daniel Alcorn established Birmingham Design Festival last year before bringing it back in June for its second outing, selling 10,000 tickets and welcoming 20,000 visitors from across the globe.
The event shone a light on creative fields such as graphic, digital and product design and included exhibitions, workshops and talks held across 40 different venues in the city.
The ambition was to create an affordable celebration of design that has bucked the trend of expensive conferences with 90 per cent of its events free to attend without any public funding.
Mr Alcorn, who launched the festival with Luke Tonge, won the arts and culture category at the Future Face of Greater Birmingham Awards before picked from the other winners to be crowned overall Future Face of 2019.
The annual awards, now in their fifth year, recognise the achievements of under 35s across nine different categories and are organised by the young professionals’ arm of Greater Birmingham Chambers of Commerce.
Away from the festival, Mr Alcorn works as a designer for web agency Substrakt and also leads creative industry networking groups Badego and Glug Birmingham.
The Future Faces judging panel said: “Daniel has demonstrated clear and serious commitment to his spare-time activities to benefit the city’s creative sector.
“He relentlessly strives to put the region’s creative community on the map and inspires others to celebrate local talent, achieve their own potential and be proud of Birmingham.
“An ambitious and hardworking individual who manages projects which are truly unique to the region and attract over 20,000 visitors from across the globe including America and Australia.
“It’s time to thank you for your tireless efforts and everything you do for the region and its creative sector.”
More than 500 people attended the annual dinner and awards at the ICC with entertainment provided by vocal group Sons of Pitches and Birmingham poet Casey Bailey.
The 2019 winners: Arts & Culture – Daniel Alcorn, Birmingham Design Festival/Substrakt; Charity and Social Enterprise – Tom Clarke-Forrest, Sport 4 Life UK; Entrepreneurship – Tru Powell, The Alternative Events Company; Finance – Katie Taylor, Oxbridge; Industry – Sabah Hussain, Xoserve; Legal – Michelle Adams, Squire Patton Boggs; Public Sector & Education – Joint winners - Sapreena Kumari, Aston University and Uttaran Datta, NHS; Sales, Marketing & Communications – Naeem Alvi, Notepad; Technology and Innovation – Luke Southan, Aston University; An Ambassador award was given to Kasim Choudhry, from ThinkFest Events. This is judged solely by the Future Faces president and executive committee and is presented to someone who has been an exceptional ambassador for membership body.