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Premier’s Design Awards: Winners announced Wednesday 16 July 2008
Design Capital: Wednesday 16 – Friday 18 July 2008
Design for Everyone: Wednesday 16 – Thursday 24 July 2008
Design:Made:Trade: Thursday 17 - Sunday 20 July

The Victoria-wide design event, The State of Design Festival kicks off on Wednesday 16 July 2008 with a host of events to appeal to anyone with an interest in design. Under the artistic direction of Ewan McEoin from Studio Propeller (one of the key organisations that make up the State of Design Alliance or SODA), the festival features four major design arenas: the Premier’s Design Awards, Design Capital, Design for Everyone and Design:Made:Trade.

While the Melbourne Museum will become a ‘design hub’ for most of the activities on offer, events will take place at venues all over Melbourne, including the Royal Exhibition Building, the Australian Centre for the Moving Image, as well as regional venues across Victoria.

The festival welcomes many international guests as well as those from around Australia, but takes a distinctly Melbourne, and indeed Victorian, focus in its celebration of design talent and innovation. One of the key themes at the festival is the issue of sustainability in design, and that is reflected in the criteria of the Premier’s Design Award, and newly introduced Premier’s Design Marks, as well as the challenges it brings to design and business as shown in Design Capital, how it affects product design in Design:Made:Trade as well as the broad scope of climate change and sustainability awareness of the entire population in Design for Everyone.

The Premier’s Design Awards
A highlight of the State of Design Festival, The Premier’s Design Awards 2008 seeks to recognise excellence in design practice in Victoria. Held biennially from 2008 onwards, the award is judged by a local and international panel and the winner announced at the opening of the festival.
In addition to the Award, the event has recently been redeveloped to introduce the Premier’s Design Marks. These Marks will ‘reward designers and practices that have developed their skills and their creative processes to respond to the new more demanding market conditions, producing exemplary approaches and outcomes that are perceived by the profession, clients and the community as a contribution to a sustainable future’.
The Premier’s Design Marks will be awarded within the following design categories in the divisions of Commercial, Cultural or Self Initiated: Industrial/Product Design, Architecture, Interior Design, Graphic Design, Multimedia Design, Landscape Design, Exhibition Design, Set Design, Textile Design, Fashion Design, Hand Made Objects.

Chris Bosse, Designer, Design Capital

Design Capital
As Australia’s first business of design conference, Design Capital, presented by Design Victoria, will bring the realms of business and design together in order to allow them to connect and discuss issues facing both areas such a sustainability, globalisation and also examining the role of design in successful innovation. Participants in Design Capital include leading innovators, designers, business figures, the media and industry who will bring their insights to the table to tackle issues relevant to designing, thinking, process, and the commercialisation of design led products and services from Victoria.

The Design Capital conference has been structured over three days according to key themes affecting business and design. These themes complement each other as well as work to stimulate debate among the participants.
Day One’s themes are ‘Designing Identity’ and ‘Place Making’. ‘Designing Identity’ examines how design is generated and shifts the identity of individuals, products, brands and places; and particularly looks at how when they work well, design solutions can provide a double dividend: a return on investment and a return on imagination, creating iconic, strategic outcomes for business. ‘Place Making’ looks at how urban renewal and development creates environments and new opportunities for business and community, acknowledging how architecture and urban planning are crucial to shape the way of the future.

‘Designing Experience’ and ‘The Opportunity of Crisis’ are on the agenda for Day Two. The former analyses the how our ‘experience economy’ harnesses design as a way to ensure consumer engagement. ‘Opportunity of Crisis’ canvasses the obligation of designers to respond to the imminent challenges of climate and society, and also motivate change as they create the products, environments and opportunities of the future.

Nendo, Design Capital

Day Three takes a global view with the ‘Convergent World’ and the ‘Commercialisation of Ideas for Export’. ‘The Convergent World’ observes how a new generation of design service systems, products and production methodologies are emerging to challenge social, environmental and consumer expectation. This theme makes particular reference to how technology-based design processes, digital networks and sustainable manufacturing are all innovation led business arenas worth watching. The ‘Commercialisation of Ideas for Export’ expands upon these themes as three innovative Victorian exporters describe their pathway to market, illustrate the commercial potential of design and manufacturing fed from research, and products rich with design.

The State of Design Festival Artistic Director and Conference Curator, Ewan McEoin, says that this conference is a ’strategic event, looking towards a competitive, innovative future for Victorian design and Victorian business’. Design Capital will be facilitated by Oliver Freeman, director of the Neville Freeman Agency, and has been strategically designed to build a picture, across six diverse yet connected themes, of where Melbourne and Victoria sit in a competitive global market, and predicts new opportunities for design-led business from Victoria and Australia.
Design Capital will run from Wednesday 16 – Friday 18 July 2008 at the Melbourne Museum.

Design for Everyone
Design for everyone proclaims that ‘Design is a Verb!’ The driving force behind this event is to make design appear as accessible and appealing as possible, that ‘it’s about doing, being, making, crafting, thinking, shaping – a process not an object, design is for everyone!’
The involvement of not only the venues across the city of Melbourne such as Melbourne Museum, ACMI, the State Library of Victoria, RMIT University and the National Gallery of Victoria, but also regional centres from Horsham to Castlemaine to Bendigo – making this a truly accessible event at the Festival.
In designing these events, program curator Fleur Watson has helped bring together the design community, giving the designers unique opportunities with a space for design in all its guises to interact directly with the public. With events ranging from exhibitions to public talks, design experiences and iconic design statements, Design for Everyone makes its message clear.

'Propogating Fiction' for 'Winterlights' - Tracy Sarroff, Mars, Design for Everyone

Design:Made:Trade
Complementing the business realm of Design Capital and its opportunity for leading businesses to network and forecast, Design:Made:Trade adds an essential commercial aspect to the State of Design Festival. This trade event brings together 40 of Australia’s most talented designers from a wide range of design disciplines including lighting, textiles, fashion design, furniture, industrial design, and graphic design, and aims to give exposure to this showcase of forthcoming products and material trends to local and international markets.
Housed in the Royal Exhibition Building, Design:Made:Trade is the perfect location to attract key buyers, design professionals, design makers, manufacturers, decision makers from national and international creative industries, as well as design conscious members of the public.

Design:Made:Trade also makes an effort to engage with the current trend of sustainability in design by giving exhibitors the opportunity to transform a design box to showcase their design talent. The boxes are provided by Visy, are constructed from recycled cardboard and will be recycled at the end of the event.
Design:Made:Trade has been compared to the designers block concept in London as well as 100% Design Tokyo events, and aims to present innovative work in an environment  focused on attracting designers and trade visitors with a creative young and fresh approach.

Zema Designs, Design:Made:Trade

The State of Design Festival has been made possible by the Victorian Government, the Design Victoria program, the State of Design Alliance (SODA) as well as commercial partnerships. SODA is a joint venture made up of Australian Exhibitions & Conferences, Winslow Solutions and Studio Propeller.

State of Design Festival
16 – 24 July 2008
Various venues

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