© VIENNA DESIGN WEEK, Vienna Design Week
© Apollonia Theresa Bitzan, Vienna Design Week
The “Vienna Design Week” has been taking place since 2007. Year after year, over ten days in late summer, the festival shows that Vienna is a “City Full of Design”. Last year, Austria’s most important curated design festival attracted 40,000 visitors at around 200 events. With a diverse range of events and very different formats, the festival, which is organised by an independent association, says it has set itself the task of “examining the role of design in society – throughout the city, with as much fun as seriousness, with free admission and with lots of exciting programmes for everyone, from children to design professionals”. Accordingly, the focus is on product, furniture and industrial design as well as architecture, graphics, circular and social design and experimental and digital approaches. In addition to all the local and content-related focal points, the graphic appearance also characterises the respective festival edition.
The focus district of this year’s Vienna Design Week from 22 September to 1 October is Leopoldstadt. This is also the location of the festival headquarters, the main venue, which changes every year and is also an information point and starting point for a tour of discovery. Recurring formats include the “Passionswege”, where the dialogue between design and craft is cultivated, “Design Everyday”, “Fokus” and the social design projects of “Stadtarbeit”. In the “Platform” format, design studios and architecture firms, companies, museums, cultural institutions and universities can once again present themselves; “Debut” focuses attention on an educational institution from Germany and abroad.
“Urban Food & Design”, a format that was launched last year, is to activate the innovative power of the design and creative scene again this year in order to initiate change processes in different areas of the food industry. New at the current edition is the “Re:Form” format developed in cooperation with Ökobusiness Wien. It aims to explore “new perspectives and innovative solutions through sustainable cooperation” and to bring together design, management consultancy and industry. The common goal is “ecologically and socially compatible forms of doing business”, i.e. lighthouse projects “that show how sustainable design, strategic thinking and the leverage of economic implementation can together make the city fit for the future”. The programme is rounded off by talks, tours and educational programmes. The “VDW App”, a “digital festival companion for your pocket”, provides an overview of venues and dates, allows you to plan routes and gain exclusive access to augmented reality installations.
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