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Dutch Design Week 2019 takes place in Eindhoven every October. This year it was 18th edition. From 19 to 27 of October, we had the opportunity to dive into the wonderful world of design. And find out its most unexpected facets. This year the theme of the week was: If not now, then when? A huge number of social projects, projects related to the environment, recycling, the use of biomaterials. It’s not easy to navigate between so many locations at Design Week. It is impossible to answer the question: what is the main expo, and where to go first. Literally, the whole city is turning into an exhibition. An incredibly interesting and attractive design project can be found behind each corner.

In general, I figured out that to go around all 100 locations and see 2600 designers, talk to them, understand ideas and reflect – it will take 7 out of 9 days that event is running. The amount of information goes through the roof! And of course, you need to take coffee breaks, good there are also plenty of cafes around. Opening hours are mainly from 11:00 to 18:00, there are a couple of locations that work until 20:00. The whole city is divided into areas in which locations are formed, united by a common idea. This year there were 9 areas, which were located at a distance of 15 minutes by bicycle, 5-10 minutes by car, 30 minutes or a little more if you walk.

And now, you live this week with the feeling of missing out, the excitement to miss something, because you get used of saying “wow” at every turn you make, which is addictive and you want to continue to explore and be surprised. Of course, it’s easy for me to say, living in Eindhoven, that you need as much as a whole week to visit. But what to do when you arrive for a couple or one day. Where to go? Let’s categorize everything. And first of all, ask yourself, but what is interesting to me? What do I like the most?

• If you are a visual person, like me. Then, of course, those projects that are brightly and originally designed are most likely to catch you. Looking at which, you even question – is it design or art. The best locations on this side were: Plan-B, Sectie-C, Strijp-R and Strijp-T, Domusdela, Kazerne, Design perron, Dutch invirtuals, Van Abbe museum. Ideal places for lovers of design spaces and interiors.

• If you are interested in craft and the new use of materials, a sustainable environment, then you need to go to Veem, Ketelhuisplein, TAC, Precious plastic.

• Technology: Klockgebauw, Drivers of Change from TU / e University

• Graduation show of Academy Design – ideas, sometimes raw, sometimes breakthrough, sometimes conceptual and symbolic. But definitely the ideas of the future.

Of course, you can come for a day and just go through 2-3 areas. But it will be only about to “take a look”.

What have I learned this year?

1. We are definitely waiting for changes in the design of cars, the trend is on electric or solar energy, driving without a driver and sharing one car with several people.

2. I liked that designers can now make objects from almost any waste, it can be ash, broken phone screens, fallen leaves, toxic metals. And there’s no need to talk about the plastic itself, recycling it – can achieve a lot. But as I see it now the main problem is not in recycling but in the collection and sorting of garbage. We are waiting for achievement on this topic at one of the next Design Weeks.

3. Design is not necessarily a project, it can be just a question asked on a specific problem? For example, the question – why should plastic pollute our oceans, and not vice versa wash our shores?

   Design is first about philosophy.

4. 3D printing is no longer a trend, but an overused technology. What value is it that you can create anything with the click of a button? Craft-people are trying to combine technology and manual work.

5. For Design Week I got press accreditation and I managed to communicate with so many creators. I made the blog posts about each of the DDW locations. In each post, I described ideas with photos and also linked designers. Who might be interested?

– If you visited all the locations but did not have time to read about all the projects and remember the designers.

 – If you couldn’t see all the locations, but curious to see what was there.

– If you haven’t been to the exhibition, but the design theme is interesting.

– Get motivated to come next time.

Besides the Dutch Design Week, it is time to enjoy autumn in Eindhoven, his industrial past: industrial buildings and raw interiors. Overall, it is difficult to find a city that retains all this factory power, does not take it all down, does not abandon it, but transforms it into living, residential, working spaces with its own charm. This is actually unique! And I want people living in Eindhoven and coming here to notice and appreciate this. We can see on this understandable example of how design can make a city, that is laking traditional Dutch cuteness/appeal, so comfortable, fresh and authentic.

I made individual guided tours of Design Week, in 3.5 hours we saw the most interesting projects. I studied a ton of information and could tell what this or that exhibition was about so that people could save time, neither read or study on their own, but just look and understand the idea by listening stories. In general, I can say for myself that it was difficult for me to perceive visually and study the idea for each project at the same time. The information was often too stunning and diverse. Therefore, I am waiting for one of the designers to create a gadget or something like that, for museums and for exhibitions: where visual and informative can be combined. So I see: we look through the glasses and see tags! So, let’s wait! Until next Dutch Design Week!

Next exhibition: Dutch Design Week 2020, October 17-25, www.ddw.nl, # DDW20