World Design Capital Mexico City 2018 Program Presentation

After a selection process in 2015, Mexico City was designated as World Design Capital 2018. This initiative, driven by Design Week Mexico along with the City Government, makes CDMX the sixth city, and the first in the American continent to obtain this title given every two years by the World Design Organization (WDO).

Under the theme ‘Socially Responsible Design’, the WDC Mexico City 2018’s program will promote design and creativity as engines of social and cultural change in an urban context, as well as to offer proposals to solve the challenges of megacities around the world such as public space, mobility and sustainability. All the creative community will be able to rethink the concept of a megacity, and exhibit the continuous efforts to build a more liveable city.

“World Design Capital Mexico City 2018 has focused on a socially responsible design approach, in order to encourage conversations about design as a configurator of material life and ideas towards the benefit of urban life. The annual agenda that has been prepared joins us to a global movement of cities with a proposal of a Public Program as an active meeting point for professionals and citizens to shape the urban future for our city”, said Emilio Cabrero, general director of Design Week Mexico and World Design Capital Mexico City 2018.

Throughout 2018, World Design Capital Mexico City will present a Program consisting on signature events and a local agenda with academic, cultural and design activities.

The signature events will be implemented in collaboration with World Design Organization, during March, April and October, meanwhile the local program will take place simultaneously throughout the year.

The exhibitions, conferences, urban interventions and educational projects will be guided by six transversal sub-themes relating to urban challenges of the 21st Century:

People

Mobility
City identity

Environment

Public space

Creative economy

Inauguration Signature Events
The World Design Capital CDMX 2018 program will open with the WDC International Design Policy Conference, which will take place on march 5 & 6 at Palacio de Bellas Artes with the theme ́The Future of Our Cities: a social approach to the challenges of the first urban century’.

The Conference will emphasize the axes of design, sustainability, education, culture and innovation through an exchange of ideas between a select group of professionals, academics and international guests.

It will also promote the reflection of how we reinvent our cities immersed in continuous state of growth, how we choose to change form a design perspective, and the notion of expansion and infrastructure to rethink urban growth and resilience of the megacities.

The WDC International Design Policy Conference program will reunite 14 renown Architects, Designers, Urbanists and Artists that will analyse the challenges, regulatory policies and opportunities that cities face in current times, regarding to public space, mobility, waste management, clean energies for the environment, etc. All this with the purpose of presenting their vision and discuss about new strategies for change that can boost the welfare of our cities and their population.

The personalities participating at the International Design Forum are: Thom Mayne, Pritzker Award 2005 and American Institute of Architects Gold Medal 2013; Daniel Libeskind, director of Libeskind Studio, multi-awarded by the Royal Institute of British Architects, and 1985 Gold Lion by the Venice Biennial; Wolf D Prix, director of Coop Himmelblau, pioneer of the deconstructivist architecture movement and winner of the European Academy of Sciences and Arts Award; Patrick Schumacher, director of Zaha Hadid Architects, pioneer of the parametricism movement, winner of the Stirling Prize 2010 & 2011, and the Structural Steel Design Awards in 2010, Shohei Shigematsu, director of OMA New York; and Joshua Ramus, founder architect of REX and winner of the AIA National Honour Award 2005 and 2011.

Other participants will be Marion Weiss and Michael Manfredi, directors of Weiss Manfredi, winners of the International Architecture Award by the Chicago Athanaeum and the European Centre for Architecture Art Design and Urban Studies, and twice winner of the AIA Quality United Architectural Design Award; Gateano Pesce, Italian architect and industrial designer, recognized as the Designer of the Year by A&W Architektur und Wohnen, and Good Design Award by The Chicago Athenaem Museum of Architecture and Design; Stefan Sagmeister, graphic designer, founder of Sagmeister & Walsch Inc., Grammy Award winner in 2005 and 2010, and National Design Award for Communications from the Cooper Hewitt National Design Museum; Daan Roosegaarde, Dutch artist, founder of Roosegaarde Studio with exhibitions at the Tate, Victoria and Albert Museum, and the London Design Museum, winner of the London Design Innovation Medal in 2016; Wade Graham, historian and landscaper, among his published books are: “Dream Cities”, “American Eden” and “Braided Waters”; Charles Montgomery, Canadian urbanist, author of the books “Happy City” and “The Last Heathen”, winner of the Charles Taylor Prize, Hubert Evans Prize and Writers Trust of Canada Prize; Atelier Van Lieshout, Dutch artist winner of the Prix de Rome Award, Stankowski Award, and Kurt Schwitters Award.

Local program

ACADEMIC AGENDA
World Design Capital Inter-university Forum

CULTURAL AGENDA
Museums and galleries

DESIGN AGENDA
Design in Mexico City

For further information about World Design Capital CDMX 2018, you can visit the site: