Skip to main content

 

Upcoming Forum!

Design China Beijing Design Forum

24-27 September 2021
National Agricultural Exhibition Centre


2021 Forum Theme:
Nature, Nurture and Sustainable Beauty
 

Over 30 design icons, global industry leaders, visionaries, and innovators, Design China Beijing’s thought leadership platform will address the show’s theme through design disciplines from across the world, with influential speakers including Stirling prizewinner Amanda Levete of AL-A Architects, designer and artist Morag Myerscough, whose graphic approach to 3D and architectural design characterised by bold use of colour, pattern and typography, Satoshi Ohashi of Zaha Hadid Architects, Dean and Professor of Architecture at Tsinghua University Zhang Li, and multi-disciplinary product and interaction designer Satyendra Pakhalé, exploring the cultural shift towards regenerative design as a response to social and environmental needs in China and beyond.

 

sign up to the design forum

Forum Theme

Forum Theme

Nature, Nurture and Sustainable Beauty

Nature is the nurturer, the source of nourishment, the giver of life. ‘Nature is not just “nice to have”,’ says Mike Barrett of WWF. ‘It is our life support system.’ Global wildlife populations have declined 68% since 1970; more than half the CO2 emissions in human history have happened since 1990. Very bad things are happening very fast. We are hurtling headlong into a catastrophe for all living beings. This isn’t just climate change; this is we humans, destroying our own home.

But we know this. We don’t want to be told it over and over again. We need messages of hope. How do we nurture nature, turn degeneration into regeneration?

At Design Shanghai 21 we celebrated design practice and practitioners committed to these principles. It’s more than using forms, structures and materials inspired by nature; we design with nature’s self-regenerating structures and materials, creating a system where resource is not just sustained, but actively replenished.

For Design China Beijing we turn our attention to the changes in thinking and attitudes we need, not just to make the world a better place, but to rescue it – to make sure it, and we, survive and thrive. Attitudes towards beauty are at the heart of this change. Advanced technologies and ancient craft traditions must feed each other to sit in harmony with nature and generate a true creative process, eliminating waste and making, not using, energy. Materials, processes, urbanism, community and communality; the relationship between digital technologies and natural resources; beautiful environments that are not only truly sustainable, but genuinely restorative. The best minds in global and Chinese design are grappling with how we handle these issues right now, and Design China Beijing is where their voices are heard and their experiences absorbed.

It’s design’s responsibility to lead the way. ‘Design is a willing accomplice in the implementation of lifestyles that we are taking for granted’ says Vienna Museum of Applied Arts curator Thomas Geisler. But that must change. ‘The climate crisis and the pandemic teach us to change our habits, to listen to our intuition and to gain empathy in order to resonate with the environment.’

We must make restorative, regenerative design not only natural but beautiful. We must design a new aesthetic, transform our thinking and our clients’ desires, to show them what is possible – outcomes they have never dreamed of.

We are part of nature, a self-regulating, self-healing, natural system. To design within that system is to create true beauty, in operation as well as aesthetics. Regenerative design is regenerating design itself.

Aidan Walker, Forum Programme Director,
Design Shanghai, Design China Beijing, Design Shenzhen

Stages (Coming Soon)

Stages (Coming Soon)

Speakers

Speakers

Schedule

Schedule

 

 

Design Shenzhen Design Forum

9-12 December 2021
Shenzhen Convention & Exhibition Center

 

Design Shenzhen will build on this platform that Design Shanghai and Design China Beijing have created to shine a light on the unique environment of Shenzhen, focusing on more forward-thinking design topics and the adoption of technologies in the design industry.

Forum Theme (Coming Soon)

Forum Theme (Coming Soon)

Stages (Coming Soon)

Stages (Coming Soon)

Speakers

Speakers

Schedule

Schedule

 

Design Shanghai Design Forum

9 - 12 June 2022
Shanghai World Expo Exhibition & Convention Center

 

As one of the best attended and comprehensive seminar programmes in Asia, Kohler Exquisite x Design Shanghai Design Forum brings together the world’s most pioneering minds, making it a unique platform for networking with Asia’s most influential design professionals. Over four days at the fair, the design forum will present inspiring and diverse content from over 100 design industry leaders and influencers.

Forum Theme

Forum Theme

Regenerative design comes to China – and the world

The world needs regenerative design and the radical re-assessment of values it demands. Sustainable design is no longer enough. Regenerative design goes beyond conventional sustainable design. Sustainability is about reducing harmful negatives; regenerative design is a positive approach that restores ecosystems, builds resilient communities, generates more clean energy than we use, and makes buildings and products that instead of using less carbon, actually positively take carbon out of the atmosphere. 

Chinese traditions, both in ancient beliefs about the unity of humanity and nature, and the building crafts for wooden construction which are undergoing a modern resurgence, have already laid the foundations for the new attitudes inherent in regenerative design. 

We come to ‘redesigning design’. Having worked for a generation to respond to the sustainability imperative, designers are now grappling with a whole new mode of thought; regenerative design demands ‘systems thinking’, the new version of ‘design thinking’. It sees us humans as part of the natural system, and we design as part of nature, to create resilient and equitable systems that integrate the needs of society with the integrity of nature. We don’t do things to nature, taking from it; we design with it, giving back what we take and balancing the system. 

In 2021 the three editions of the Forum for the Design Shanghai family – in Shanghai in June, Beijing in September and Shenzhen in December – will explore different aspects of this huge cultural shift. The Design Shanghai Forum is proud to represent thought leadership – and present thought leaders – from both Chinese and global design. You cannot afford to miss it.

Aidan Walker, Forum Programme Director, Design Shanghai / Design China Beijing / Design Shenzhen

Stages

Stages

Speakers

Speakers

Schedule

Schedule

logos

 

Design Shanghai 10th anniversary kicks off on 8-11 June 2023 at Shanghai World Expo Exhibition & Convention Center. Register your ticket now.

Ticket registration    View Exhibition Highlights