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| Melbourne Design Week | |
|---|---|
| Name | Melbourne Design Week |
| Location | Melbourne, Victoria, Australia |
| First | 2013 |
| Frequency | Annual |
| Genre | Design festival |
| Organiser | National Gallery of Victoria |
Melbourne Design Week is an annual design festival hosted in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, curated by the National Gallery of Victoria and presenting a program of talks, exhibitions, workshops and installations. The event operates in concert with institutions such as the Australian Centre for Contemporary Art, RMIT University, the State Library of Victoria and the City of Melbourne, and features contributions from international and local designers associated with the Victoria State Government, Creative Victoria and the Australia Council for the Arts. The festival intersects with biennials and citywide cultural initiatives including the Melbourne Arts Precinct, Vivid Sydney and the Venice Biennale through collaborations, commissions and touring projects.
Melbourne Design Week stages a curated sequence of exhibitions, public programs and industry forums that foreground architecture, product design, graphic design, digital fabrication and urban design. The program integrates outputs from the National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne Museum, Heide Museum of Modern Art, ACMI, RMIT Design Hub and the University of Melbourne Faculty of Architecture, Building and Planning. Activities range from design laboratories and maker sessions to keynote lectures featuring contributors linked to Designboom, Dezeen, ArchDaily, Domus and Wallpaper*. Public-facing elements include installations on Federation Square, the Melbourne Arts Precinct Laneways, Royal Exhibition Building surrounds and Docklands promenades.
The festival was launched as a response to a perceived need for a metropolitan design platform and quickly evolved through partnerships with the City of Melbourne, the Victorian Arts Centre Trust and Museums Victoria. Early editions drew on networks established by the NGV International, the British Council and the Goethe-Institut to present cross-cultural projects and commissions by studios connected to the Design Museum, Cooper Hewitt, MoMA and the Vitra Design Museum. Over successive years the program expanded to include collaborations with institutions such as the Smithsonian Institution, the British Library, the Australian Institute of Architects and the International Council of Museums, reflecting shifts in curatorial leadership and funding from Creative Victoria and the Australia Council for the Arts.
Core program strands typically feature keynote lectures, design forums, hands-on workshops, temporary pavilions, public art commissions and student showcases. Past keynote speakers and panel participants have included practitioners from Foster + Partners, Zaha Hadid Architects, Bjarke Ingels Group, OMA, Studio Mumbai, Nendo, Snøhetta and UNStudio, while exhibitions have presented works by Jasper Morrison, Philippe Starck, Patricia Urquiola, Konstantin Grcic and Hella Jongerius. Industry-oriented events have engaged associations such as the Australian Institute of Landscape Architects, the Design Institute of Australia, International Council of Societies of Industrial Design, World Design Organization and the International Federation of Interior Architects/Designers. Educational programs have partnered with RMIT University, Monash University, Deakin University, Swinburne University of Technology and La Trobe University.
The festival utilizes a constellation of venues including the National Gallery of Victoria, NGV International, NGV Australia, ACMI, Federation Square, Royal Exhibition Building, Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre, Melbourne Town Hall and Carlton Gardens. Satellite and community sites have included Prahran Market, Collingwood Yards, Blindside, Centre for Contemporary Photography, Gertrude Contemporary, Craft Victoria and Next Wave studios. Strategic partnerships extend to Creative Victoria, City of Melbourne, Telstra, Australian Broadcasting Corporation, SBS, VicHealth, Museums Victoria, Arts Centre Melbourne and UNESCO City of Design networks, as well as international cultural agencies like the Institut français, Japan Foundation and US Embassy cultural affairs.
Critical reception has emphasised the festival’s role in boosting public engagement with design and in supporting commercial and cultural networks across Melbourne and Victoria. Coverage in publications such as The Age, The Guardian Australia, The Sydney Morning Herald, The Australian and ArchitectureAU has noted contributions to tourism metrics tracked by Visit Victoria and event economic assessments commissioned by the Victorian Government. Commentators from The Conversation, Monocle, Financial Times and The New York Times have evaluated the festival’s curatorial direction, and awards recognition has involved nominations and prizes from the Australian Design Awards, Victorian Premier’s Design Awards and Museum and Gallery Services Australia.
Highlighted commissions have included large-scale installations and retrospectives by designers and studios associated with Marimekko, Knoll, Herman Miller, Vitra, Eames Office, Issey Miyake, TOTO, FLOS, Artek and Muji. Collaborative projects have featured research outputs linked to the CSIRO, Victorian Organic Centre, Future Cities Catapult and Melbourne School of Design, along with experimental prototypes from the RMIT Makerspace, Fab Lab Melbourne and the Australian Centre for Field Robotics. Touring exhibitions have been programmed in partnership with the Victoria and Albert Museum, Centre Pompidou, MAK Vienna and the National Gallery of Denmark.
The festival is curated and administered by the National Gallery of Victoria within a governance framework involving the NGV Board, the Victorian Minister for Creative Industries and advisory panels comprising representatives from Design Institute of Australia, RMIT University, Monash University and industry stakeholders. Funding streams combine public investment from Creative Victoria, the Australia Council for the Arts and the City of Melbourne with private sponsorship from corporations such as Telstra, ANZ, BHP, Commonwealth Bank, Lendlease and Section Partners, philanthropic support from the Myer Foundation and business partnerships with commercial galleries, galleries like Sullivan+Strumpf and distributors such as Aesop and Crown Resorts.
Category:Festivals in Melbourne