A design challenge for under-graduate and post-graduate students in the run-up to the World Design Assembly, which Hyderabad will host in October, was launched on Saturday.
It is the first of several events planned leading to the World Design Assembly, biennial event of World Design Organisation (WDO) that is coming to India for the first time, Industries and IT Secretary Jayesh Ranjan said at the launch in which WDO President-Elect Srini Srinivasan participated. Saturday was also World Industrial Design Day.
Finding solutions
Telangana government, in association with industry body CII, has conceived the design challenge with a view to devise solutions for five problems — design a unique water bottle to reduce plastic pollution; design a universally recognisable symbol/logo for persons agnostic of culture, academic and socio-economic backgrounds for (a) warnings for danger, keep out (b) toilets (c) chemist shop (d) medical facility (e) zebra crossing; design interventions to alter human behaviour and create a more civil society; help reduce weight of school bags; and a conserve and reuse water mechanism for households.
August 31 is the last date for submission of online entries.
Winners will be awarded during Hyderabad Design Week, a five-day city-wide event from October 9 organised by the government coinciding with the WDO’s Assembly in October. Installations, interventions, exhibitions and workshops that demonstrate the power of design to improve lives will form part of the programmes.
The World Design Assembly, 31st in the series, will have ‘Humanising Design’ as its theme and be held on October 11-12. Formerly the International Council of Societies of Industrial Design, WDO is an international non-governmental organisation founded in 1957 to promote the profession of industrial design.
The WDO had, in July 2018, announced selection of Hyderabad to host the next Assembly. “In the context of WDO’s recently adopted World Design Agenda, the city of Hyderabad presented an outstanding proposal, with numerous opportunities to position design as a critical tool for addressing the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), WDO President Luisa Bocchietto had said.
According to WDO, the Assembly brings together leadership, membership and external stakeholders to discuss key issues affecting the industry, guide the future of the body and explore the ways design can contribute to the international development agenda.
Paris, Vienna, London, Moscow, Milan, Helsinki, Amsterdam, Sydney, Toronto, Seoul, San Francisco and Singapore figure in the list of cities to have hosted the Assembly since the first Assembly in Stockholm in 1959.
