Design Wales

Service Design Workshop for Design Silesia

2012-01-18T04:34:00.000-08:00

For most of this week we have a group from Silesia (Poland) here in Cardiff attending a workshop on how to run design-led innovation projects in public services.
The group includes Polish designers and representatives from Design Silesia, who, as part of the Silesian Marshall's Office, are supporting the project. In delivering the programme of training for the Polish designers Design Wales invited Age Cymru into the workshops to provide a real project case study that the delegation will work on to develop their understanding and use of service design tools. At the end of the week the group will return to Silesia to work with three target public services but continue to have support from the Design Wales service design programme as their live projects develop.
With a similar industrial heritage and economic objectives for the future the Welsh Government and the Region of Silesia have a long-standing Memorandum of Understanding to work together and on their first day the group were formally welcomed to Wales by the office of the First Minister from the Welsh Government.

Design Silesia identified this opportunity to work together after hearing about the service design programme that was launched by Design Wales in July 2010. With support from the Welsh Government the service design programme provides both an advisory service to manufactures as well as building capacity for service design in the Welsh design sector.

Looking for a design manager

2012-01-11T07:23:00.000-08:00

The PDR Building in Cardiff

Design Wales are looking for a new member of staff with experience of design management to help us advise businesses in Wales (particularly SMEs) how they might best manage design.

Based at our offices in the National Centre for Product Design & Development Research (PDR) at Cardiff Metropolitan University this is going to be a fixed-term post that runs until 31st July 2015.

Full details of the post (title: Design Advisor-Design Management) and application forms will be available from next Tuesday 17th January via www.cardiffmet.ac.uk/jobs

If you have any questions about the post then please e-mail gcawood@designwales.org

SEE Design Policy Monitor

2011-12-13T03:50:00.001-08:00

Design Wales has been leading the SEE project since 2008. SEE has been sharing international best practice to integrate design into innovation policies and programmes. A key initiative has been to examine innovation and design policies and programmes developments between 2009 and 2011. The results are in and we present the SEE Design Policy Monitor, which reveals the scope and depth of policy provisions for design an innovation in the partner regions/countries.

Design policy has been a hot topic recently with the results of the European Commission’s call for projects as part of the European Design Innovation Initiative expected in January 2012, BIS publishing the UK’s Innovation and Research Strategy including design for innovation and the Design Council event ‘Should government have a design strategy?’.

As part of the Design Policy Monitor, we examined the innovation policies for the EU’s 27 Member States, which revealed that 17 out 27 have design included (in some form) in a national level strategy. This demonstrates that in the context of economic renewal, design is being recognised as a driver of innovation. On 8 December, the UK Department for Business Innovation and Skills published their Innovation and Research Strategy for Growth with an entire section devoted to design for innovation. Here are some key quotes:

‘Design can be transformative for companies, through leading or supporting product and process innovation, for managing the innovation process itself, for the commercialisation of science, and the delivery of public services.’ P. 35

‘Design thinking can play an important role in strengthening the public sector’s capacity to be an intelligent customer as it involves bringing together different perspectives, including industry and users of a service or product, to understand needs. The use of design can deliver cost savings and improved efficiency in the delivery of public services and help to generate solutions to societal challenges.’ P. 85

The role of design in the new strategy was presented by a representative of BIS at the Design Council policy event on 1 December. Gavin Cawood also presented an overview of the state of play for design policy across Europe. The videos are available on the Design Council website.

Design Wales and SEE will continue to monitor policies for innovation and design over the next few years to examine new trends in the future at European, national and regional levels.

Design Wales Launches Service Design Website

2011-07-18T14:40:00.000-07:00

The Service Design Programme is an initiative developed by Design Wales to help the manufacturing and creative industries apply the latest service innovation techniques to their businesses.

There is a dedicated website for this programme with case studies, project news, service design resources. You can reach this website here: www.testyourservice.co.uk

Service Test App

The site also includes an on-line tool that companies can use to check the quality and cost of their service. It is often the starting point for companies that want to improve their service but simply don't know where to start. Try it for yourself here: www.testyourservice.co.uk/app

Case studies

One company that we have seen service design make a big impact in Aggrelek, an advanced manufacturer from Swansea, you can read all about how they have benefited from the programme here: www.testyourservice.co.uk/blog/news/aggrelek-case-study

Next steps for the Design Wales manifesto & petition

2011-07-15T06:41:00.000-07:00

At the Cardiff Design Festival 2010, Design Wales launched the Design for Innovation in Wales Manifesto and Petition. The petition has been discussed in four Petition Committee meetings to date and Design Wales has had the opportunity to engage with Lesley Griffiths, the Deputy Minister for Science, Innovation and Skills. Recently, Design Wales was invited by the Petitions Committee to identify where further action can be taken to realise the aims of the manifesto and petition. On 12 July, the Assembly Members agreed to raise our requests at the Welsh Government's Enterprise and Business Committee.

Read the submission to the Petitions Committee by Design Wales below:

Design is gaining recognition around the world as a driver of innovation in industry, services and society. Design is a problem-solving process. It is an approach to innovation that is user-centred, creative and viable.

The European Commission strategy Innovation Union identifies design as a key discipline for innovation in the private sector for bringing products and services to market, in the public sector for making public services better correspond to citizens needs as well as for addressing social challenges:

‘Our strengths in design and creativity must be better exploited. We must champion social innovation. We must develop a better understanding of public sector innovation. Design is of particular importance as a key discipline to bring ideas to the market, transforming them into user-friendly and appealing products.’

To raise awareness and understanding of this strategic role for design among politicians, policy-makers and the public in Wales, in October 2010, Design Wales launched a Manifesto and Petition. The Petition gained 369 signatures and called for the National Assembly for Wales and Welsh Government to consider the role of design in future policies and programmes for innovation, public services and social enterprise. The Manifesto recommendations were met with overwhelming support when on 5 October 2010 Assembly Members unanimously passed an amendment to the strategy Economic Renewal to ‘harness the power of design for innovation in industry, services and society’. In response to the Petitions Committee request to provide insight into where further action can be taken, Design Wales has identified how design can play a strategic role in contributing to the Welsh Government’s policy priorities:

• Creative industries

• Manufacturing and service industries

• Public services

• Education

• Social enterprise

Creative industries

In 2008, the Creative and Cultural Skills (Sector Skills Council) published the economic ‘footprint’ of the creative industries revealing that the professional design sector in Wales accounts for the greatest proportion (22%) of Wales’ creative industries. In addition, the creative industries contribute £465M to the Welsh economy, of which 36% is generated by design. However, the strategic contribution of design to the creative industries was overlooked in the ‘Heart of Digital Wales’ review in favour of music and broadcasting. Since the Economic Renewal programme identifies the creative industries as a priority sector of strategic importance for the Welsh economy and as design constitutes a significant driver of competitiveness, design merits better representation in policy discussions. Design Wales calls for design to have a representative on both the Digital Wales Board and the Economic Renewal Creative Industries Sector Panel to champion the role of design within the creative industries in Wales to support the development of this important professional sector.

Manufacturing and service industries

In Economic Renewal, the Welsh Government encourages businesses, particularly the advanced manufacturing sector, to invest in design to develop new products . While this commitment represents a significant step, the interpretation of design is limited to product development; this does not reflect the broader strategic role attributed to design in Innovation Union where design is also a driver of innovation in services. Service innovation has been identified by the European Commission as an area of increasing importance in the coming decade . Those products proving most successful in competitive markets are those integrated into an advanced customer experience with intelligent services adding value to the product itself. The Welsh Government is already supporting the Service Design Programme delivered to the advanced manufacturing sector and could play a role in raising demand for innovation in services across Wales. Design Wales calls for the Welsh Government to examine the role of design in service innovation and attribute a more strategic role to design in the Economic Renewal Programme.

Public services

Design is proving itself as a process for delivering more efficient public services since it involves both the service provider and the service user (citizens) in an engaging process of identifying inefficiencies and proposing solutions that are creative, user-centred and viable. The Welsh Government is examining more effective public service delivery as part of the New Models of Service Delivery Work Stream. However, since design has not been articulated as a priority by the Welsh Government, design is not one of the models under consideration. Design Wales calls for the New Models of Service Delivery Work Stream to consider the role of design in delivering more citizen-focused public services.

Education

The Dyson report identifies design as a bridge between the STEM subjects. ‘To a large extent, the STEM agenda has also ignored the silent D (design). Used as a tool to make products a reality, design links engineering to business and the end-user. At school level, design and technology should receive the same priority status as science and maths’ as design is the subject that combines analytical and practical skills. Design Wales calls for the Welsh Government to recognise design as the link between the STEM subjects and integrate design into the STEM curriculum.

Social enterprise

As a dynamic tool, design is a process for addressing social challenges. Social enterprises should be citizen-centred and the Welsh Government has made a commitment to further this agenda in the Social Enterprise Action Plan for Wales . By involving a broad spectrum of stakeholders in creative processes, design can enable citizens to come up with their own solutions for social enterprises. Design Wales calls for design to play a role in Social Enterprise Action Plan programmes.

In order to make these ambitions for design a reality, Design Wales is supporting four Assembly Members in establishing a Cross-Party Group for Design and Innovation. The aim of the Design and Innovation Cross-Party Group is to raise and maintain awareness at a policy and programme level of the role of design in realising innovation within industry (for competitive advantage), public services (for greater efficiency and citizen focus) and social innovation (for greater public participation).

Design Wales are currently active in communicating the role of design in innovation policy by leading a European network of 11 organisations since 2008 called SEE. Speaking at the SEE project’s Policy, Innovation and Design Conference in the Flemish Parliament in March 2011, Peter Dröll, Head of Unit the Commission’s Directorate General for Enterprise and Industry stated that “Our vision would be that in 2020, design is a fully acknowledged, well-known, well-recognised element of innovation policy across Europe, at the European level, at the national level and at regional level”.

Wales has the opportunity to be regional forerunners in championing the design for innovation agenda and Design Wales is committed to enabling the Welsh Government make this happen. Design Wales calls for design to be recognised both horizontally across Welsh Government policies as well as vertically at policy, programme and project levels. Design Wales calls for the Welsh Government to develop a vision for design in Wales as has been articulated by the Danish Government.

to read the transcript of the meeting click here.

SEE launches Policy Booklet 4

2011-07-11T07:47:00.000-07:00

The SEE project, led by Design Wales, has recently launched SEE Policy Booklet 4, which examines the role of design in bringing innovative ideas to market in the context of i) new product and service development; ii) design support for SMEs and iii) national design systems.

i) Section one demonstrates that design features not only at intermittent points in the innovation process but can form part of every aspect of the process from generating new product and service concepts and understanding user needs to a product’s production, use and ultimate disposal.

ii) Section two describes the lessons learnt during the course of the SEE project in delivering design support programmes focused on enabling industry to develop new products and services.

iii) Section three contextualises the role of design support programmes within the broader national system for design, which includes other elements that make up a nation or regions’ design resources and actors.

Since design is increasingly highlighted in innovation policies (such as the European Commission’s strategy Innovation Union), mapping regional and national design systems can enable policy-makers to identify opportunities and obstacles in the way actors interact within the system in order to develop better programmes and policies.

SEE is a network of 11 European partners exploring how to integrate design into regional and national innovation policies. Electronic copies of all our publications are available to download from the SEE website: www.seeproject.org/publications.

SEE are RegioStars Finalists

2011-06-28T09:01:00.000-07:00

On 23 June 2011, Design Wales attended the RegioStars award ceremony hosted by the European Commissioner for Regional Policy, Johannes Hahn, in the Bozar, Brussels. The SEE project, led by Design Wales, was short listed as finalists for the 2011 award and although we did not win, the feedback from the judges was very positive:

“This is an interesting policy-building project in a forward-looking area – design as a source of innovation. Its broad partnership and EU endorsement gives credibility to the statement that it paves the way towards new innovation policies, suited to regions outside the Science and Technology hubs.”

SEE was nominated for the award by the Welsh European Funding Office (WEFO). WEFO Director, Damien O'Brien said that being named RegioStars finalists is an excellent achievement. Wales did not come back empty handed as the ‘Growth in environmental marine science’ (GEMS) project were named winners!

Design Wales also had the opportunity to engage with the Deputy Minister for European Programmes, Alun Davies AM and discuss plans to establish the cross-party group for design and innovation in the National Assembly. We will provide an update about the cross-party group soon!

SEE, a network of eleven European partners sharing experience on how to integrate design into regional, national and European innovation policies, co-financed by ERDF through INTERREG IVC.

Design Wales Forum visits The South West Design Forum

2011-06-15T09:01:00.000-07:00

Media and Innovation Awards in Plymouth

Design Wales Forum was able to secure some funding from the HEFCW SIP Programme fund to make a visit with South West Design Forum. The Strategic Insight Programme (SIP) was launched to help university staff develop and build relationships with external partner organisations. Design Wales Forum is currently looking at ways to create a sustainable model for the forum. The visit with South West Design Forum enabled Design Wales Forum co-ordinator Victoria Jones to open a dialogue between the South West Design Forum and Design Wales Forum. A further meeting has been arranged in order to discuss future potential for collaboration.

During her visit Victoria shadowed Tim Burley chair of the South West Design Forum. She attended the Media and Innovation Summit, the South West Design Forum AGM and the Media and Innovation Awards.

"This was an opportunity to gain insight of another design organisation: how it is structured and how its activites are run. The only way to have gained this information was by spending time with them." Victoria Jones, Design Wales Forum.

SEE project launches sixth bulletin

2011-06-14T02:05:00.000-07:00

The SEE bulletin seeks to contribute to the growing interest in design policy across Europe and beyond. With the debate gathering pace (particularly in light of the European Design Innovation Initiative), SEE continues to provide strategic insight based on the shared experience of the partners. SEE has been examining the role of design in innovation policy for the past three years and this edition reflects the changes we have seen in that time. Highlights include:

• Research: How Policies Matter to Design (Dr Qian Sun)
• Interviews: Design Policy and Promotion Map (Estonia, Finland, Italy and South Korea).
• Special Reports: SEE Project’s Policy, Innovation and Design Conference. Dublin’s Bid for World Design Capital 2014.
• Case Studies: Service Design Programme (Wales, UK) and Design and Business Concepts that Merge (Argentina).
• SEE Legacy: Next Steps for the SEE Project.

The SEE bulletin is the only publication entirely dedicated to exploring matters related to design policies and programmes for design support. It is published by Design Wales, lead partner of the SEE project and is distributed to over 60 countries.

SEE is a network of 11 European partners exploring how to integrate design into regional and national innovation policies. The project is co-financed by the European Regional Development Fund through the INTERREG IVC programme. An electronic copy of the bulletin is available to download from the SEE website: www.seeproject.org/publications.

Commission announces Leadership Board for the European Design Innovation Initiative

2011-06-13T07:10:00.000-07:00

After much speculation, the European Commission has announced the 15 members of the European Design Innovation Initiative (EDII):

- BEDA - Bureau of European Design Associations - Deborah Dawton, President
- UEAPME – European Association of craft, small and medium-sized enterprises represented by Gerin Trautenberger, Vice-President of Austrian creative Industries - member of UEAPME
- TAFTIE – the European Network of Innovation Agencies - represented by Andrea Siodmok, Technology Strategy Board - member of TAFTIE
- German Design Council, Andrej Kupetz, Chief Executive Officer
- Barcelona Design Center, Isabel Roig, Directora general
- Hungarian Design Council, Dr. Miklós Bendzsel, Chairman
- Christian Bason, MindLab Copenhagen
- Giovanni Antonio Cocco, Managing Director ISNART S.c.p.A, Istituto Nazionale Ricerche Turistiche
- Rachel Cooper, Professor of Design management, Chair of Lancaster Institute for the Contemporary Arts and Chair of Imagination Lancaster
- Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo, Chairman of the Committee supporting World Design Capital Helsinki 2012; former President and CEO of Nokia Corporation
- Stefano Marzano, Chief Creative Director, Philips Design
- Klemens Rossnagel, responsible for Design Research Audi Group
- Livia Tirone, TIRONE NUNES, Founder of TIRONES NUNES dedicated to designing and promoting "bio-climatic" & "sustainable buildings"
- Roberto Verganti, Visiting Professor in Copenhagen Business School, Department of Management, Politics and Philosophy and Professor in Politecnico di Milano
- Thierry Wasser, Perfumer, Guerlain

The EDII was launched in 2011 by the European Commission as part of the Europe 2020 strategy Innovation Union.

The EDII aims to:
- Raise the awareness of design as a driver of innovation in Europe
- Enhance its role as a key discipline to bring ideas to market transforming them into user-friendly and appealing products, processes or services by enterprises and public services in the EU.

The Board, the Secretariat (Aalto University – Finland) and the European Commission will work together to develop a joint vision to better integrate design into innovation policy.

The first meeting of the Leadership Board took place on 27th May 2011 in Helsinki; Deborah Dawton, BEDA President attended and reports:
“The significance of design in European innovation policy is now established. With 46 organisational members in 23 Member States, BEDA is delighted that its lobbying over the past decade has encouraged the Commission to integrate design as a key driver for Europe’s competitiveness and innovation. The policy is now converting to action and BEDA looks forward to playing a full and active role on the European Design Leadership Board as it continues in its task.”

Service design event scores in Cardiff

2011-05-26T06:25:00.000-07:00

Left to right: Paul Thurston (Design Wales), Hugo Raaijmakers (Philips), Mark Hartvelt (Philips), Andie Mudie (Nuaire), Phil Morgan (Aggrelek), Gavin Cawood (Design Wales)

The Design Wales Service Design Programme held a succesfull event at the end of last week with 80 delegates registered to take advantage of the excellent facilities at the Cardiff City football ground.

With an emphasis on demonstarting how manufacturing companies can realise the benefits of moving from being simply product led to understanding the needs of their end users in the form of developing innovative services, the event included a key note presentation from Philips Design alongside Nuaire of Caerphilly and Aggrelek of Swansea.

Philips Design employ over 450 designers and engineers in studios around the World, primarily serving the product design and innovation needs of Phillips and its key partners. Established almost a century ago Phillips have grown as an innovative but product/manufacturing-led business, but over the last 30 months they have been undertaking a process of cultural change (led by the most senior management) to shift towards a greater service-led approach that is transforming their business model and broadening opportunities as they explore working with new partners and exploit developments in communications technology.

The presentation by was given by Hugo Raaijmakers (Creative Director for Service Deisgn) and Mark Hartvelt (New Business Director), both based in Amsterdam, who have been given the task of integrating this new approach into Philips. The story of how Philips are progressing towards being much more service-led in their drive to deliver innovative offerings to their end users has not necesarily moved them away from being manufacturers but changed fundamentally how they work with external partners, make use of existing and emerging communications platforms and where value can be found in their business models. Rather than being a threat to manufacturing, seeing how such an established business are shifting towards being more service-led should act as an inspiration for how the sector can find long-term sustainability.

How such a shift is possible in a small and a medium sized business was demonstrated by complimentary presentations from Phil Morgan (MD) of Aggrelek and Andy Mudie (Marketing Director) of Nuaire. Aggrelek and Nuaire are two of “The 90” businesses the Service Design Programme are seeking to work with over the three years in order to help build upon their manufacturing expertise by raising awareness and application of service design.

Design Welcomes French intern

2011-05-26T05:53:00.000-07:00

On the 23 of May a French student of Brittany, Maryline Danielou joined Design Wales for 6 weeks to do a work placement as part of her 2 year-course of Personal Assistant. Before it she studied for one year English at the Quimper's University.

Maryline will help with administration on the Service Design Programme and with the running of the Design Wales Forum.

In 2004 an agreement (The Memorandum of Understanding) was signed between Welsh First Minister and President of Regional Council of Brittany. The MoU was to explore how Wales and Brittany can work together in the 21st Century. These two regions have many things in common; they are Celtic peoples on the West of France and Great Britain and they each have also around 3 million people.

Moving From Products To Services with Philips, Nuaire and Aggrelek

2011-04-26T08:38:00.000-07:00

Design Wales Service Programme will bring leading industry voices to Wales, the first of our keynote events is due to take place in May and focuses on companies that have shifted from being product focused to service focused.

Book your tickets now: www.fromproductstoservices.eventbrite.com

The event will also showcase examples of great service design within Welsh industry through two manufacturers that have already joined The 90 companies that care about good quality service.

Three questions on design policy for the Philippines.

2011-03-15T14:20:00.000-07:00

Tonight (15th March) we were able to contribute to an event taking place in the Philippines called: The State of Philippine Design.
In preparation the event organiser, Brian Tenorio, asked us three questions about design policy. Rather than fly out there we were able to make a short film that he could edit for the event.

The three questions he asked were:

1. Would you think that having a Design Policy -- or design policies -- in a developing country such as the Philippines help in National Development? If yes, how?
2. What are the special concerns in Design Policy Initiatives and Formation that may be specific to Developing Countries (and, even more specifically, the Philippines)?
3. What advice can you give to the different representatives from the design industries, academe, government trade offices, and businesses present in this forum regarding Design Policy work? Regarding Design as a tool for National Development? Regarding Design as a provider of sustainable strategic advantage for a country?

You can find a raw version of the film on you-tube (its about about 14 minutes long so grab a coffee before you start).

The Service Design Programme...for designers

2011-02-17T01:40:00.000-08:00

The Service Design Programme is a new package of support for the creative industries in Wales.

So, what is service design and why does it matter to you?
Well, it matters because we live in a service economy. 66% GVA comes from this sector in Wales compared with 32% from manufacturing. Services are all around us, they play key roles in our lives and generally they aren't designed very well.

But it matters to you because whether you're a freelancer, artist, designer, or run your own design company then you're a service provider. Start by asking yourself these questions; What is the quality of your service like? What do clients say about your service (not your work)? Do clients buy from you more than once?

Service design is a process and set of methods, tools and approaches that can help you answer all of these questions and help you design a better service for your business and your clients.

Design Wales have been funded by the Welsh Assembly Government to provide support and training to businesses that want to innovate their existing services or develop completely new services. Paul Thurston, who leads the programme says "It's come about due to combination of two factors, firstly the growth in the practice of service design across Europe and secondly, the need for companies to think beyond the products they produce and start thinking about the service they provide".

Get involved with the programme
The 'Service Design / For Designers' training programme will launch later this Spring and we are currently looking for 6 Welsh companies from the creative industries to apply for the 6-month course. More information will be available by the end of March but if you would like to register your interest now we will let you know as soon as the application process is open. To do this please email: pthurston@designwales.org

Find out more
These upcoming events will introduce you to the core principles of service design.

Breakfast Seminar
Swansea on 23rd March
Book your place now

Breakfast Seminar
Conwy on 8th April
Book your place now

Policy, Innovation & Design Conference

2011-02-07T09:25:00.001-08:00

The SEE project, led by Design Wales, is a network of 11 European design organisations engaging with regional and national government to integrate design into policy, particularly innovation policy. The project runs from September 2008 to June 2011, co-financed by the European Regional Development Fund through the INTERREG IVC programme.

This conference is the project’s final event and aims to provide delegates with an overview of design’s role in innovation, recent design policy developments in Europe, examples of successful design policies and promotion programmes. The programme will be opened by Polish MEP, Jan Olbrycht with reflections on design as part of the Europe 2020 strategy. Other highlights from the conference include:

Design as part of innovation policy in a global context

Gavin Cawood / Operations Director, Design Wales

Making design policy happen in Denmark: the journey since 1997

Anders Byriel / CEO of Kvadrat, Chairman, Danish Design Council

Innovate and integrate: Design support for companies in New Zealand

Judith Thompson / Director, Better by Design

Design policy in practice: innovative strategies for local authorities in Flanders

Patrick Janssens / Mayor of Antwerp

Jan Van Alsenoy / Association of Flemish Cities and Municipalities

Design as a Government capability

Bryan Boyer / Strategic Design Lead, SITRA – the Finnish Innovation Fund

EU Design and Innovation Initiative: What’s next for design in Europe?

Christine Simon / European Commission DG Enterprise and Industry

During the day, the SEE project lead partner, Design Wales, will briefly present the project’s achievements over the last three years, we will screen 11 short films about design policy developments in the SEE partner countries and delegates will receive the ‘Service Design Toolkit’.

This is a free event but delegates are required to register. The programme, logistics and registration can be found at www.belgiandesignforum.be

SEE bulletin 5 out now!

2011-01-26T04:55:00.000-08:00

With ‘Innovation Union’ at the heart of the ‘Europe 2020’ strategy, design has been highlighted as a means to achieve ‘smart, sustainable and inclusive growth’ in Europe. This is part of a growing trend around the world where design is climbing up the policy agenda as reported in SEE bulletin issue 5.

The research article is from our Finnish partner – the Global Design Watch 2010 reveals how design is more in evidence in policy and programmes across the globe. We also present special reports on how design is part of China’s drive to become an innovative economy as well as how the SEE project has been examining ‘next’ practice in design support programmes in Estonia. Our case studies highlight the Polish business support programme ‘Design Your Profit’ and the Scottish ‘Centre for Design and Innovation’. We also provide an update on EU design-related policy developments.

The SEE bulletin is the only publication entirely dedicated to exploring matters related to design policies and programmes for design support. It is published by Design Wales, lead partner of the SEE project and is distributed to over 60 countries.

SEE is a network of 11 European partners exploring how to integrate design into regional and national innovation policies. The project is co-financed by the European Regional Development Fund through the INTERREG IVC programme. An electronic copy of the bulletin is available to download from the SEE website: www.seeproject.org/publications.

We would also like to take this opportunity to invite you to the SEE project’s final conference to take place on 29 March 2011 in the Flemish Parliament, Brussels. For more information and to register for this free event visit: www.belgiandesignforum.be

SEE Policy Booklet 3 'Evaluating Design' is launched

2010-12-03T04:45:00.001-08:00

The SEE project, led by Design Wales, has just published Policy Booklet 3 entitled 'Evaluating Design: Understanding the Return on Investment in Companies, National Industry, Programmes & Policies, Economy & Society'.

A lack of knowledge and tools to evaluate the rate of return on design investment is often cited as a severe barrier to advancing the understanding of design’s value among policy-makers and civil servants. With design firmly on the European political agenda as part of the strategy ‘Innovation Union’, policy-makers across Europe will be looking at how design can meet challenges in industry, services and society. However, without insight on evaluating design and its strengths compared with other disciplines, we risk missing key opportunities for consolidating the contribution of design to competitiveness and social innovation in our regions.

This third SEE Policy Booklet provides an overview of current practice in design evaluation and identifies actions to improve these methods. The Policy Booklet notes that there are several different dimensions that must be taken into consideration when investigating design evaluation, which should include micro and macro levels in both the private and public sectors. :Each section of the booklet discusses a different dimension of this framework, exploring how design can be evaluated in different contexts and providing illustrative case studies. The four sections are:

1. Return on investment in design for individual companies

2. Return on investment in design in national industry

3. Return on investment of public funds in design programmes or policies

4. Role of design and its impact on the national economy and society.

This publication is one of the outputs of the SEE project, a network of eleven European partners engaging with European, national and regional governments to integrate design into public policy. The project is co-financed by the European Regional Development Fund through the INTERREG IVC programme. This is the third of four SEE Policy Booklets to be published between 2009 and 2011. An electronic copy of the booklet is available to download from the SEE website: www.seeproject.org/publications. If you would like to receive future SEE Policy Booklets please email info@seeproject.org.

Petition Design for Innovation in Wales is accepted by the National Assembly's Petitions Committee

2010-11-18T05:51:00.000-08:00

Thanks for all of your support in signing the Petition Design for Innovation in Wales. The petition closed on Friday 12^th November with 369 signatures.

On the 16^th November it was reviewed and accepted by the National Assembly's Petitions Committee. As result, the petition was referred to the Deputy Minister for Science, Innovation and Skills Lesley Griffiths AM for her view about further action.

The focus of the petition was also described as ‘interesting’ by Veronica German AM, who also proposed a second action to establish who else in the Welsh Assembly could address the issues raised in relation to ‘social enterprise and new ways to deliver public services’.

On the 17^th November, the Design Wales team met with Andrew Rt Davies AM, member of the Petitions Committee, to reinforce our recommendations and to discuss how we can ensure the momentum we have created can be sustained and lead to a greater commitment to design by the Welsh Assembly. (photo by Darragh Murphy)

Design Wales wants to raise the profile of design ahead of next May’s elections and ultimately aims to see the assembly members form a cross-party group for design and innovation in Wales.

We would like to thank once again all the endorsers of the Manifesto and individuals who have signed the petition. The manifesto would not have been possible without the SEE project, a network of 11 European partners, co-funded by the European Regional Development Fund through the INTERREG IVC programme.

To learn more and to download the Manifesto ‘Design for Innovation in Wales: Industry, Services & Society’, visit: http://www.designwales.org/pages/manifesto.htm

4th design policy workshop takes place in Poland

2010-11-08T11:10:00.000-08:00

On the 4th and 5th November Design Wales took part in the latest thematic workshop involving the 11 SEE Project partners and their regional government representatives in Cieszyn in Southern Poland.

Opening address by Polish MEP Jan Olbrycht.

Hosted by the Silesian Castle of Art & Enterprise the theme was “Bringing innovative ideas to the market more quickly” and combined presentations from leading European innovation programmes as well as hands-on workshop sessions for the partners and their government representatives.

SEEProject steering group meeting.

Facilitated by Alexander Grots of Gravity Europe (Germany) the presentations of current design/innovation intervention programmes included; Jonathan Ball, Design Council (UK); Sergey Dmitriev, Sea Xray AS (Norway) and Sami Heikkinemi, Tekes (Finland). The first day concluded with a presentation by Aron Losonczi, founder of the company Litracon (Hungary) who have brought an innovative and award winning product to market in the form of concrete that allows light to travel through it via thousands of fibre optic cables or plastic rods moulded into to it.

Litracon - see-through concrete

The second day of workshops saw the partners unfolding in some detail various case studies of how design has played a role in bringing innovations to market, the development process that might have been followed and the part that government intervention can play in possibly improving this.

The workshop sessions taking place in the old castle stables.

The key output of the workshop will be a policy guideline booklet intended to inform policy makers but available to all via the SEEProject website early next year. SEE is co-financed by ERDF through the INTERREG IVC programme.

SEE bulletin 4 now available!

2010-10-28T01:43:00.000-07:00

The SEE project, led by Design Wales, has just launched the fourth edition of the SEE bulletin, the only publication entirely dedicated to discussing design and innovation policies and programmes across Europe and beyond.

Over the course of the SEE project, we have observed how the use of design has been evolving. More and more, we are seeing that design approaches are not only being applied to product development, manufacturing and technology, but to a growing array of other domains such as the public sector, social innovation and sustainability projects. This edition delves a bit deeper into how design techniques are being applied to specialist scenarios such as peace and security.

This issue includes:

Research: Designing Programmes in Contexts of Peace and Security – Derek B Miller, Lisa Rudnick (United Nations Institute for Disarmament Research) and Lucy Kimbell (Saïd Business School, Oxford University).
Interviews: Design Policy and Promotion Map with insights from Chile, Croatia, India and South Africa.
Research: National Design Systems – Dr Gisele Raulik-Murphy (Design Wales, UWIC).
Case Study: Design Advisory Service (Canada).
Special Report: SEE Project Activities and Results.
SEE Library: papers and documents related to design and innovation policies.
Design Policy Conference: SEE project final conference will be held on 29 March 2011.

SEE bulletins are distributed to over 60 countries around the world and are available to download from www.seeproject.org/publications.

Don't forget we are still collecting signatures for the petition 'Design for Innovation in Wales', which is an output of the SEE project. Your signature is very important in generating attention at political level. To sign visit www.designwales.org.

SEE is a network of 11 European partners exploring how to integrate design into policy. The project is co-financed by the European Regional Development Fund through the INTERREG IVC programme. If you would like to receive SEE communication in the future please email us at info@seeproject.org

"Coup for design in Wales".

2010-10-20T05:40:00.000-07:00

Our recent actions to raise the profile of design at a political level in Wales have caught the attention of the Associate Parliamentary Design and Innovation Group (APDIG) in Westminster. The APDIG Group Manager, Jocelyn Bailey, drafted a thorough and sharp critical appraisal of whats happening here in Wales for their October Newsletter, describing the full context of the recent unanimous vote for design in the Senedd during a debate about innovation.

Read the whole article via: http://www.policyconnect.org.uk/apdig/coup-design-wales

Remember; you can still join in the campaign by signing our e-petition via:
Saesneg / English:
http://www.assemblywales.org/gethome/e-petitions/sign-petition.htm

Cymraeg / Welsh:
http://www.cynulliadcymru.org/gethome/e-petitions/sign-petition.htm

Manifesto Launched - Petition on-line

2010-10-15T05:21:00.000-07:00

Last night saw the launch of our Manifesto for design innovation in Wales at the Pierhead Building in Cardiff Bay. In parallel with this we also announced our intention to compile a petition that follows the same themes - this is now available to sign on-line.

The wording of what we are petitioning for follows a standard/approved format and is as follows:

We call upon the National Assembly for Wales to urge the Welsh Assembly Government to consider the potential significant role for design in future innovation, public service and social enterprise policies and programmes. This is in the light of increased commitment to design agenda by other nations around the world and in preparation for a new Innovation Policy due to be published by the European Commission. This imminent new policy is likely to include a broader definition of innovation that embraces services in the public & private sectors and social enterprise on equal terms with traditional research and development (R&D).

There is also some background information.

You can following the link below to sign the petition:

Saesneg / English:
http://www.assemblywales.org/gethome/e-petitions/sign-petition.htm

Cymraeg / Welsh:
http://www.cynulliadcymru.org/gethome/e-petitions/sign-petition.htm

There are two possible outcomes - an official enquiry (which will not happen in this case) or individual AMs will be encouraged to find out more and get involved - which is what we want- with some of them hopefully coming together to form a Cross-Party Group for design innovation to keep it on the political agenda.

The petition closes on the 12th November.
Please forward this anyone you think might be interested.

Design on the political agenda

2010-10-11T03:11:00.000-07:00

Our Design Manifesto - set for launch on 14th October.

This year the Cardiff Design Festival is not only about celebrating design, there’s a political dimension too. On 14 October, Design Wales is launching its Manifesto ‘Design for Innovation in Wales: Industry, Services and Society’ in the Pierhead Building, Cardiff Bay. The manifesto is an output of the SEE project, a network of 11 European partners, co-financed by ERDF through the INTERREG IVC programme.

The manifesto aims to secure design’s place on the Welsh political agenda ahead of the National Assembly elections in May 2011. It calls for Assembly Members to establish a cross-party group for design and innovation to champion the benefits of good design. It presents the rationale for the Assembly to act upon regional design resources and take advantage of design strategies for adding value to industry, services and society. It describes case studies for fostering innovation in companies using design processes, for creating more effective services (both private and public) and for using design for social innovation and promoting an inclusive society.

The manifesto has been endorsed by a number of international, national and Welsh organisations including among others the Bureau of European Design Associations (BEDA), UK Design Council, Creative and Cultural Skills, South Wales Chamber of Commerce, Institute of Welsh Affairs, University of Wales Institute, Cardiff, University of Wales Newport, Swansea Metropolitan University, EcoDesign Centre, Design Commission for Wales and Wales Quality Centre.

The document has already attracted significant political attention. On 5 October, the manifesto and design was raised in plenary session in a debate on innovation. Mark Isherwood Conservative Welsh Assembly Member quoted the manifesto saying that “Wales needs to step up to the mark and harness the power of design for innovation. If our nation is to create user-centred services, embrace social innovation and excel as a competitive economy, the Welsh Assembly Government must act now”.

Mark Isherwood AM

A Welsh Assembly Government report entitled ‘Economic Renewal: a new direction’ has been published on innovation and in a motion that ‘Welcomed the steps taken by the Welsh Assembly Government to encourage world-class research and development’ an amendment to include design was unanimously approved. Lesley Griffiths, Deputy Minister for Science, Innovation and Skills stated “the UK has a strong reputation for design excellence, and Wales should develop its own design expertise”.

Gavin Cawood, Operations Director for Design Wales said; “The Welsh Assembly has been consistent in supporting the use of design by industry since 1994, but this new development is a major step in placing design on the political agenda and sets the foundation for design to find a key role in improving public services and supporting design beyond the constraints of traditional R&D”.

New Service Design Programme for Wales

2010-10-11T00:42:00.000-07:00

Design Wales have always been supporters of new approaches to design; so when service design first came into prominence we were right there to support it. Our first foray into this emerging sector took the form of a document called 'Design Matters; Design For Service' which was published in September 2008. The document explored some of the trends at that time and presented a two case studies from Max Bank and The Baltic.

Design Wales also worked with Engine Service Design to produce a document called Design For Service, this was a much more detailed look into how service could benefit SME's in Wales, the three vision case studies are particularly useful for any business looking into service design.

The next stage of work has just started with Design Wales sucessfully proposing to the Welsh Assembly Government that they deliver a service design support programme - focussed on supporting he use of service design in industry as well trying to develop a strong cluster of regional expertise. It's a very exciting piece of work and a programme that will benefit Welsh Design and wider industry in the form of jobs, the economy and the international reputation of these sectors.

Personally I’m really pleased to see such a progressive move from the Welsh Assembly Government and look forward to working towards an internationally recognised hub of service design excellence here in Wales.

If you would like to find out more about the programme then have a look at our web page or follow @SD_Wales on twitter.

Service Design Network

2010-10-05T07:10:00.000-07:00

Design Wales are excited to be attending the service design network conference in Berlin next week. The annual meet up of service design practitioners, agencies and academics has been growing every year and you can see pictures and videos of last years event on: www.service-design-network.org

We look forward to sharing our new Service Design Programme with the wider community and hearing about the latest work from around the world.

PechaKucha Cardiff - Oct 7th

2010-09-24T02:53:00.000-07:00

The next PechaKucha event organised by Lou Cameron takes place on the 7th October at Chapter.

Presenters include:

Richard Weston, "Ammonites to digital delight."
Richard Huw Morgan, "Croeso i Gymry/u Fwyaf!"
Ric Bower, "Did you ever Start Something."
Guto Evans, "Brand shit."
Corinne Thompson, "Flutterbugs - My creative journey."
Theo Humphries, "Crapestry."
Dr. Ben Evans, "Bloodhound, 1,000mph car."
Orkid Studio, OrkStudio: Shelter for the Soul."
Huw James "Science and sport - A relationship of two halves."
Jon Chase "Life - An autobiography."

Check out the e-flyer and pass it around. You will need to register for free tickets at www.inklingcreative.co.uk

Colour and Trend Event A/W 2011/12

2010-09-06T01:57:00.001-07:00

Booking Now Open!

Design Wales Forum Presents
Colour and Trend Event A/W 2011/12

October 2010 sees the return of Design Wales’ much missed colour and trend event. Presented by Jaana Jatyri CEO of Trendstop, the event will cover the A/W season 2011/12. The inspirations behind the trends and their practical application will be covered.

The event will feature a round up of the developments in the fashion and textile sectors in Wales in the past year. If you have any developments/ awards/ facilities you would like others to use/ in your business, organisation or network and you would like to share them with your peers, please forward the information to Victoria Jones at vjones@designwalesforum.org

who should attend: fashion, textiles, product and graphic designers
date:15th October 2010
venue:Central Cardiff
cost: £50 (including lunch)

To secure a place contact Victoria Jones on 02920 417 018

Design for Innovation in Wales Manifesto

2010-08-20T07:08:00.000-07:00

Design Wales is currently preparing a manifesto entitled Design for Innovation in Wales: Industry, Services and Society. It presents the rationale for the Welsh Assembly Government to act upon regional design resources and take advantage of design strategies for adding value to industry, services and society. It describes case studies for fostering innovation in companies using design processes, for creating more effective services (both public and private) and for using design for social innovation and promoting an inclusive society. The manifesto aims to secure design’s place on the Welsh political agenda and establish a cross-party group for design and innovation to champion the benefits of effective design.

The manifesto will be launched during the Cardiff Design Festival on 14 October 2010 in the Pierhead building next to the National Assembly for Wales.

DME Award 2010- open for entries.

2010-07-26T02:16:00.000-07:00

The only award dedicated to the management of design, the DME Award, is now open for its fourth edition. Previous winners of the DME Award including Virgin Atlantic, NHS, Festo, Decathlon, Senz Umbrellas, Roca and EDF all represent highly innovative organisations where design plays an integral part of their strategy and operation. This year the award will be located in Lisbon and represents a new era of the DME Award.
Wales, through PDR at UWIC, has and continues to play a significant role in developing the DME Award, coordinating the judging process and hosting the award ceremony in Cardiff back in 2008 (with the Welsh Assembly First Minister openning the event) and providing technical expertise for this years award.
Companies and organisations wishing to enter the DME Award 2010 should visit: www.designmanagementeurope.com
Welsh companies have found success in the DME Awards, including; Nomad Wheelchairs, Performance Health Products, Thrislington Cubicles and Sobor.

Practical insight to design careers from the DESIGN WALES FORUM

2010-07-23T01:34:00.000-07:00

The audience.

Professional "mingling" after the interviews.

The panel.

We’ve been receiving great feedback about the Design Wales Forum event we held earlier this week (20th July) at the Wales Millennium Centre.

"Help I’m a graduating designer…what do I do next"? brought together a panel of established creative professionals from the design sector in Wales to talk about their career paths since graduation to provide insight to those just finishing their degree. The panel revealed their personal stories whilst being interviewed, chat-show style, by Design Wales Forum Coordinator Victoria Jones. If there were common threads about how their creative careers had developed, it was probably in maintaining a singular focus and desire to work in the creative sector. This along with making sure they were ready to take advantage of every opportunity they came across – which frequently came from unexpected places and had results they could never have foreseen.

After a rapid 90 minutes of interviews the audience, panel and Design Wales team were encouraged to “mingle”, swapping contact details and exchanging ideas – because you never know where your next opportunity or even a possible business partner might come from!

We have to thank the panel for their time and being prepared to tell their personal professional stories. They were:

Felicity Sawkins (fashion)
http://www.tinkersinfinity.com/,

Carla Reynolds (ceramics and creative business advice),

Dominic Eggbeer (product design and research)
http://www.pdronline.co.uk/whatwedo_research.php,

Tim Harling (graphic design)
http://www.keepdesigntidy.com/,

Kate Vaughan (copywriter)
http://www.the-proofreader.co.uk/
http://www.blindspotdesign.co.uk,

Ollie Wells, (interactive media)
http://www.sequence.co.uk/,

Emma Luczyn (interactive media)
http://www.sequence.co.uk/.

This event was a partnership between the Design Wales Forum and the Wales Millennium Centre, who expertly provided the venue, sound engineer and house staff.

SEE nominated for RegioStars award!

2010-07-21T04:13:00.000-07:00

The SEE project, led by Design Wales, has been nominated for RegioStars – the awards for regional innovative projects.

SEE is a network of 11 European partners sharing knowledge and experience on how design can be integrated into regional and national policies to boost innovation, sustainability, social and economic development. The aim of SEE is to pool knowledge, share experiences, stimulate debate, develop new thinking and build rapport and credibility in order to influence policy at regional and national levels to integrate design. The project’s ultimate goal is to integrate design into innovation policies. This work is focused on creating better conditions for SMEs to operate, developing innovation and making use of design resources.

‘The objective of the RegioStars Awards is to identify good practices in regional development and to highlight original and innovative projects which could be attractive and inspiring to other regions.’ We were invited to submit an application under the category ‘networking initiatives supporting regional growth and SMEs’, stating how far our project objectives have been met, the strategic context of the project, highlighting the innovative character of the project and the impact.

Our objective to ‘compare strategies and delivery of design support programmes, in particular those related to the development of innovative products and services’ directly links to the project’s impact on SMEs. During SEE’s lifespan there has been a continuous debate about good practices to deliver design support for SMEs, an activity all partners undertake in their regions. The next project workshop (November 2010) will focus on support programmes for SMEs, in addressing a route to market for their innovative ideas. Concrete results are expected from the exchange of experiences/policy recommendations drawn from the workshop. Results so far have been incremental, as result of the exchange of experiences.

We will keep you informed of our progress in the application process….

SEE Policy Booklet 2 now available in French

2010-07-21T03:52:00.000-07:00

The second SEE Policy Booklet is now available to download in French from the SEE website.

As part of SEE’s efforts to engage with government representatives and policy-makers to integrate design into policy across Europe, we are publishing four SEE Policy Booklets between 2008 and 2011. The first, Integrating Design into Regional Innovation Policy, was published in November 2009. The second, Realising Sustainability and Innovation through Design: Making it Happen in Communities, Industry, Public Sector and Policy-Making, has just been released. Both booklets outline the rationale behind policy intervention, explore how design can be employed to realise innovation and sustainability, provide illustrative case studies and put forward policy proposals.

To download a copy visit: www.seeproject.org/publications

Design Wales Forum and the Wales Millennium Centre Present....

2010-07-02T08:48:00.000-07:00

Help I’m a Graduating Designer… What Do I Do Next?
After all the stress and activity of finishing your degree… you begin to realise that you have to think about what you are going to do next. Should you get a job? Start a business? Study further? There are a myriad of possible paths to take and decisions to make… it can all be a bit bewildering. You are not the only new designer to have gone through this…
We have invited a panel of designers from different disciplines and other creatives to share their experiences of what happened to them after they graduated, and what they did next. This chat show style event will also include an opportunity for you to ask questions of them yourself.
This FREE event would be useful for recent design and other creative graduates. For further details and to book a place email vjones@designwalesforum.org / 02920 417 018
Date: 20th of July 2010
Time: 6:30pm – 8:30pm
Venue: Wales Millennium Centre

International response to launch of the second SEE policy booklet

2010-06-28T03:03:00.000-07:00

We have had a great response to the launch of the latest SEEProject Policy booklet from leading design organisations around the World. The European Commission, ICSID, BEDA and the New York University Design Department have all highlighted the latest booklet in their on-line news feeds.

The SEEProject is intended to help our understanding of the role design can play in realising regional and national innovation regional policy. The most recent booklet aimed at policy makers is entitled Realising Sustainability and Innovation through Design and can be found on the SEEProject website along with other resources.

Design Wales are the lead partner for the SEEProject, which is funded by the European Commission through the INTERREG programme.

Design Wales recruiting a Service Designer

2010-06-21T06:01:00.000-07:00

Design Wales are looking for an experienced Service Designer to play a role in the development and delivery of a three-year Service Design programme for industry.
The project has the joint focus of developing capability in Wales whilst raising awareness and uptake of Service Design in wider industry (so increasing regional capacity whilst raising demand).
Design Wales have a strong track record in design support, primarily because of our ability to recruit designers who are interested in using their experience to help industry firstly understand design and then manage its use within the unique context of that particular business - these skills build on what's required of a good designer but have a different emphasis.

The advert above will be in DesignWeek for the next two weeks. The deadline is 5pm on 6th July and an application form can be obtained from www.uwic.ac.uk/jobs

Study visit to Denmark

2010-06-08T06:05:00.000-07:00

Last week (1st & 2nd June) we joined a study visit to Denmark and Sweden to investigate social innovation projects in Copenhagen and Malmo. We were invited along by the organisers La 27e Region who had brought along a large group of French civil servants interested in learning how a wide variety of social issues and public sector services can be addressed through design thinking, collaboration between stakeholders and creative new approaches.

Of particular interest was a workshop undertaken at MindLab in Copenhagen. Funded by three Danish ministerial departments (the Ministry of Economic and Business Affairs, the Ministry of Taxation and the Ministry of Employment), MindLab acts as an innovation unit that engages the public sector, citizens and businesses in creating new solutions for society by providing a physical space and inspiring creativity, innovation and collaboration.

The discussion during the workshop centred on how social innovation might develop in the coming years and the barriers that exist in developing the wider use of more innovative approaches to resolving societal issues - such as the use of language and who has potential ownership of social innovation. The workshop at MindLab included a presentation by You, I and We, who come from an urban design background and have a vision to develop Copenhagen as an international centre for social innovation, leading the rest of Europe.

Whilst in Denmark we took the opportunity to also meet with the Danish Design Centre in Copenhagen (one of our SEEProject partners) and the Healthcare Innovation Centre in Herlev just north of the city to discuss our new service design project (more information to come soon).

La 27eRegion positions itself as a "laboratory of new public policies in the digital age. We want to provide a framework for all those and all those who wish to innovate, experiment with new approaches, and imagine the future of the territories".

Updates from the SEE Project

2010-05-27T04:49:00.000-07:00

May has been a busy month for the SEE project and Design Wales:

- Launched second SEE Policy Booklet – Realising Sustainability and Innovation through Design: Making it Happen in Communities, Industry, Public Sector and Policy-Making.
- Released SEE bulletin issue 3.
- Posted the Design Policy and Promotion Map on the website
- Held third SEE thematic workshop on Evaluating Innovation and Design Policies

Since policies for sustainability and innovation are expected to serve an increasing array of purposes, this second SEE Policy Booklet aims to demonstrate how design can incite a sustainable and innovative mindset among all players in society. For communities, industry, public sector and policy-making the publication outlines the rationale behind policy intervention, explores how design can be employed to realise sustainability and innovation, provides illustrative case studies and puts forward policy proposals.

In this SEE bulletin we have invited Ezio Manzini, Professor of Design at Politecnico di Milano and a leading expert on sustainable design, to contribute the research paper. His article explains social innovation and how design can play a role in this context. Jean Schneider, from the Agence pour la Promotion de la Création Industrielle (APCI), provides a summary of the 7th European Conference on the ‘Challenges of Design Promotion’. The Design Policy and Promotion Programme Map presents interviews from Botswana, Brazil, Kenya, Latvia and Poland. We present two case studies: the Irish programme ‘Innovation by Design’ guided six SMEs through a design approach to understanding client needs and identifying the right ideas to commercialise. The Public Waste Agency of Flanders has launched the Ecolizer 2.0, a smart tool that enables designers to incorporate eco-design into innovative products. Finally, the SEE Library is back again.

To get a global perspective on the growing number and increasing maturity of design policies and promotion programmes, this map presents statements from design practitioners from several countries around the world. Each statement provides us with an overview of the current developments in their country and outlines how design fits into government strategies for fostering innovation. It is now available on the SEE website!

For more information about the SEE workshop visit earlier blog post or the event report.

SEE is a network of eleven European design organisations (co-financed by INTERREG IVC / ERDF) working to integrate design into regional, national and European innovation policy.

Design Wales Presents Innovation Policy Finding at HEI Conference

2010-05-27T04:07:00.000-07:00

Design Wales presented our study on innovation policy conducted as part of the SEE project. As a network of eleven European design organisations (co-financed by INTERREG IVC / ERDF), SEE has been investigating the scope and depth of the European policy provisions for innovation and design.

On 21 May 2010, Design Wales presented ‘Academia-Industry Links in Innovation Policy and the Role of Design’ at the HEI conference at Bradford University.

The aim of the study was to present a review of the current state of innovation policy across Europe with particular emphasis on the growing prevalence of academia-industry link and the role of design.

The rationale behind the study was derived from an observation in October 2009 by Jerzy Buzek, European Parliament President: ‘Europe is aiming to become the leading knowledge-based economy. However, innovation excellence is lost somewhere between R&D and the market.’

The presentation is available here and the results were also presented to the Welsh Assembly representatives in the SEE Policy Booklet also available online.

Design Wales at SEE Project Workshop on Design Policy Evaluation

2010-05-27T02:42:00.000-07:00

On 10 and 11 May 2010, Design Wales and the SEE project partners met for the third SEE workshop in Florence hosted by Consorzio Casa Toscana. The theme for this workshop was Evaluating Design and Innovation Policies. SEE is network of eleven European design organisations co-financed by INTERREG IVC / ERDF.

‘If you cannot measure it, you cannot improve it.’
Lord Kelvin, Worldwide Governance Indicators brochure

We had a very intense two days discussing a topic that many design practitioners and even policy-makers do not reflect upon enough. At a time when design is gaining recognition at policy levels across Europe the question of evaluation has become vitally important.

Despite the volcanic ash, all eleven SEE partners attended the event and most were accompanied by a regional government representative although unfortunately two of the speakers’ flights were grounded. Nevertheless, the discussions addressed crucial questions such as:

‘what are the challenges in evaluating policies on design and innovation?’,
‘what information do governments require to inform policy-making?’ and
‘what lessons can be learned from our experiences as design practitioners and government representatives?’

All presentations available on the SEE project website.

On the second day, the SEE partners and government representatives participated in an interactive session to discuss the ideas from the previous day and propose tools to assess and evaluate the impact of design and innovation policies. This part of the workshop was facilitated by FUTOUR using their novel Digital Mosaic tool.

Participants were invited to discuss a number of key issues relating to the workshop objectives in small groups. Each group was provided with a keyboard that allowed emerging ideas to be instantaneously visible on a large screen. The issues discussed centred on how to evaluate the impact of design-based programmes and the rationale for government support in this domain. For each issue that was discussed there was a summing up so that the groups could identify the emerging patterns, key words, insights and piggy-back off each other’s suggestions.

In the afternoon, the groups participated in a scenario building exercise designed to get everyone to reflect on how to improve current practices in evaluation. The groups had to complete six tasks: identifying a research questions, choosing a methodology, investigating indicators, collecting data, presenting arguments and disseminating results.

The findings from this workshop will be presented in the third SEE Policy Booklet due in September 2010.

Design to be championed in new EU innovation policy

2010-05-18T04:08:00.000-07:00

Design Wales is keenly following EU innovation policy developments in the European Commission. EurActiv recently interviewed the EU Innovation Commissioner Máire Geoghegan-Quinn, who stated that the new EU innovation policy due this autumn will be ‘fundamentally different’ to the previous policy. More significantly the scope of EU innovation policy will broaden from the conventional drivers of innovation: R&D, technology and product development, to include a strategic role for social innovation, industrial policy and DESIGN.

When the responsibility for drafting the new document was transferred from Commission DG for Enterprise and Industry to DG Research there were concerns that the progress made by the design lobby in getting design on the agenda would be overlooked. Now it looks like the results of the public consultation will still be incorporated into the new policy although the exact role of design has not been clarified.

To access EurActiv’s interview with EU Innovation Commissioner Máire Geoghegan-Quinn, click here.

Second Pecha Kucha Night for Cardiff

2010-05-13T00:53:00.000-07:00

Following the first successful event last month, Lou Cameron has organised a second, authorised, Pecha Kucha event for Cardiff (with the support of a number of organisations, including Design Wales).
This time around the guest speakers include;
Julian Sykes, Designer, Hoffi
Peter Cox, Blogger
Aisha Morris, Design student
Carl Morris, Sleeveface
Anand George, Restaurateur
Amelia Johnstone, Illustrator
Cormac West, Design student
Paul Thurston, Designer, Thinkpublic
Sarah Featherstone, Architect
Nicholas Whitehead, Spoken word artist
You can register your place in he audience via http://www.inklingcreative.co.uk/

Consultation on Digital Media Centre

2010-05-06T07:08:00.000-07:00

The Welsh Assembly have asked Design Wales to promote a consultation they are undertaking in relation to the potential development of a digital media centre in Cardiff Bay.

You can take part in a five minute questionnaire via www.surveymonkey.com/s/dmcquestionnaire or if you want to find out even more and share ideas about what you think should happen in the building and what types of offices and facilities should be available, they are a holding a workshop on the evening of Monday 17th May in the old Natwest Bank on Bute Street from 6.00 – 7.45 with drinks and light refreshments from 5.30 pm.

Please RSVP if you can make it to Toby Hyam (toby@creativespaceman.com).

On-line Design Directory for Wales

2010-04-20T06:08:00.000-07:00

Wales has a large, capable and diverse design industry. Since 2000 Design Wales has maintained a comprehensive on-line database of design expertise available in Wales so those in the private and public sector can find relevant and local design services.

Much more than a list of contact details the directory allows you to search by region and design discipline and provides vital information to help you find the most relevant design expertise including; principal clients, number of staff and how long they have been established.

This on-line resource can be found at; http://www.designdirectorywales.org/

Design Wales hosts live web debate on design

2010-03-27T08:44:00.000-07:00

On Friday 26th March, Design Wales hosted a viewing of the live Design Council web-cast ‘Design beyond the recession: For better or for worse?’. The event debated three motions before a live audience in London and wider on-line community - totalling more than 600 people - were able to submit their votes.

David Kester (Design Council Chief Executive) introduced the event and Ursula Davies (Research Manager) presented the latest statistics from the UK design industry survey. According to the research, there are 232,000 designers in the UK. 28% of them are freelance (up 39% from 2005) while those in design consultancies and in-house teams each represent 36%. Since 2005, around 40% of consultancies and freelancers report increasing their fee rates compared with 40% who have registered no change. The survey also revealed that only one in ten designers is a member of a regional design network.

The debate centred on three motions:
1. Recessions are good news in disguise for designers
2. Networks are fine but they won’t keep me in business
3. Tighter finances mean more on the job learning and that’s a good thing

While the debates were lively and informative they were ultimately inconclusive as the delegates and spectators agreed that in each case it was not a question of ‘either or’ but ‘a bit of both’. For example, while the necessities of a recession can lead to innovations, at the end of the day design firms need to balance the books and the figures are often stacked against them. Similarly, while networking and regional design networks can create excellent opportunities for meeting new clients and generating new business, all the fundamental business principles still apply and designers need to sell themselves. Again, in the case of training versus on the job learning, participants agreed that a delicate balance between the two was optimal.

With regards to the second motion, Design Wales was able to submit an online question, which was taken up by the panel: If regional design networks are so great, why are only 10% of UK designers members of one? Is it the cost of membership, value for money, lack of awareness of the networks or the quality of the networks on offer? The issue of regional design networks is one that is currently being examined by both Design Wales and the Design Council. Design Wales is in the process of launching a new forum for Wales while the Design Council is trying to identify the priorities for designers in regional networks across the UK.

For each of the three motions, the distribution of the combined votes from the live and remote audiences was approximately 40% for and 60% against. Nevertheless the event was a success. Although the phrasing of the motions came under criticism from the audience in Wales, the concept behind a live design debate across the UK bringing the diverse design disciplines into an animated discussion was a valuable exercise and one which all involved would like to see take place again.

The full report 'Design Industry Research 2010', including a factsheet on Design Businesses in Wales, can be downloaded from here.

PechaKucha Night in Cardiff

2010-03-23T02:30:00.000-07:00

Design Wales are helping to promote the first official PechaKucha night in Cardiff.

Taking place at Chapter in Cardiff on 25th March the line up of 13 speakers with 20 slides shown for a maximum of 20 seconds includes; Michael Johnson of Johnson Banks and Nick Clark of The Partners. You can see the detail on the promotinal poster by visiting the official PechaKucha website.

The night will be webcast live and available on demand a few days later, the link to watch it is http://www.inklingcreative.co.uk/.

Design Evaluation for Public Policy

2010-03-22T09:18:00.000-07:00

On Monday 15th and Tuesday 16th March 2010, Design Wales attended the National School of Government course ‘Evaluating Public Policy and Programmes’ in anticipation of the third SEE workshop. Design Wales is Lead Partner of the SEE Project, a network of eleven design organisations examining how to integrate design into regional policy. SEE is operating from September 2008 to June 2011, co-financed by the European Regional Development Fund through the INTERREG IVC programme. The third SEE workshop will be held in Florence on 10th and 11th May and will focus on ‘Evaluation Tools for Implementing Design Policy’. As Lord Kelvin stated in the Worldwide Governance Indicators brochure, ‘If you cannot measure it, you cannot improve it’. Evaluation is a key stage in the policy cycle, one which is too often overlooked due to lack to resources. The course involved a six stage policy simulation exercise which addressed each step in the process of evaluation for evidence-based policy-making. The course will not only provide input for the thematic workshop but will also provide valuable input for the third SEE Policy Booklet on the same topic. As James Moultrie mentions in the first SEE bulletin, ‘Whilst there is some evidence to demonstrate the value of design to the firm, there are very few studies that have successfully demonstrated the value of design at a regional or national level’. Therefore evaluation is one of many barriers to achieving the SEE objective of integrating design into regional policy. The absence of a pan-European definition for design means that design is hard to measure and if you cannot measure performance, you cannot evaluate its contribution to public policy. Therefore the challenge set for the third SEE workshop will be investigating various tools and methods for evaluating design in a policy context.

Design Wales to host regional debate event.

2010-03-20T01:25:00.000-07:00

On the 26th March between 9:30 and 11am the Design Council are hosting a debate in London that will be available via live webcast. The focus of the event is on design and the economic recession and the questions debated:

Are recessions good news in disguise for designers?
Has the downturn forced designers to value their networks?
Is on-the-job learning better than no learning at all?

And there will be no fence-sitting –at the end of each debate there will be a vote "for" or "against".

Digital design specialist Simon Waterfall is the compere for the morning, calling in the votes not just from the event but from a live webcast audience as well. Speakers locking horns include iconic product designer Tom Dixon, graphics grandee Mike Dempsey and creative industries number cruncher Mandy Merron.

You can register to view and vote from your own computer by visiting: www.designcouncil.org.uk/beyondtherecession

Design Wales are also hosting an event to view the webcast and discuss the issues off-line after the vote. If you would like to attend please e-mail gcawood@designwales.org

Design Wales' SEE Project Quoted in Key Design Procurement Report

2010-03-16T04:31:00.000-07:00

Earlier this month (2nd March) the Associate Parliamentary Design and Innovation Group (APDIG) and Design Business Association (DBA) launched their report Design and the public good: Creativity vs. The Procurement Process in the House of Lords.

The report is the result of a six month inquiry into the procurement of design services by the public sector and includes a reference to our own SEE Project Policy Booklet - Integrating Design into Regional Innovation Policy.

In addition to highlighting the problems from the perspective of the designer the report expertly outlines the potential benefits being missed by the wider public sector through not working effectively with creative services and goes on to propose recommendations in terms of:

Knowledge; to deepen the understanding of the value of design amongst policy makers and buyers.
Skills; to improve the capacity and skills of public sector design and innovation procurers.
Process; to transform the procurement process for design and innovation.

This report makes a lot of sense and wherever possible we will champion the report in the Welsh public sector through our networking and business support activities. If you want to read the report yourself then visit the APDIG website to download your own copy and find out more about wider government-related design and innovation stories.

For more information visit:

SEE invited to European Commission St David's Day celebrations in Brussels

2010-02-24T15:02:00.000-08:00

1st of March is St David’s Day, the national day of Wales. In preparation for the celebrations, the First Minister of Wales, Carwyn Jones AM hosted a reception in Brussels, at the Concert Noble, on the 22nd February.

Design Wales was invited by WEFO, the Welsh European Funding Office, to attend the reception presenting the SEE project. It was an opportunity to discuss the SEE project with Welsh government representatives and European Commission officials.

Brand Essentials, One-to-One workshops.

2010-02-04T01:22:00.000-08:00

We continue to receive enquiries from individuals asking for advice and support about how to develop a brand. To meet this demand we can now offer a half-day workshop tailored for and delivered to individual organisations to help them understand and manage the brand process – building their confidence to define their specific needs and get the most out of working with external design agencies. This impartial advice will help them make the most of the money they invest in what should be their most valuable asset – their brand.

The workshop includes:

A thorough introduction to the brand process.
Discussion on how to define your brand values in relation to the competition.
A framework for specifying your needs via a comprehensive brief.
Guidance on how to find, select and manage the most appropriate external design expertise.
Post-workshop support in interpreting quotes & proposals from prospective design agencies.

Dates: The workshops can be arranged at a time convenient to you.
Location: Cardiff, but all other locations can be arranged.
Cost: £300

We can also run this successful and popular Brand Essentials workshop for groups of companies on behalf of any regional business support organisation in the UK - just ask for details.

SEE bulletin issue 2

2010-02-03T03:39:00.000-08:00

At the end of January 2010, the SEE project launched the second edition of the SEE bulletin, one of six to be published between 2009 and 2011.

In this issue, the research paper is a contribution from Hong Kong by Professor John Heskett. ‘Aspects of Design Policy in History’ traces the evolution of policy from images of identity to economic intervention across ancient civilisations, political regimes to present-day economic doctrines. The article ‘From 2009 to 2010: EU and Regional Design Policy Developments’ is a review of the current state of play in the EU and regional design policy debate, a continuation from the article published in the previous SEE bulletin. We also explore the imperative of modernising policy-making through comparing two different approaches to drafting policy in the US and Denmark. This edition’s case studies feature ‘Good Design Selection’ from Korea as an integral part of the government’s innovation and procurement strategy; and ‘Better by Design’ from New Zealand, a government initiative to expand the country’s economy through the successful application of design to export businesses. Finally, we present a snapshot of world design policy news through interviews from Argentina, Australia, Canada, Costa Rica, Iceland and Qatar.

The SEE bulletin is the only publication entirely dedicated to exploring matters related to design policies and programmes for design support. It is published by Design Wales, lead partner of the SEE project. The SEE bulletin is distributed to 58 countries around the world.

SEE is a network of eleven European partners exploring how to integrate design into regional and national innovation policies. The project is co-financed by the European Regional Development Fund through the INTERREG IVC programme. An electronic copy of the bulletin is available to download from the SEE website: http://seeproject.org/publications. If you would like to receive SEE bulletins in the future please email info@seeproject.org.

SEE visits National Assembly for Wales Senedd

2010-01-30T05:21:00.000-08:00

On 28 January 2010, SEE went on a reconnaissance visit to the National Assembly for Wales Senedd in Cardiff Bay. The objective behind the visit was two-fold. First, to explore the Senedd and surrounding administrative buildings in order to possibly in the future locate a SEE project information stand; and second, to ask questions about plenary proceedings and protocols to meet the SEE project aim of liaising with regional government officials in order to integrate design into public policy.

The tour of the Siambr (debating chamber), Public Gallery, Committee Rooms and Oriel (open public space with views down into the Siambr) provided a good context for our theoretical knowledge of the workings of the Senedd. We also discovered that it is possible to set up exhibitions in this area, which might potentially be an option for the SEE project information stand. The visit was also an opportunity to learn about Assembly agenda-setting - the most valuable nugget of information being the news that a petition or manifesto, signed by at least ten Welsh residents has to considered by one of the Committees.

The building itself is very iconic and inspiring architecturally and symbolically. The most striking features include the four glass walls representative of democratic transparency; the Oriel, a large funnel in the centre reflecting natural light into the Siambr intended to encourage visitors to meet and share ideas; and the technological advancement of the Public Gallery, which enables onlookers to see the voting results of the Plenary sessions in real-time and so experience politics in action. The structure is a showcase of sustainable design as the majority of its building materials were locally sourced and with its ingenious use of renewable energy – natural lighting, innovative ventilation system (the Oriel is the largest wind cowl in Europe) and intriguing earth heat exchange system comprised of 27 boreholds each 100 metres deep.

SEE is a network of 11 European design organisations working to integrate design into innovation policies across Europe. It is co-financed by ERDF / INTERREG IVC. For more information visit www.seeproject.org

7th European Conference on Design Promotion

2010-01-19T03:12:00.000-08:00

The 7th European Conference on Design Promotion was held in Paris on the 10th and 12th January 2010. It was promoted by APCI, the Agence pour la Promotion de la Creation Industrielle.

The two day-conference was inspired by the theme ‘Design: by all?’. Here are some notes:

Opening speech:
- Nabeel Hamdi, Professor emeritus, Oxford Brookes University (author of ‘Small Change'). If in the past participation could be seen as an obstacle to creativity, engaging with society is now a key for change. Designers must act as catalysts, who can understand the citizens’ needs and plan for change. However, how far should we go when we design? What is the least we can do to get the things done? What is the right balance between freedom and intervention?

First day/morning: Which approaches and methods can satisfy many stakeholders and develop successful results?
- Andrea Siodmok, Dott Cornwall (UK): To promote real change you have to immerse yourself in the context. Dott Cornwall addresses sustainability and an inclusive society, in a world that is complex, where the community doesn’t live in the community green anymore. Involving citizens from the very beginning and throughout the process is important in order to build their ownership and engagement in the project.
- Nathalie Arnould, City EcoLab (France): The involvement of citizens, who are believed to be the actors of change in the context of social innovation. International network was emphasised, in both capturing examples of solutions developed for similar problems, as well as sharing the solutions created in France.
- Daniel Mignolet, Habitat et Participation (Belgium): Again, designers can be catalysts and promote the engagement of citizens in the process of change. However, engagement must be developed responsibly, in order to avoid manipulation, and value empowerment (see ‘Ladder of Citizen Participation’ by Sherry Arnstein, 1969).

First day/afternoon: Living labs in rural areas, commitment of institutions – which types of organisations, partnerships and governance are key success factors? This session was chaired and concluded by Gisele Raulik-Murphy, Design Wales Senior Researcher and SEE project coordinator.
- Jesse Marsh, TLL-Sicily (Italy): Living Labs are user-driven open innovation systems based on a partnership between business, citizens and government, which enables participants to take an active part in the research, development and innovation process. This is applied to technology, ICT and communication sectors. The speaker also talked about the role of regional innovation policy and designers in the current context (which has shifted from building infrastructures to building networks). Regions must overcome the slow policy process at EU level, be creative and promote transversal, demand-driven innovation policy. Designers have the role of contributing to policy formulation, innovation transfer and partnerships. Link to the Governance and Innovation social network.

- Salvador Fernandez Marquez, Cudillero Living Lab (Spain): a practical example of a Living Lab, Cudillero shows the use of information technology benefiting the traditional fishing industry.
- Philip Joyce, Newcastle City Council: examples of projects that have engaged citizens in the course of developing Newcastle, reinforcing the differences between engaging citizens and empowering them during this process. Principles underpinning community engagement in Newcastle: fairness and equality, clarity, learning, inclusion, and capacity building.
- Claes Frossen, City Move Interdesign (Sweden): integrating a multidisciplinary team, where design methods are applied to engage the community around an issue of local and international relevance. Project managed by SVID, the Swedish Industrial Design Foundation, model provided by ICSID, the challenge: to move Gellivare (the town and the community) to a new area, in order to avoid the risk of ground collapse due to the mining industry.
- Gisele Raulik-Murphy, Design Wales/SEE project (UK): To what extent the initiatives could be transferred to other contexts? Is it possible to replicate solutions and magnify the results? The contrast of traditional policy-making (top-down approach), and modern policy-making (bottom-up approach), which seeks for examples of good practices to inform evidence-based government policies.

Second day/morning: The management of design in turbulent times.
- Thomas Bertin-Mourot, Quantum Glass (France): despite the economic crises, the company invests in product development and innovation in the field of high technology glass.
- Patrick McGowan, IBM/Lotus (USA): not all the design decisions must be based on statistics and facts; however, the designer must have the data available to argue its decisions, even if it is against the evidence available. Co-design is an important process also in the private industry, in order to generate design awareness, demystification and appreciation: ‘When you involve people you must do it in a constructive manner’.
- Robert Sachon, BSH Bosch (Germany): in times of difficult economy, good brands seem to perform better. Bosch has continued to invest in design, and its position is still on the top of the brand benchmarking tables.
- Darragh Murphy, PDR, Design Management Europe – DME Award (UK): a comparison of design strategies, based on the practice presented by the participants of the Design Management Europe Award 2008, followed by a critical comment of their performance in the last year, facing the economic downturn. ‘Where design is a supportive activity, companies invest in design according to their performance’. ‘Where design is a core activity, companies invest heavily in design to overcome poor performance’.

Second day/afternoon: Recreating society: a new design territory?
- Stephane Vincent, La 27eme region (France): the application of design methods and creative thinking within local authorities in order to address social innovation issues. ‘I’d like designers to work with public authorities but they have to be proactive and work with other professionals’. At national level there is little exploitation of design, because it is seen primarily as a tool for economic development. At regional level there are more opportunities, as design is employed in social innovation.
- Pelle Ehn, University of Malmo (Sweden): from ‘thing=object’ to ‘things=governance’, the issue of systems, where design plays a role in developing solutions for the future use and users.
- Sara de Boer, T+Huis/Caren Weisleder, Kolding School of Design (The Netherlands and Denmark): design thinking to solve social problems, illustrated by a case study from Eindhoven, The Netherlands, where the city council entrusted a social challenge to design students, who delivered promising results in the context of rescuing women from prostitution and street life. Their design brief: to create a service that would promote perceivable improvement in the women’s lives.

Final session:
- Charlotte Arwidi, DG Enterprise and Industry: what the Commission is currently saying about design, the results of the public consultation ‘Design as a driver of user-centred innovation’, and some possible future (promising!) steps for design at EU level.

Shape the Future of Design Networks

2009-12-18T03:50:00.000-08:00

Last week we were asked to contribute to the Design Council-organised event that looked at Design Networks in the UK. The day was divided between presentations from and discussions with the four key National Design Bodies along with representatives from Regional Networks and Regional Support organisations; we provided a short presentation in this last group.

There was quite a lot of discussion about how design networks can be financially sustainable in the future and the role they have for the wider development of the industry. The South Coast Design Forum raised some relevant points in the potential role for such networks as technology allows more creative workers to make a living away from the major cities.

Our presentation focussed on our growth from delivering only design support activities to now also engaging with regional policies that have an impact on how design is utilised and our experience of leading networks, particularly the current European SEE Project and how we make each meeting a meaningful experience for each partner with useful outputs.

Our concluding comments demonstrated our strong opinion that there is a substantial role for design to help realise future economic development policies at a European, national and regional level as the understanding of innovation becomes much broader; the role of the regional design networks is to make sure that those responsible for drafting future policies understand this potential.
Organisations that took part in this Design Council event were;
UK design bodies - DBA, CSD, BDI & D&AD
Regional design networks - South West Design Forum, South Coast Design Forum, Designer Breakfasts.
Regional Support – One North East, Yorkshire Forward, Design Wales.

Managing New Product Development Course launched.

2009-12-10T05:33:00.000-08:00

Early in the New Year Design Wales are to run a 5 day workshop programme entitled The Management of New Product Development in SMEs. This will be run in partnership with the Wales Quality Centre and, for certain sectors of industry, be co-funded by SEMTA (the Sector Skills Council for the manufaturing sector).

The five day-long workshops are intended to introduce a new product development capability to small and medium sized enterprises by providing delegates with the capability and confidence to manage design within their own organisation.

There is much talk about the need for innovation in business and design offers a practical route to making this happen. Delivered only to small groups the course takes a workshop format, using practical exercises to both improve the skills of delegates and ensure the material is directly applicable in each company.

These five days will provide each delegate with the capability to champion design within their company; able to establish an appropriate product development process, be aware of the latest prototyping technology, manage the best external expertise and take control of your brand assets. In short, develop products that are more fit-for-purpose in a shorter time.

The programme will be accredited as a stand-alone module from the University of Wales Institute, Cardiff (UWIC) Integrated Masters Scheme (Master of Design) and those that choose to can gain up to 60 credits of Approved Prior Learning (APL) for joining UWICs MDes or related courses, including those of other institutes.

The dates of the first set of five workshops are; 12th & 22nd February, 8th & 22nd March, 12th April. More dates will follow in the New Year.

For more information contact either gail@walesqualitycentre.org.uk or gcawood@designwales.org

SEE at the European Year of Creativity & Innovation Third Flagship Conference

2009-11-25T07:20:00.000-08:00

2009 is the European Year of Creativity and Innovation (EYCI). As part of this initiative, 27 Ambassadors have been appointed to support the EYCI objective of promoting policy debate on these issues. Last week the Ambassadors published their Manifesto recommending seven lines of action relating to design, education and the knowledge economy. To coincide with this launch, the European Commission Directorate-General for Education and Culture (D-G EAC) organised on 23-24th November, the EYCI Third Flagship Conference ‘Beyond the Crisis: Design for a Sustainable Future’.

Anna Whicher, Design Wales Research Officer, attended this event in order to collate research and best practice examples for the second SEE Policy Booklet ‘Bridging Design, Sustainability and Innovation in Regional Policy’. This is an output of the SEE project, which aims to lobby regional governments to incorporate design into their policy measures. SEE is co-financed by the European Regional Development Fund through the INTERREG IVC programme.

The two-day event was opened by Odile Quintin, D-G EAC, who was keen to encourage horizontal cooperation between several Commission Directorate-Generals in order to bring design up the policy agenda. Highlights from the first day included the speeches from two of the EYCI Ambassadors, Erik Spiekermann, Designer, and Damini Kumar, Design Professor NUI Maynoot, who spoke animatedly about design thinking in diverse contexts.

The conference was also an opportunity for design stakeholders and policy actors to engage with one another. Anna used the event as an occasion to network with Commission officials in order to disseminate the first SEE Policy Booklet ‘Integrating Design into Regional Innovation Policy’.

On the Tuesday, the theme explored design thinking for sustainability in innovative organisations, processes and services. For the second SEE Policy Booklet, the most intriguing presentation was from Anne Stenros, Director of Design at KONE, who discussed design thinking as a “process between analytical and intuitive thinking”. Richard Hill, Managing Partner of EuroPublic, summed up the session by emphasising the need to “brand Europe as the place to create".

The next issue of the SEE bulletin, featuring an article on EU versus regional policy developments relating to design, will be published in January 2010. The second SEE Policy Booklet will be published in March 2010.

SEE Policy Booklet Launch

2009-11-17T03:30:00.000-08:00

On the 9th November 2009, the SEE project launched its first Policy Booklet on Integrating Design into Regional Innovation Policy at the SEE workshop in Copenhagen. SEE is a network of eleven European partners working to lobby our national and regional governments to assimilate design and creativity into public policy. The project is co-financed by the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) through the INTERREG IVC programme.

The SEE Policy Booklet presents an overview of innovation policy priorities in the SEE partner regions. These priorities were identified from national and regional policy documents and contrasted with the strategic priorities for innovation identified by the European Commission. From this comparative analysis six key issues emerged as common across the policy agendas:

- Innovation in Services
- Public Procurement
- Collaborative Clusters & Networks
- Lead Markets & Eco-innovation
- Intellectual Property Rights
- Broadening the Scope of Innovation

For each of these priorities, the SEE Policy Booklet outlines the drivers and obstacles for enhancing the performance of regional innovation policy, explores how design can be used to address the issue, provides illustrative case studies and puts forward policy proposals.

This is the first of four SEE Policy Booklets to be published between 2009 and 2011. An electronic copy of the booklet is available to download from the SEE website: http://seeproject.org/publications. If you would like to receive future SEE Policy Booklets please email info@seeproject.org.

SEE workshop in Copenhagen.

2009-11-11T09:32:00.000-08:00

As lead partners in the SEE network we've spent the last two days in Copenhagen at the Danish Design Centre (one of the other 10 SEE network partners) hearing presentations and working on issues related to design and sustainability.

We realised several years ago that getting partners together to simply listen to speeches is not enough to make a network effective. So to make sure we all engage meaningfully with the issues being discussed we prepare a series of activities for the partners to work through, this time facilitated for us by the Bigger Picture from Denmark; who take an interesting approach to recording the proceedings.

The output from the workshop in Denmark will be a second policy booklet that provides guidance to policy makers on aspects of design related to sustainability. The first SEE policy booklet was launched earlier this month and addresses the link between design and innovation policy.

Helping to develop Design Support in Scotland.

2009-10-27T02:27:00.001-07:00

Design Wales spent yesterday facilitating a workshop for key design stakeholders in Scotland. At the invitation of Scottish Enterprise we prepared a programme of activities for key stakeholders from the public, private and education sectors to explore the potential need, scope and objectives in developing a design support programme for the Scottish Enterprise region.

Scotland has a strong track record in running design related events, festivals and programmes and could have undertaken the workshop themselves; but Design Wales were brought in to initially provide an overview of the state of design support across Europe as a benchmark and then to prepare activities and facilitate a workshop to explore the potential for design support in the region.

The activities provided a framework for broad and in-depth discussion, which was captured on pre-prepared worksheets that will now be reviewed as the basis for a workshop report to be provided to Scottish Enterprise.

With a mixture of classic and modern architecture, Glasgow is always a pleasure to visit and yesterdays mild weather had plenty of people sitting outside cafes enjoying the sun -even if they were still in their coats. Pictured above: Glasgow City Chambers on George Square and the Clyde Arc Bridge.

Award for Design Wales client

2009-10-23T05:08:00.000-07:00

Flying the flag for the UK at last nights Design Management Europe Awards (taking place during the Dutch Design Week in Eindhoven) were two companies based in Wales; Nomad Wheelchairs (Aberaeron) and Contour Premium Aircraft Interiors (Cwmbran). Nomad was awarded the winner of the First time users of design Category and Contour received an honourable mention in the very competitive Large companies Category.
Design Wales has special pride in Nomad’s success for playing instrumental role in assisting in their design strategy. In no small part, the advice given by my former Design Wales colleagues Simon Chaytor, Lucy Richardson and Alan Mumby has been recognised by Jon and Mark Owen of Nomad, as well as the invaluable creative work of Elfen, Attic2 and Studio SDA. The DME Award is the first Award gained by Nomad since the two brothers started to work together on developing a new and desirable wheelchair. Their excitement and pride was tangible as at last their hard work and intelligent management have been awarded.
Congratulations!

Dutch Design Week, Eindhoven 17-25 October 2009

2009-10-23T05:04:00.000-07:00

In their bid to become a World Design Capital 2012, the City of Eindhoven has shown its commitment to design with its showcase Dutch Design Week Festival. For Eindhoven design entrepreneurship has been targeted as a solution by the City to fill the vacuum left by the relocation of Philips manufacturing. However, the legacy of the Philips heyday is noticeable in the many huge factories left empty, as well as the history of innovation and technical capabilities.
With more than 250 events across 60 locations, the Dutch Design Week is an impressive event. It has taken place in Eindhoven every year since 2003.
Among the highlights of this year’s exhibitions are the Design Academy Graduation show and the Dutch Design Awards. I particularly liked the Paper Zoo exhibition, with very interesting conceptual creatures made of paper, a lot of creativity and clear conceptual thinking, At the Graduation show students were able to show interesting and challenging concepts, presented with functioning prototypes and well written brief justification of their ideas. Also impressive was the attendance to the exhibitions. The student show was buzzing even though it was a midweek morning.
Another fun element of the event’s infrastructure were the ‘design rides’, specially decorated taxis to transport visitors around the many design venues. Great service and good fun adding to the city’s creative atmosphere!
The Week’s key event was the Design Management Europe (DME) Award 2009 (following the DME Award 2008 which took place in Cardiff) on Thursday 22nd. The venue was one of the old Philips factories, the De Machinekamer in the Strijp-S. Being the decommissioned power station for the Philips Factory, the venue provided an authentic experience to the DME Award attendees.

SEE attended 1st European Innovation Summit!

2009-10-16T06:06:00.000-07:00

In order to enhance the quality of the research presented in the SEE Policy Booklet, an output of the SEE project (co-financed as part of the INTERREG IVC programme), I attended the First European Innovation Summit held in Brussels on 13th and 14th October.

On the Tuesday morning I met our Belgium partner in order to find out about the new Flemish Innovation Policy being published this month as well as to discuss a case study on intellectual property rights, both of which will feature in the booklet. I also had the pleasure of meeting Prof. Mary McBride, Director of the Pratt Institute Design Management programme (New York) to moot the contribution of design to innovation in public policy and discovered the Catalyst Strategic Design Review.

In the afternoon from 14.00 until 18.30 I attended a series of three lectures focusing on ‘Innovation Policies and Practices Across Europe’ at the European Parliament as part of the First European Innovation Summit. The first panel, moderated by Claus Schultze, Director of the European Regions Research and Innovation Network, centred on the strategic role of the Regions in the European Innovation System. The second panel, moderated by Gernot Klotz, Director of Research and Innovation at the European Chemical Industry Council, discussed private sector participation in the innovation process; while the final panel, chaired by Andre van der Meer, Permanent Representative for the City of the Hague to the Institutions of the EU, centred on future EU innovation policy and concluded with insightful questions from the floor.

The event was a great success and enabled innovation practitioners and EU policy-makers to engage in dialogue. However, design as a strategic disciple for innovation and public policy did not feature on the agenda so the SEE Policy Booklet will be an opportunity to advance the debate.

Anna

2009 Prince Philip Designers Prize

2009-10-16T04:53:00.000-07:00

Last night I was lucky enough to attend the award ceremony for the 2009 Prince Philip Designers Prize in Buckingham Palace. In addition to taking place at The Palace, it was really well organised by the Design Council and attended by the great and the good of the design world to celebrate 50 years of the Prince Philip Designers Prize.

Special commendations were given to Jeff Banks and Michael Peters but I was really pleased when the award for 2009 was given to Andrew Ritchie, the man behind the Brompton folding bicycle. I’ve had a Brompton for about 11 years and love its simplicity and functionality – apart from pumping up the tyres and giving it the odd drop of oil it just keeps going. Children in the rougher parts of town do make the odd funny comment when you whiz past them but you soon get your own back when it folds into a tiny package to fit behind the seat of the train or into the boot of a car.

Also interesting during the presentations was hearing about the origins of the Award. Launched in 1959 the original drive was to encourage manufacturers to make use of design to develop affordable and desirable products that could compete on the World stage – we’ve come a long way since then but it does still sound rather familiar.

Gavin.

UK Design Support Network meet in Bristol.

2009-10-11T14:00:00.000-07:00

Gisele and Anna from Design Wales attended the UK Design Support Network meeting on the 8th October at the Arnolfini in Bristol, hosted by Anna Traylor of the South West Design Programme.

Divided between presentations from design organisations in the South West of England and discussion between the attendees from across the UK, the three key topics of discussion during the meeting were: funding sources, the promotion of design, and how to work together. One simple suggestion we made was sharing the cost of bringing overseas speakers to the UK – hopefully we can make this work.

The UK Design Support Network was established by Design Wales in 2007 as a platform for any UK organisation involved in supporting and encouraging the use of design in industry. The group meets twice a year at venues across the UK, each meeting hosted and organised by the regional design organisation/programme. The next meeting takes place in the South East of England.

SEE bulletin issue 1

2009-08-28T06:52:00.000-07:00

New! We are delighted to announce the launch of the first SEE bulletin, one of six to be published twice a year between 2009 and 2011.

This edition includes a research paper presented by Dr James Moultrie (University of Cambridge), interviews with Mika Takagi (Design Policy Office, Ministry of Economy, Trade & Industry, Japan) and Dr Julio Frias Peña (Design & Innovation Centre, Monterrey Institute of Technology, Mexico), an article on the future of EU innovation policy, a special report on the SEE partners’ study visit to Helsinki, two design policy case studies and a Library of references to related research and policy documents.

The SEE bulletins will be exploring the opportunities for integrating design and creativity into regional and national innovation policy as well as policy areas relating to competitiveness, entrepreneurship, sustainability and economic and social development. We hope you enjoy reading it and we welcome contributions, comments and feedback.

If you would like to receive SEE bulletins in the future please email info@seeproject.org

No rest for the wicked!

2009-08-07T02:32:00.000-07:00

The August Summer holiday season is turning out to be a busy one for us. Our intention since April has been to build a portfolio of complimentary activities that demonstrate best practice in the provision of bespoke design support and by doing so give us the authority/insight to network with other design organisations and take a strategic perspective on the role design can play in economy development at a policy level.

Our work over the last couple of months on both of these levels is starting to come to fruition with the launch of a series of design workshops for business (delivered in partnership with the Wales Quality Centre) and support for another UK region in helping them to understand how their design support programmes might develop in the future.

The design support workshops make up a five day course intended to introduce a new product development capability to small and medium sized enterprises. The five day-long sessions will not transform delegates into designers but provide them with the capability and confidence to champion design within their company. Dates are yet to be agreed, but it looks as though the first workshops will be delivered at the end of September.

Meetings at the Design Council and the Parliamentary Group for Design

2009-07-30T01:17:00.000-07:00

On Monday 27th July, Gisele and Anna went to London for meetings at the Design Council and the Parliamentary Group for Design. The objective of the trip was to discuss the best format for presenting policy recommendations, in order to ensure that the Policy Recommendation Booklets that we will be producing in cooperation with other SEE partners provide the best support for drafting design policy.

The first meeting was with Mel Taylor (Head of Knowledge & Research) and Sara El Nusairi (Head of Government Relations) at the Design Council. The meeting was an opportunity to gain an insight into effective methods of lobbying the government. Sara described how they are encouraging the government to adopt a more systematic approach to design policy and provided us with examples of policy submissions they had produced on various topics. Mel discussed her work on evaluating the impact of their design support programmes, which we are keen to include as a case study on the SEE library. The meeting gave us real food for thought on how to achieve our policy objectives.

Our second meeting was with Jocelyn Bailey, Manager of the Associate Parliamentary Group for Design and Innovation (APGDI), which is the leading advocate for design in Parliament. We learnt about some of the group’s projects including a series of recommendations to improve public procurement, which will be presented to Parliament in October. As Jocelyn will be preparing her own policy suggestions, she was able to give us insightful tips on what strategy would be best for presenting our booklets to policy-makers in the SEE partner regions.

Having done our research, we are looking forward to collaborating with the SEE partners in developing a blueprint for our first Policy Recommendation Booklet on ‘Integrating Creativity and Design into Regional Innovation Policy’.

Services for regional business & design support programmes

2009-07-21T06:20:00.000-07:00

We can now offer a portfolio of services for both business support organisations and regional policy makers. The first workshops will be delivered in October and more details and dates will be announced shortly.

These and other activities will be the basis for a new organisation we will launch in the next few months that will better define our objectives and capabilities. At that time Design Wales will become a regional brand for our activities in Wales and as a regional partner in the European SEE network.

So far our portfolio of services includes:

Support services & workshops delivered to business.
(either directly to industry or in partnership with regional business support organisations).
Managing new product development.
Includes 5 day-long workshops over 10 weeks that identify a design champion within an organisation and develops their skills to manage design and increase their capacity for new product development.

Managing service innovation & design.
Includes 2 day-long workshops to raise awareness of how design can help services businesses be innovative, followed by practical tools and techniques to start making it happen.

Brand Essentials workshops.
Half-day workshops to help SMEs understand the value of design, take ownership of their own brand, draft design briefs and identify appropriate expertise.

Colour & trend prediction seminars for the fashion & textile sector.
Seasonal half day seminars aimed at the fashion & textile sectors.

Support services for regional business support staff.
Design, innovation and creativity for business support staff.
A day-long practical workshop for general business support personnel to help their understanding of design, how this can help the businesses they support be more innovative and how they can facilitate them in working with the most appropriate local design expertise.

Development course for specialist design advisory staff.
A two-day short course to help new specialist design or innovation advisors in the transition from industry to being effective part of the business support infrastructure.

Recruitment of design & manufacturing advisory staff.
Assistance in the recruitment of staff with the combination of the right industrial experience, business knowledge and approach towards business support.

Support services for national & regional economic development offices.
Design and Innovation for policy makers - introduction.
A one-day workshop for regional policy makers that provides an overview of the current and potential future state of European policy and best practice models of support.

Design and Innovation for policy makers – practical tools & techniques.
A three-day practical workshop that includes the introductory course above but goes on to provide practical sessions that enable delegates to map their regional design & innovation system, develop appropriate intervention strategies and measure the potential future outcomes.

Bespoke regional design policy, strategy and support advice.
We can provide bespoke support to;
Map national design systems,
Develop regional design policy and support programmes,
Establish evaluation models for current & futures support programmes.
Conduct independent audits of the impact, service quality and regional integration of
current regional business support programmes.

New member of staff builds our policy expertise.

2009-07-10T07:17:00.000-07:00

Just under two weeks has gone by since Anna Whicher joined Design Wales as a Research Officer within the SEE project. She has already proved effective in encouraging our SEE partners to engage with their own regional policy makers to establish what it is they really want from the policy guidelines we will be producing later in the year – and so by taking a user-centred approach.

After finishing her undergraduate studies in French and History, specialising in European integration, at the University of Reading, Anna went on to gain an MSc in European Public Policy at UCL. She already has experience of working in political circles from working in Westminster for her local MP and also spent a year working as assistant marketing and communication manager at Siemens in Paris. She will be using her experience to support the smooth running of the SEE project and helping us to best understand the part design has to play in European, national and regional policies.

SEE project - First thematic workshop in Lyon

2009-07-01T02:57:00.000-07:00

Following the opening conference in Cardiff last October, a study trip to Finland in May (to better understand how their design policy was realised) and the first of four thematic workshops having taken place in Lyon last month the SEE project is well under way.
The SEE project is funded by the European Commission under the INTERREG IVC programme and brings together a network of 11 design and innovation organisations from across Europe to further understand how design can help realise national and regional innovation policy. That’s interesting enough, but each of the 11 design partners has to not only demonstrate a close link to their regional policy makers but also ensure they bring their representatives with them to the workshops and events.

Gisele (Design Wales) and Justin (Centre for Design Innovation, Ireland) discuss a point!

Working for their lunch.
It might seem obvious, but from our experience of a previous network (SEEdesign) the most constructive and rewarding outputs resulted when we pushed the partners to work on addressing a topic together – rather than only listening to presentations from regional initiatives. This is the approach we are taking with the SEE project and in June the partners and their regional policy makers (24 people all together) gathered in Lyon to work on developing material to guide policy makers on - Integrating creativity and design into regional innovation policy – which is the first of four themed workshops to produce policy guidelines.

The innovation policy map taking shape.

Mapping regional policy.
Using a combination of Pecha Kucha presentations and large format questionnaires on the walls we were able to quickly map the clarity, longevity and scope of each regional or national innovation policy and related design programme. We are all European but each region and nation has a unique economic, political, industrial and cultural environment that has resulted in a broad variety of approaches to innovation policy and related support for design. This approach to mapping the current state was very successful and we intend to further interpret the results before we make them available more widely.
Following the mapping exercise the two groups, design organisations and policy makers, divided to discuss how design could be integrated into innovation policy and the barriers to actually making this happen. By placing these thoughts in priority of importance on the walls of the meeting room the groups were able to switch positions to interpret and comment on the postings from their policy or design colleagues.

Debating the results.

Publishing the results.
The findings from this workshop will be published as guidelines for policy makers. To get this right we are asking the policy makers what they actually want in terms of format and supporting information; by doing so we are hopefully taking more of a user-centred approach and will produce something that’s actually used rather than filed!
The next workshop is not until November and takes place in Denmark, but there is a great deal to do before then.

Gavin

An update on our activities

2009-06-26T08:18:00.000-07:00

There is growing interest in how design is being supported and promoted in regions and nations around the World. Design is increasingly acknowledged as a key element in the realisation of innovation and wider economic development policies and strategies, even though it is currently primarily only linked to the development of technology and new products. In 2010 or 2011 a revised innovation, or possible individual design policy, at a European level is likely to highlight the potential for design in the development of not only manufactured products but also non-technological innovations and public sector services.

Building on 15 years experience of the delivery of design support programmes and leading networks in the UK and Europe, Design Wales is an international centre of expertise for design support and related national & regional policy.

Our programme of activities includes:

Support services delivered directly to business.
Delivered on behalf of regional economic development offices and independent business organisations these workshops, training courses and events support industry in understanding and managing design issues such as branding, new product development and service innovation.

Support services for regional development offices / innovation programmes.
To help regional economic development offices understand the role of design, develop their own regional policy & support programmes and train local business support staff.

Networks.
Design Wales already leads a network of 11 European design organisations and regional policy makers and established the UK design support network in 2007. The insight gained from engagement with this broad network of partners provides invaluable knowledge of the current level of regional engagement and best practice delivery. (visit http://www.seeproject.org/).
The SEE network involves both design organisations and policy makers from each of the 11 European regions. SEE is funded by the European Commission under the INTERREG IV C programme.

Research.
Design Wales undertakes research to understand the role of design support and promotion in economic development at a policy level and to further highlight best practice in support programmes. Design Wales have hosted a bi-annual International Workshop on Design Support (IWDS) since 2002 each time attracting up to 100 delegates from around the World.

In addition to the SEE network we are already delivering design support services and providing advice to several regional business support organisations in Wales, Scotland and as far afield as South America. We are also starting to grow again. This week a new member of staff joined us with specialist knowledge of European policy to help us further understand how design can be integrated into or developed alongside innovation policy and support programmes.

With changes and cuts in the business support infrastructure, the wider economic downturn and the potential for future European and regional policy to at least include significant aspects of design and non-technological innovation these are exciting and challenging times. We intend to make full use of our past business support experience, policy knowledge and networking capability. We have already formed a revised management board and over the next month we will announce firmer plans for our objectives and activities.

Free advisory services come to an end

2009-05-12T06:09:00.000-07:00

As of 31st March 2009 Design Wales will no longer provide a free advisory service for Welsh industry.

All free advisory support services for industry are now provided under the banner of the Welsh Assembly Governments Flexible Support for Buisness programme (http://www.business-support-wales.wales.gov.uk/).

Design Wales will continue with a revised programme of activities to be announced in the near future that build on our experience for the provision of practical services and events to encourage and facilitate the use of design and support the development of regional design policy.

Design Wales Presents Design Futures 2009

2009-02-26T02:30:00.000-08:00

date: 12th March 2009
venue: National Museum of Wales, Cardiff
time: doors open 7:00pm for 7:10 start

Design Wales would like to invite you to the annual Design Futures event.

In addition to presenting the annual Ffres Awards to the best entries from graphic, textile and fashion design students from Wales, this year’s speakers will be:

Angus Struthers: Head of Service Design
Virgin Atlantic
“Find out why Virgin Atlantic has a Service Design team, what we do and how we do it”.

Steve Masterson, Partner & COO,
Kiska Design, Austria
Founded in Salzburg in 1990, KISKA has grown to be one of Europe's largest design companies with more than 100 employees from 15 nations offering design services that range from brand strategy to transport and exhibition design.

The Ffres Awards
Launched to help design students from Wales gain experience in working with industry, this year’s briefs for the competition were set and judged by:
Seren for graphic design
New Look for fashion design
Mothercare for textile design
All three companies will be talking about the brief, the challenges they set for the students and presenting the awards to the winning entries on the night.

The Design Futures event is free but all delegates must be registered in advance.
To request a ticket and receive more information please
e-mail enquiries@designwales.org or call 0845 303 1400

Design Wales Finds Development of the Metallica Brand Very Interesting!

2009-01-13T06:37:00.000-08:00

Design Wales attend Service Design Conference

2009-01-08T06:47:00.000-08:00

The first international Service Design conference in Europe took place in Amsterdam on 24-26 November 2008. Design Wales attended the 2nd day ‘Share’ of the three-day conference organised by the Service Design Network. During the day academic experts and practising service designers shared their knowledge and experiences of service design projects. As Service Design is a relatively new discipline it was especially useful to gain insight into real life projects through the case studies from live|work and Engine.

http://www.service-design-network.org/
http://www.livework.co.uk/
http://www.enginegroup.co.uk/

Design Wales draws attention to the British Standard for Web Accessibility

2008-12-03T02:28:00.000-08:00

Attention all website designers! The British Standard Institute has begun the process of issuing a British Standard for the creation of websites which are accessible to disabled people. The draft document entitled, ‘Web accessibility – Building accessible experiences for disabled people – Code of practice’ is now open for public comment.

The draft document can be found here. In order to view the document and make comments, reviewers are asked to register. The registration process is easy - name and e-mail address; the password will be e-mailed to you.

Design Wales contribute to the design policy

2008-11-21T03:47:00.001-08:00

After Turin (see post below), the discussion about design policies continued in Barcelona, at the DME Workshop. At this meeting, speakers presented their work on methodologies for measuring the impact of design and for design management. Gisele Murphy from Design Wales contributed to the programme with the speech “Policies in support of design”. The meeting was moderated by Keith Sequeira, from the DG Enterprise and Industry of the European Commission.

The DME Workshop took place on the 11th November. It was part of the Barcelona Design Week, organised by Barcelona Design Centre.

Design Wales take part in Turin Conference

2008-11-21T03:14:00.000-08:00

The first-ever dedicated conference to the discussion of design policies took place in Turin, Italy, on the 6-7 November. Shaping the Global Design Agenda – an International Conference on Design Policy was extremely useful in raising awareness about policies for design and in sharing information about the different approaches that have been adopted around the world. Speakers attended from Qatar, Costa Rica, China, Japan, Finland, UK and the European Commission. Design Wales senior researcher Gisele Raulik-Murphy was invited to take part in discussion panel “Design and the Economy”, moderated by Jean Schneider from APCI (Paris). It was interesting to hear about the concerns that drive the design policy agenda in the different countries: Qatar is facing the risk of losing their cultural identity over the recent developments; China develops the manufacturing industry but faces environmental issues; Costa Rica is improving their design infrastructure with support of the Ministry of Culture…

The conference was part of the celebrations of Torino World Design Capital 2008, which organised hundreds of events during the year.

Design Casa was one of these events, timed to coincide with the international Design Policy conference. It aimed to reveal to the people of Turin and international visitors how the culture of design is expressed in other parts of the world. Several “Casas” were set up around the town, presenting design exhibitions from France, The Netherlands, Singapore, Japan, Belgium, Norway, Spain (photo), Eastern-Europe, Austria and South Korea.

The Dream exhibition presented over 50 car prototypes, in a review that started in the 1950s and included legendary models by Fiat, Bertone, Pininfarina, Ghia, Ferrari and Maserati. The Dream exhibition took place at the Torino Esposizioni, designed by Piero Luigi Nervi , venue that hosted prestigious motor shows in the past.

Design Wales are pleased to announce ...

2008-11-07T06:48:00.000-08:00

Kerry, the website design advisor at Design Wales, gave birth to a healthy baby boy yesterday. Samuel weighed in at 6lb 5.

Congratulations Kerry, Ed & family.

Design Wales at Wrexham Business Week

2008-10-21T05:10:00.000-07:00

Wrexham Business Week 2008

If you want to get one step ahead of the fashion market, the next Design Wales event may be of interest to you. The event will take place during Wrexham Business Week and will focus on three key areas: Colour & Trends for Autumn/Winter 09/10, presented by Alison Hughes of Carlin International; Developing a fashion brand and promoting it off and online, presented by Victoria Jones of Design Wales; Intellectual property in fashion design, presented by Nicola Giles of Design Wales.

The event will take place on Thursday 23rd October, 2.00pm – 5.30pm at the Ramada Hotel, Wrexham. The event is free, but entry is by ticket only. If you would like to attend, please contact Design Wales (T: 0845 3031400).

Design Wales presented Blair Enns... but what next?

2008-10-20T12:59:00.000-07:00

As widely anticipated Blair Enns came to Cardiff and spoke to the Welsh design community about his 'Win Without Pitching' campaign. DesignWales has been keen to have Blair come and speak as part of our ongoing research into the impact of free pitching and speculative work on design, particularly graphic design businesses.

The core of Blair's stance, is that in order for design businesses to flourish, they need to focus on specific business areas and become known as experts in that area. The examples he gave, were of a mobile telephone fascia company and a catalogue design company. In order to be perceived as expert, design companies must write about their expertise as well as demonstrate it. They must continually build on their knowledge and not become complacent. The idea being, that if you are considered an expert in your chosen field, then you don't have to look for clients... they look for you!

Operations Director of Design Wales, Gavin Cawood in conversation with Blair Enns

The baton has now been passed to the designers present at the talk... so tell us in the comments below, if Blair's talk has given you food for thought.

Design Wales Attends the Launch of the Cardiff Design Festival

2008-10-06T07:48:00.000-07:00

Thursday the 2nd of October saw the launch of the Cardiff Design Festival at the Senedd building in Cardiff Bay. Lord Dafydd Elis-Thomas AM hosted the event, with speeches from Olwen Mosely the director the festival, and Tom Bewick representing the Cultural Skills Council.

Olwen announced a series of interesting events occuring during the festival. Design Wales is pleased to support the festival by hosting some of these events. A full list of Design Wales events during the Cardiff Design Festival is on our site http://www.designwales.org

The launch event also featured a selection of the finalists' artwork for the Cardiff Design Festival Showcase...it was encouraging to see such a high standard of design work. During Tom Bewick's speech he made reference to a recent study which showed that a higher than average proportion of Welsh companies had design embedded into their businesses. This fact married with a vibrant design community, should make for an optimistic economy!!

The Cardiff Design Festival runs until the end of October.

Booking Open for Blair Enns Design Wales Visit in October

2008-09-04T08:03:00.000-07:00

Design Wales is pleased to confirm that Blair Enns' talk on October 17th 'Win Without Pitching' is now open for booking. The event is open to Welsh design businesses only. Places are restricted to two per company and are allocated on a first come first served basis.

Click here for the booking form

Design Wales presents Blair Enns 17th October 2008

2008-09-04T03:10:00.000-07:00

Booking is now open for Blair Enns' talk in Cardiff on the 17th of October 2008

Design Wales discusses the recent Barbie v Bratz case

2008-08-21T03:45:00.000-07:00

Although this IP news item is a month old now, it’s such a good story from an IP ownership and employment contract perspective that we had to include it.

Most designers are aware that the work they create during the course of employment usually belongs to their employer; but what about the designs they create in their own time? Can their employer also claim ownership of these works? A Californian court hearing the Barbie (Mattel, Inc.) v Bratz (MGA Entertainment, Inc.) case believed that this is exactly what an employer could do.

Mattel ex-employee Carter Bryant claimed he created the Bratz doll whilst on a leave of absence from the toy giant. Bryant briefly returned to Mattel after this break, eventually leaving to go and work for MGA. Shortly after starting his employment there, MGA launched the Bratz range of dolls. Mattel took umbrage at this, insisting that Bryant was still an employee of Mattel when he created the drawings for the Bratz dolls. Mattel consequently initiated legal proceedings against both Bryant and MGA for breach of contract and copyright infringement.

Although it was a victory for Mattel, the case was not as straightforward as it first appeared. As reported by LexisNexis, Bryant was still under contract when he created the drawings of the Bratz dolls, even though he was on leave of absence. It also appears that he deleted computer files before submitting the computer as evidence.

From an employer’s perspective this is an interesting case because it emphasises the importance of including IP clauses in contracts.

The BBC’s report on the case can be found here.

Star Wars - Design Wales highlights the problems of relying on copyright to protect designs

2008-08-13T07:00:00.000-07:00

We’re often asked how designs can be protected; unfortunately the answer to such a pertinent question is not always straightforward. A common misconception is that all designs can be protected by copyright; this isn’t the case as the recent Lucasfilm v Andrew Ainsworth case illustrates.

Andrew Ainsworth a prop designer based in Twickenham, was said to have infringed the copyright of Lucasfilm by selling replicas of the Imperial Stormtroopers’ armour and helmet. Ainsworth, who was commissioned by Lucasfilm to create the armour and helmet for the initial Star Wars film released in 1977, used the original moulds to make the alleged infringing articles. By making a replica of the helmet, Lucasfilm claimed that Ainsworth had infringed the copyright in the design drawings of the helmet. The judge hearing the case disagreed, explaining that if the helmet was to be protected by copyright, it would have to be regarded as a sculpture or a work of artistic craftsmanship and not as an artistic work which the design drawings would be considered as. The judge concluded that since the helmet was a prop, it could not be regarded as a sculpture or a work of artistic craftsmanship, ruling that copyright had not been infringed.

Admittedly this is a complicated case, but if there is a moral to this tale it is this - before taking legal action against a third party that you feel has infringed the copyright in your designs, make sure that copyright subsists; otherwise it could be a very expensive lesson in copyright law.

Design Wales Discusses the Olympic Torch

2008-08-11T09:39:00.000-07:00

The Olympic torch has caused much controversy during its journey in 2008. Named the 'Cloud of Promise', this year's torch was created by Chinese PC manufacturer Lenovo.

Symbolic of freedom, youth and unity, the Olympic torch has had many redesigns over the years, testing creative prowess in the way the games test physical prowess...
www.nytimes.com

Confirmed! Design Wales Will Present Blair Enns in October

2008-07-29T08:22:00.001-07:00

Design Wales have confirmed that Blair Enns founder of the Win Without Pitching movement will be giving a speech in Cardiff on the 17th of October. Having previously seen Blair present we know how inspiring and insightful he is!

Places for the Blair's talk will be on a first come first served basis and restricted to two places per company. The event is open to Welsh design businesses only.

Design Wales represented at the 2008 Design Research Society Conference

2008-07-19T08:27:00.000-07:00

Design Wales researcher Gisele Raulik-Murphy attended the “Undisciplined! - the Design Research Society Conference", from 16 to 19 July in Sheffield. This biennial event is the main conference for design academics. This year “Rigour in emerging design disciplines and professions” was chosen as the conference theme. The objective was to discuss the new kinds of “designing” that have been emerging to challenge the traditional design professional profile and reshape the field of design practice.

Gisele presented the paper “A comparative analysis of strategies for design in Finland and Brazil”, emphasising ‘design policy’ as a new discipline for design research. The paper was co-authored with Gavin Cawood from Design Wales; Dr Povl Larsen and Professor Alan Lewis, from PDR.

Product design edition of ‘Design Matters’ launched by Design Wales

2008-07-19T08:19:00.001-07:00

In July Design Wales presents a special edition about product development. As well as stories from the mountaineering equipment producer DMM and the boatbuilding company Mustang Marine it also shows that there can be risk in launching new products and how it is crucial to make sure that products are aimed at the right market. Issues related to risk management and sustainable design are also explored in this on-line magazine.

Download the Design Matters: http://www.designwales.org/

Design Wales and intellectual property

2008-07-07T04:39:00.000-07:00

Who owns the designs you’ve been commissioned to create? What are the pitfalls of selling goods bearing your brand name outside the UK? At Design Wales we are often asked these questions and as you would expect the answers can be quite complex.

Although this blog will focus primarily on design, we will also include design related intellectual property (IP) items that we find interesting/useful. The inaugural IP entry concerns IP courses, specifically the online IP course offered by the British Library. It focuses on trade marks, copyright, registered designs and patents - what they are, how to claim ownership, how to carry out searches, etc.

We are often asked if any distance learning IP courses exist that could provide a basic overview of IP; hopefully this offering from the British Library will appeal to many people.

A design policy for Europe? Design Wales take part in the discussion

2008-06-30T02:49:00.000-07:00

The Innovation Policy Workshop – Design as a tool for Innovation took place on the 26th and 27th June in Marseille, France. About 20 people from different countries in Europe were invited to join this meeting, organised by the European Commission - INNO-Grips. The objective was to get a better view of how the use of design can help tackling the challenges encountered by European companies and society today and to come up with concrete proposals for European action in support of design. In support to the discussion, Gisele Raulik-Murphy, Design Wales researcher, was invited to attend the workshop and present results of her current studies on design policies around the world. Conclusions of this meeting will be edited by INNO-Grips into a report which will help during the public consultation for the need of a design policy on European level.

Design Wales has Visitors from Poland

2008-06-24T06:50:00.000-07:00

Last week Design Wales received a delegation from Poznan in Poland. The group included the Vice Marshall of Poznan, university academics, a local entrepreneur and the president of the industrial design association in Poland. The group are part of a move to establish a design centre in Poznan.They have been travelling across Europe to examine different design centre models. They were welcomed by Gavin Cawood (Operational Director) and Gisele Raulik-Murphy (Senior Researcher) of Design Wales; and Darragh Murphy European Project Manager at PDR.

Design Wales Design Films

2008-06-18T05:30:00.000-07:00

In Autumn 2007 Design Wales commissioned three films about Welsh businesses who use design strategically. 'Twice the Boat in Half the Time' describes how the effective use of design changed the fortunes of a boat yard in Wales, UK.

Design Wales' Design Matters Goes Online

2008-06-13T01:57:00.000-07:00

Design Wales' design magazine Design Matters has now gone online. In keeping with our eco ethic we have decided not to produce a print version of the magazine just an online one.

The new edition is a food industry special, featuring many great examples of good design and branding from food producers in Wales.

Design Wales presents Stefan Sagmeister

2008-06-10T07:59:00.001-07:00

Stefan Sagmeister visited Cardiff last night on the end of his tour promoting his book 'Things That I have Learnt in My Life So Far' ... and how fantastic and inspirational his talk was!

Encouraging eco design and Stefan Sagmeister

2008-06-06T01:57:00.000-07:00

Design Wales staff are all ex-designers but we are not allowed to design when we work here... but...it doesn't stop us talking about design...

Today we were quite taken with some bio-degradable flower pots. The pots are made from PAP 22 polymer which is fully compostible in a home composter. We are quite curious about how the material could be applied to other products... like food packaging.... as we advise quite alot of food producers about design...

We are all excited by the visit to Cardiff on Monday of Stefan Sagmeister. We are looking forward to what he has to say and how he is going to say it!