What role can design play in defining a better and more human future? At the halfway point of the 2030 Agenda and its 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), a roadmap agreed in 2015 by 193 countries to end poverty, promote peace, guarantee equal opportunities and protect the planet – which Not only is it not being met but today it is the subject of bloody attacks by the extreme right -, Barcelona Design Week (BDW) launches as a global initiative a new objective, the 18th, whose challenge would be to take advantage of the potential of design to address in a practical way the main concerns of our time.
“We do not want to be a simple event that begins and ends in a short period of time, but rather a catalyst for change with a longer life,” says Alessandro Manetti, curator of BDW 23, which until October 28 promotes a hundred exhibitions and activities around issues such as climate change, AI, cultural and gender diversity or the fight against inequality and poverty.
“Humans are part of the problem, but we have to be part of the solution,” argues the strategy designer and trend researcher, who advances that of the workshops and work days, such as the one that will be held this Wednesday at the Disseny Hub (Design For Human Future) concrete proposals would come out that would then be sent to the UN headquarters in New York. “Because we have to generate a platform of content that is useful not only for the present of companies, something very important, but also for the future of people,” he adds.
And since this is an issue that affects us all (design is not an isolated bubble), the people of Barcelona will also be able to make what they think and need heard. The team of designers and researchers Domestic Data Streamers, in collaboration with the company Escofet, has created an immersive installation on Gran Vía with Paseo de Gràcia, a forest of flags with seventeen questions (How can design affect our mental health? Does the design break gender stereotypes or reproduce them?) to which you can respond through a QR code that also includes the example of 51 inspiring projects.
Directed by Isabel Roig, BDW 23, which reaches its 18th edition, also has a second installation on the DHUB lake, in which IED students show new ways of transforming and giving new life to glass bottles, a exhibition of 3D printed plants (award-winning work from External Reference, at The Social Hub Barcelona Poblenou) or the multi-sensory proposal, Natura, designed by Benedetta Tagliabue for Milan Design Week based on 20th century Barcelona architecture (Roca Gallery). For her part, photographer Cristina García Rodero will show the precariousness of the homes and how four young people live in them (Palau Robert). The festival will also allow you to discover some of its associated venues, such as the HP Experience Design Center, which opens in an old farmhouse in Sant Cugat.
