Online Talks: Right Aligned, from Coventry Design Festival
Since the actual festival won't be returning until May 2022 there will be a series of online talks designed to inspire creative minds. The series of talks will host founders and designers from renown studios such as Studio Bellow, Ocra, Middle Boop and Sea. Tickets are £4.90 and can be purchased through their website.
Exhibition: Sneakers Unboxed, Studio to Street, The Design Museum
After numerous delays due to lockdown restrictions, the Design Museum's headlining exhibit finally opens this month. The exhibit centers around sneakers. It will showcase the innovation in materials, explore its cultural connotations around the world and how the shoe became the cultural symbol of our times. The exhibit will also feature some innovation experiments from Nike and MIT's Design Lab, highlighting some of the innovations in sustainability. The exhibit will run from May 18th to October 24th. Tickets start at £6.50 and can be purchased on the museum's website.
Book: Extra Bold, A Feminist, Inclusive, Anti-racist, Nonbinary Field Guide for Graphic Designers, by Ellen Lupton and Jennifer Tobias
Extra Bold is part text book, part comic book, part manifesto, part self-help book that explores the more problematic issues in the design industry. It looks at the history and theory of design by looking at themes that include sexism, racism and ableism with topics such as disability theory, typographic binaries and teaching black designers. The book offers advice for a variety of situations - from internships to work from home scenarios, and ranges from everything covering discrimination to psychological health. The book has interviews with several professionals at different stages in their career and has some case studies. The authors' sense of humor definitely gives this book an added touch. This will be out in stores as of May 13th.
Podcast: This Way Up
This Way Up is a podcast for women’s careers featuring interviewees in female leadership from around the world. The podcast was inspired by the lack of diverse voices in the industry. You can find the podcast on Spotify and Apple Podcasts already.
Online Platform: What if...?/Scotland
This is a project from 25 designers and architects across Scotland showcasing their dreams and wishes for where they live. This project is response to the Venice Biennale’s theme about living together in the future (and was also supposed to debut at the festival) but will now have to debut at the V&A Dundee and become available online for those in other cities. Visitors (both in person and online) will be able to add their hopes and dreams onto the "Cloud of Dreams." This will run from May 22nd to November 21st. More information is available on V&A Dundee's website.
Learn more about these events @DesignWeek
