The first ever Design Society Conference (of Singapore) was in January this year. It was held at the National Library, drama centre which is pretty much the 3rd floor as you can plainly see from the sign.
Tickets for members were $25 and $50 for non-members. Well for now, membership is free. I got the programme for the day and also a book magazine thingy!
I took this picture in the auditorium so it’s pretty dark. See the circle thing on my hand? Hahaha, it’s a red stamp once you get in and show your ticket.
So the day technically started at noon with the emcee being Graham Perkins. The sessions featured Lim Sau Hoon and Jay Phua from 10AM Communications, Lim Chong Jin the deputy director of project and capability development in Temasek Polytechnic School of Design, :PHUNK Studio, Kelley Cheng from The [Press] Room, Kun of Make Studios and Theseus Chan of WERK Magazine.
Considering it’s the first conference by the Design Society, it was pretty crowded! The audience filled the upper floors too.
The talks were pretty interesting, Kelley Cheng inspired me to make my own magazine or periodical. Well, eventually anyway since I have been meaning to do so. Kun was pretty amusing too and heck, everyone in the panels from the start to the end of the day was pretty informative.
Considering this was a design event, those on twitter would have notice me saying that it’s the only place where you’d find people wearing so much black besides a funeral. Or that there was an unspoken dresscode there. Jeans and any monochromatic top. There was of course colour in the audience but really, majority of the people there were wearing jeans and any monochromatic top. Like I did too… Haaaa.
Well, the sessions ran a bit late because there were quite a bit of questions and that the panelist were very engaging when they showed us their works and problems they faced for a particular project or so. There’s too much of it to summarize because it was an experience you need to learn for yourself if you’re interested in design. Heh, best sign up as a member at the Design Society and perhaps whenever the second conference comes about, you can attend it too.
Okay I forgot the exact name of this exhibition but it showcased the 100 most memorable symbols/logos in Singapore. The opening ceremony for the exhibition was after the conference ended. So to sum it up, the whole conference was pretty good! I’d go to the next one whenever they have it. We must indeed increase design knowledge in Singapore.
Or at least enough so that people know what designers exactly do and what they can’t do in terms of being freaking psychic to read the minds of wibbly clients who don’t know what they want.
Um, right. ANYWHO, Design Society, wooooooooh.
