ConcurrentlyHong Kong Design Centre Honours Global Designer and Projects with 2018 DFAAwards

HONG KONG, CHINA - MediaOutReach - 22 November 2018 - Organisedby Hong Kong Design Centre (HKDC), co-organised by the Hong Kong TradeDevelopment Council (HKTDC) and sponsored by Create Hong Kong, Business ofDesign Week (BODW), Asia's leading annual design event, will be held in HongKong from 3-8 December 2018. The week-long event will feature more than 20events, including the BODW Summit, BODW City Programmes and a series ofconcurrent events, all with the aim of providing a platform for business andcreative leaders to exchange ideas, network, and explore new businessopportunities.

Concurrently,HKDC will honour the 2018 recipients of the DFA Awards. The Awards are widelyknown in the industry as one of the most important and prestigious honoursstemming from the region. The Awards encompass five-major programmes, withthree pillars that recognise individual contributions to the advancement anddevelopment of design, as well as two programmes that celebrate impactful andoutstanding design from the Asian perspective and support and cultivate localup-and-coming designers and design graduates.

Business of Design Week 2018

Thisyear's BODW summit will take on thetheme of 'Think ∙ Collaborate ∙ Create'and be presented in collaboration with partner city, Melbourne, cited as theworld's most liveable city by the Economist Intelligence Unit for sevenconsecutive years (2011-2017). The event features more than 70 speakers fromover 15 countries and regions to present the latest industry insights and topromote the advancement of the creative industries.

"BODWrepresents a core component of the Hong Kong Design Centre's public mission topromote a good design culture and cultivate design thinking for all," saidDr. Edmund Lee, Executive Director of HKDC. "We are thrilled tosee this event grow from strength to strength since its inception in 2002 tobecome one of the most important events on the global design calendar."

An anchorevent of the week, the BODW Summit presents a stellar lineup of internationalspeakers to share the latest industry insights and to promote the wide andstrategic use of design for cities, the economy, culture and living. Inaddition, new sessions focusing on Digital & Design, the Greater Bay Area& Design and more, will be introduced this year.

BODW Summit'sPlenary sessions feature a lineup of design experts including Martha Thorne, scholar and executivedirector of Pritzker Architecture Prize (US); Prof. Rob Adams AM, director of city design & projects of Cityof Melbourne (Melbourne); and Ben vanBerkel, founder / principal architect of international design networkUNStudio (The Netherlands), and the designer of the Lyric Theatre of theWestKowloon Cultural District; Ron Arad,acclaimed industrial designer, artist, and architect (UK); Charles Renfro, distinguished architect and partner of DillerScofidio + Renfro (US), and Toyo Ito,multi-award winning Japanese architect (Japan).

The 'Brand Asia Forum' and 'Communication & Design' tracks willexplore the future of brands and how the shifts in lifestyle are transformingbusinesses and changing the way we connect and communicate. Influential leadersand visionary creative minds includeErik Spiekermann, iconic type and information designer as well as an expertin letterpress printing (Germany); AntonioColombo, president of Cinelli &Columbus (Gruppo Company) (Italy); TonyChambers, creative consultant and founder of studio of TC & Friends,and former Editor-in-Chief of Wallpaper* (UK); Suzanne Santos, chief customer officer of Aesop (Melbourne). Otherparticipating brands include naked Group (Mainland of China) and BEYORG (HongKong).

In the 'Product & Technology' track andthe newly introduced 'Digital &Design' session, BODW will explore how technology and its applications arechanging our everyday experiences with speakers such as Sonny Tilders, animatronics designer, creative director & CEOof Creature Technology Co. (Melbourne); KenWong, game designer, creative director and founder of crafts games studioMountains who won the Award at Apple's annual Worldwide Developers' Conference (Melbourne);Leah Heiss, Melbourne-based designercombining design research and technology to benefit the health industry, whohas won a Premier's Design Award for her design of the world's first modular hearingaid product -- Facett (Melbourne); RexSham, co-founder & chief science officer of Insight Robotics; Michael Stoddart, Director, CreativeCloud, Asia Pacific of Adobe; and a panel of speakers and disruptors coming fromacross the fintech, healthtech, retail and hospitality sectors.

Newlyintroduced in 2018, the 'Greater BayArea & Design' track provides knowledge into the business opportunitiescreated under the Greater Bay economic policy spearheaded by the mainlandChinese government. Speakers include JiaWei, founder and chairman of LKK Design Company (Mainland of China); Mann Lao, founder and creative directorof Chiii Design (Macau);Elaine Yan Ling Ng,founder of THE FABRICK LAB (Hong Kong); and Hong Ko, partner of KL & K Design (Hong Kong / Mainland ofChina)

The 'Creative Mindset' session willfeature speakers including Patrick leQuément, co-founder and president of the Advisory Board, The SustainableDesign School (France) and SebastianConran, CEO of Sebastian Conran Associates and Consequential Robotics (UK). In response to Melbourne's globallyrecognised status as the world's most liveable city from 2011 to 2017, aspecial seminar on 'Liveability, Sports& Design' will feature prominent speakers from the city of Melbourne,Hong Kong and beyond. Jill Garner,Victorian Government Architect; BrianMorris, CEO of Melbourne & Olympic Parks Trust; and Alastair Richardson, director of CoxArchitecture, will bring valuable insights on how forward-thinking sports venuedesign and strategic redevelopment of existing sports facilities can increasethe liveability of a city and benefit its economy. Margaret Brooke, co-founder of Heritage Hong Kong Foundation andVery Hong Kong Foundation, will also share her insights into the liveabilityand wellbeing industry from a Hong Kong perspective.

Thisyear's Masterclass will feature Carol Ross Barney, FAIA, renownedarchitect, urbanist, educator, and design principal of Ross Barney Architects(US). She will discuss the making of liveable cities and how to design forsocial good.

BODWCity Programme

Launched this year as anew extension of BODW, the BODW City Programme is an annual creative communityactivation programme featuring exciting happenings such as art installations,exhibitions, creative tours, and education and community programmes. It will debutin Wan Chai and other districts in Hong Kong with the vision to engage both businessand the public. The BODW City Programme aims to foster stronger collaborationsbetween local designers, businesses and brands to celebrate good design andinnovation, and strengthen Hong Kong as a creative hub in Asia. The annualprogramme will take place from November 2018 to January 2019.

For thelatest information about ticketing and this year's programme, please visit bodw.com.

DFA Awards 2018

Awardeesof the 5 major programmes of the 2018 Design for Asia Awards were announced bythe HKDC earlier this year. This year DFA Design for Asia Awards and DFA HongKong Young Design Talent Awards recognised 203 Local and International Awardeesfor the Best of Design Excellence in Asia. In addition the individual winnersfor the three prestigious awards were also announced.

DFADesign for Asia Awards received overwhelming response this year, with over 1,000entries from 18 economies submitting design projects for consideration, thehighest number to date. The judging panel selected 187 design projects, all ofwhich launched available in Asian markets, and that demonstrate how design hascontributed to social, cultural and economic progress, covering four majordesign disciplines including apparel & accessory, communication,environmental and product & industrial designs. A total of 10 Grand Awards,3 Grand Awards for Culture, Sustainability, and Technology, 10 Grand Awards forSpecial Mention, and 164 winners from the Category Award are conferred,altogether demonstrating the power of design solutions to enhance and improvethe quality of life in Asian regions and as well for the global populations.Among the winners, design projects from Japan and Hong Kong stand at the top ofleaderboard, each with 55 winning projects, followed by Mainland China with 40winning projects.

DFA HongKong Young Design Talent Award fosters the development emerging designpractitioners or graduates of 35 years old or under from Hong Kong. In 2018, 13out of 16 winners will be awarded up to HK$ 5 million in total in grants foroverseas attachments to incubate visions and provide opportunities forcross-cultural exchange projects. The programme seeks to cultivate the nextgeneration of home-grown design to broaden exposure to the global designlandscape. Through overseas work experiences or educational initiatives, thenext generation can continue to fuel the creative economy, with the vision tofurther build Hong Kong's competitive offerings.

The2018 recipients of the DFA LifetimeAchievement Award (DFA LAA), DFADesign Leadership Award (DFA DLA), and DFAWorld's Outstanding Chinese Designer (DFA WOCD), the highest and mostprestigious design honours of DFA Awards in the year were also annouced. TheDFA LAA is conferred to Sir Terence Conran, one of the world's best-knowndesigners, retailers and restaurateurs. Concurrently, this year's DFA DLA willhonour Dr. Andrew Dent of Material ConneXion, a leading global expert insustainable and advanced material research and development. The DFA WOCD willgo to Mr. Lyndon Neri and Ms. Rossana  Hu, architects and co-founders of Neri&HuDesign and Research Office.

NOTES TO THE EDITOR

More information, please visit www.dfaawards.com.

About Hong KongDesign Centre

Hong Kong DesignCentre (HKDC) was founded in 2001 as a strategic partner of the HKSARGovernment in establishing Hong Kong as centre of design excellence in Asia. HKDCcontinues its public mission to promote wider and strategic use of design anddesign thinking to create business value and improve societal well-being. Ourinitiatives are anchored by five major work directions: CONNECT, CELEBRATE,NURTURE, ADVANCE and ENGAGE.

HKDC's flagshipprogrammes include Business of Design Week (since 2002) -- Asia's leading annualconference and event on Design, Innovation and Brands; DFA Awards (since 2003)-- a widely recognised design awards that celebrates outstanding designs withAsian perspectives; Design Incubation Programme (since 2012) and FashionIncubation Programme (since 2016) -- 2-year incubation programmes to nurturefuture design and fashion entrepreneurs; FASHION ASIA HONGKONG (since 2016) -- afashion initiative combining conversations, interactions and cultural exchangesto energise the city's image, and position it as an Asian hub for fashion tradeand business development; Knowledge of Design Week (since 2006) -- an annualthematic design knowledge sharing platform that explores how design can solvecomplex challenges of our society.