KISD hosts Global Design Initiative for the 10th anniversity in Cologne

Global Design Initiative (GDI) is celebrating its 10th anniversary from February 17-22, 2025 in Cologne. This year’s event will bring together more than 15 faculty members and 18 students from six schools for a week-long intensive design workshop including SIVA Shanghai as this year’s guest partner of GDI. The workshop will be followed by a one-day un.conference.

All dates at a glance

17-21 February 2025:                      GDI conference workshop in Cologne
21 February 2025, from 2 p.m.:  Public presentation at the KISD
22/02/2025, 10:30-17:30:             Public conference at the KISD

Participation only with registration until Thursday, 20 February via gdi.cologne@gmail.com

Click here for the conference programme

As a novelty in the history of GDI, KISD has partnered with urbz, an international urban research collective that focuses on community-led development and inclusive urbanism. The workshop Third Places in Cologne: Designing Transformations for Convivial Encounters is developed and will be co-led by Rahul Srivastava and Clarissa Pelino from urbz and Philipp Heidkamp from KISD. This partnership is an exciting step forward for the GDI Network, demonstrating its commitment to promoting interdisciplinary learning, fostering global collaboration, and driving positive change in our cities. The collaboration will provide both faculty and students unique insights into innovative approaches to explore, frame and design in a specific urban context in close collaboration with local partners. This workshop aims at recognizing, understanding and supporting (pre-identified) spaces of sociability, exchange, and urban resistance in Cologne. By engaging in observation as well as dialogue with the different stakeholders engaged in these spaces and drawing from experiences and settings from their hometowns, students explore opportunities to understand their potential and imagine, project and protoype possible and desirable futures for them.

This year’s partnerships aim to foster interdisciplinary learning experiences by integrating local knowledge, expertise, cultural perspectives, and grassroots initiatives into the workshop’s curriculum. Through partnering with various local organizations, artists and collectives we will seek ways to both learn from them and create local impact through this global collaboration. The workshop results will be presented at KISD on Friday, February 21 from 2pm on.

On Saturday, February 22, GDI will conclude with the un.conference about “Global Design (Collaborations) – Local Impact” both reflecting the outcomes of the ongoing collaboration, but also exploring future opportunities of academic formats and modes of collaborations with local partners and communities. The un.conference is scheduled from 10.30 to 17.30h.

Everybody is welcome, but please register until Thursday, February 20 at gdi.cologne@gmail.com. Participation is free, but we charge 6€ for water, coffee and a light lunch.

The Global Design Initiative is a joint venture among five globally-oriented Art and Design Universities and Institutes: LASALLE University of the Arts Singapore, Musashino Art University, Tokyo; SCID, Shih-Chien University, Taipei; Central Saint Martins, University of the Arts, London and Köln International School of Design / TH Köln, Cologne. GDI has been collaborating on annual workshops since 2015, each year hosted by one of the partnering schools.

Website: www.globaldesigninitiative.com
Instagram: @gdi_cologne
Contact: gdi.cologne@gmail.com
Partner: www.urbz.net