REPORT 2012 BEIRUT DESIGN WEEK
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MESSAGE FROM ORGANIZERS INFOGRAPHICS
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LAUNCH EVENT/ DESMEEM CONFERENCE PARTICIPATING DESIGNERS’ EVENTS OPEN STUDIOS WORKSHOPS TALKS STREET INTERVENTIONS FILM SCREENINGS
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SCREEN & PRINT OUTDOORS COLLATERALS BY PARTICIPANTS TELEVISION PRESS ADS & ARTICLES SPONSORS
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Dear Friends, We, the MENA Design Research Center founders and Beirut Design Week organizers, would like to take this opportunity to thank everybody who contributed in making the first Beirut Design Week a great success. We are pleased to note that we made headlines in local regional and international press. Over 3500 attendees took part actively in launch events, workshops, talks, conferences, film screenings, and open studios whilst activating Beirut’s design community in one collaborative effort on multiple fronts. From established to young and upcoming designers, the participants showcased Beirut’s current design culture. In this documentation of Beirut Design Week 2012, we have gathered a collection of images and text that summarize the major events that took place during the week. We have also included most of the online and printed press that were released regarding major events. Amidst political turmoil and instability, we believe that Beirut Design Week is very important for the country’s creative economy and brand image. We are dedicated to the progressive development of Beirut Design Week in the coming years and aspire to promote it as a global event (like all design weeks in major cities), knowing that Lebanon is a small country with a young design history. We hope that Beirut Design Week becomes a yearly event where we all collaborate as one voice, and one entity to showcase Beirut as the Design Capital of the Middle East to the global community.
We look forward to seeing you next year,
Doreen Toutikian and Maya Karanouh Beirut Design Week Founders and Organizers
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A VERY SPECIAL THANKS TO Our partners, sponsors and supporters are the heroes of the Beirut Design Week initiative, without them, none of this would have been possible. On such short notice, you all pulled through for us and we want you to know that we truly appreciate all your efforts in helping us. Vrouyr Joubanian, for being the world’s most enduring Project Coordinator Ulrich Novak and Farid Majari from the Goethe Institute Barbara Hewitt from the British Council Nada Sardouk and Mona Fares from Ministry of Tourism Brahim Samaha and Nidal Riachy from Laboratoire D’art David Munir Nabti from AltCity Wael Hmaidan, Nadine Ajami and Layal Nehme from Indyact Dina Debbas for providing calming and soothing advice The whole team at Tagbrands for supporting and pitching in when needed Carol Murr from MTV for being a grear supporter and sponsor Alain Saba from Promonet Media Jihad and Rachad Achkar from Anis Printing Press Francois Harik and Marcus Matossian for creating the best animations All the Desmeemers for putting their heart and soul into their projects Tony Feghali and Eliane Saade at AUB for all their support with the conference Elie Hasbani at the Municipality of Beirut Wyssem Nochi for his support and advice Ziad Mugraby for his great support and all are our other sponsors, media partners, participants, friends and family.
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5 INTERESTING FACTS 1. The brand equity created with Beirut Design Week was
so powerful in terms of marketing that many designers across the country created an event and promoted it as ‘during Beirut Design Week’ even though they were not part of the official participants list.
2. ‘Beirut Design Week’ is now a registered trademark 3. Beirut Design Week is the only week long national event in the Middle East that is completely independent from art exhibits and events.
4. New participants for next year’s Beirut Design Week have already started applying.
5. Beirut Design Week received $100,000 in funding and $200,000 in kind
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BEIRUT DESIGN WEEK LAUNCH EVENT DESMEEM EXHIBITION AT THE MINISTRY OF TOURISM
Beirut Design Week 2012 was launched at the Ministry of Tourism in Hamra with the DESMEEM exibition. The launch event hosted over 450 visitors and marked the beginning of the first Design Week in the Middle East.
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DESMEEM is the international design project of 27 designers from Europe and the Middle East, who collaborated with Lebanese NGOs to create more sustainable and efective solutions to a variety of l issues in Lebanon. BEIRUT DESIGN WEEK REPORT | 11
THE FUTURE OF DESIGN EDUCATION CONFERENCE AT THE AMERICAN UNIVERSITY OF BEIRUT The main conference of Beirut Design Week was held at the American University of Beirut and included a line up of influential design educators from Lebanon & around the world. They came together in Beirut to discuss the future of design education.
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From left to right, the speakers and moderators of the conference: Linda Selwood Choueiry (NDU), Uta Brandes (Koeln International School of Design), Halim Choueiry (AUST), Michael Erlhoff (Koeln International School of Design), Gordon Hush (Glasgow School of Art), Doreen Toutikian (moderator/ director MENA Design Research Center), Jamer Hunt (Parsons New School), Simon Mhanna (moderator), Ayssar Arida, and Tim Marshall (Parsons New School).
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PARTICIPATING DESIGNERS
Jewelry
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Beirut Design Week 2012, the first design event of such a large scale in the region, included 52 participants and over 50 events. These events include collection launches, book launches, performances, catwalks, open studios, workshops, talks, and street interventions. In the next pages, you will find the photos of events of the participating designers that took place in Beirut during the week.
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PARTICIPATING DESIGNERS’ EVENTS NADA DEBS
Nada Debs invited the public to an ‘Artisanal Performance’, where artisans work with their hands on her furniture designs in Saifi Village
SARAH’S BAG
Sarah’s Bag hosted a special visitors day where people came to discover her latest bag collections, with a ‘Making Of’ video projection. 16 | BEIRUT DESIGN WEEK REPORT
ANNABEL KARIM KASSAR
NADA ZEINEH
CAI LIGHT
Annabelle Karim Kassar and CAI Light displayed their designs in Balima, a restaurant in Saifi Village.
Nada Zeineh had an impressive collection launch in her Sursock boutique with a lovely rooftop overlooking the city at sunset. Guests included some of Beirut’s more charismatic characters.
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MARIA HALIOS
‘Boho Beirut’, the title of the new book that was launched by Shirine Saad at Maria Halios design showroom in Mar Mikhael.
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SPARE ARTS GALLERY
Spare Arts gallery displayed their latest furniture collection and hosted a newcomer into the scene, in Mar Mikhael.
MUKHI SISTERS
An upcoming young and trendy duo, bursting on to the jewellery design scene are the Mukhi Sisters. Their event in Beirut Souks brought together a surge of happy visitors, each getting their own special goody bag.
GEORGES EL TEN
Georges El Ten displayed his new collection ‘Out of Clutter’ at Spare Arts Galery in Mar Mikahel. His works are interpretations of musical pieces into illustrations on metal plates.
ATELIER G
Aterlier G launched their new collection of colorful flowy dresses ‘Four Years on the Move’ at their space in Sassine.
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OPEN STUDIOS
Open Studios refer to the days that the participating designers invited the public to visit their studios and offices to be informed about how and where they work. .PSLAB
Internationally acclaimed, Beirut-based .PSLAB opened up their perfect postmodern design studios to the public with private tours by the staff in Mar Mikhael. MAAJOUN
Maajoun, a young duo of typographers and communication designers opened up their doors to other young and curious designers along with homemade cake and beverages. Their studio is located in Corniche al Mazraa.
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APRACTICE
Apractice, an architecture studio in Gemmayzeh invited guests to explore their new interiors and a showcase of their work.
CREATIVE SPACE
A non-profit initiative, the Creative Space in Achrafieh, hosted the entire international team of speakers of the Beirut Design Week conference and met with their young ambitious fashion designers. BEIRUT DESIGN WEEK REPORT | 21
WORKSHOPS JOHNNY FARAH - BAG DESIGN
Johnny Farah’s bag making workshop was such a success that they had to add extra sessions to accomodate the curious participants. The photoshoot with Joe Keserwani was one of the highlights of the Beirut Design Week.
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RANDA TABBAH - JEWELLERY DESIGN
Randa Tabbah’s boutique in Saifi welcomed dozens of people who learnt how to make their own jewellery pieces.
WHITE SUR WHITE - PRODUCT DESIGN
White Sur White’s workshop allowed designers and architects to manufacture their product designs using 3D printing at their studio in Achrafieh.
MIRADA MADRID - DESIGNPRENEURS
Mirada Madrid’s workshop ‘Designpreneurs’ served to bridge the gap between being a designer and an entrepreuneur at AltCity, Hamra.
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DESIGN RESEARCH COMPANY - DESIGN RESEARCH
Design Research Company partners Bianca Bender and Pia Drechsel from Cologne came especially to shre their expertise on Design Research at Laboratoire D’Art. Gemmayze. 24 | BEIRUT DESIGN WEEK REPORT
DENSITY DESIGN - INFOGRAPHICS
Density Design infographic experts Giorgio Roberto Uboldi and Donato Ricci taught the participants how to create infographics using tags about Lebanon from international news reports. This resulted in an exhibition of the created works on the last day of Beirut Design Week.
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service design - giulia bazoli & Eeva campbell
In the Service Design Workshop the participants were asked to design a service for different scenarios using various methods. 26  |  BEIRUT DESIGN WEEK REPORT
video documentation - Nina martin, giorgio bordiga & sara manzini
The Video Documentation Workshop required that each participant develop a new perpective of Beirut. The results were exhibited on the last day of Beirut DEsign Week at Laboratoire D’Art.
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TALKS
Audiences gathered from all over to AltCity in Hamra from Tuesday til Friday to learn from a multitude of designers and their experiences.
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Simon Mhanna and Linda Selwood Choueiry deliver their talk ‘Emotion Flows with Mindful Design’.
Joanna Choukeir tells the public about Imgaination Studio, a social design project to eliminate sectarian differences.
Left: Joumana Ibrahim reveals the issues involved with the lack of public information in Lebanon. Right: Samer Yamani talks about the Design Road project which plans to come to Beirut next.
Left: Ziad Abillama discusses ‘Are Derrida and Design Strangers that never Met?’ at Atelier S/Z in Gemmayze. Top right: Sarah Naim, delivering a DESMEEM talk about the role of design in creative education alongside her teammates Sara Manzini and Tatiana Toutikian. Bottom right: Connie Yeh delivers a DESMEEM talk about the role of design in Energy consumption awareness with teammates Karim Badra, Farah Yassine, and Peter Mattar (below right).
Right: A DESMEEM talk with the Sustainable Consumerism team (Mary Rizk, Giorgio Uboldi, Marwa Boukarim & Nisrine Sarkis) anout how we can use plastic bags to design everyday objects.
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STREET INTERVENTIONS ALL AROUND BEIRUT
EXPAND
Two daring communication designers (Elie Bou Fadel & Sara Makki) decided to take their designs to the streets of Beirut and EXPAND people’s visual field of perception. PACMAN
Image courtesy of Brofessional Review
The Urban Pacman team was at the St. Nicholas Stairs in Gemmayze on the last day of the week selling road signs as memorabilia, a sarcastic take on urban laws in Beirut.
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FILM SCREENINGS
AT ST. NICHOLAS STAIRS IN GEMMAYZE
Every night of Beirut Design Week, a curated selection of design documentary films were screened on the St. Nicholas
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SCREEN & PRINT
Beirut Design Week 2012 website
Organized by
Organized by
2012
BEIRUT DESIGN WEEK Invitation cards
The MENA Design Research Center cordially invites you to the launching event of the Beirut Design Week & Desmeem Exhibition DATE 6 PM, 25th June 2012 VENUE Ministry of Tourism, Hamra RSVP hello@menadesignresearch.com For more information please visit www.beirutdesignweek.com
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2012
BEIRUT DESIGN WEEK
THE FUTURE OF DESIGN EDUCATION CONFERENCE The MENA Design Research Center cordially invites you to attend the Beirut Design Week Conference. DATE 10 AM to 4 PM, 27th of June 2012 VENUE West Hall, AUB GUEST SPEAKERS Tim Marshall Parsons New School for Design Jamer Hunt Parsons New School for Design Uta Brandes Koeln International School of Design Michael Erlhoff Koeln International School of Design Gordon Hush Glasgow School of Art
Ayssar Arida Q-DAR Howayda Al Harithy American University of Beirut Linda Selwood Choueiri Notre Dame University Halim Choueiry American University of Science & Technology Randa Abdel Baki Lebanese American University Marc Baroud Academie Libanaise des Beaux Arts
Map Catalogue
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OUTDOORS
MORE THAN 40 BILLBOARDS ALL OVER BEIRUT
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OUTDOORS
5000 POSTERS ALL OVER BEIRUT
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COLLATERALS BY PARTICIPATING DESIGNERS ADAPTATION OF BEIRUT DESIGN WEEK LOGO
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TVC ON MTV SHORT ANIMATION
TV spot promoting Beirut Design Week on MTV for 2 weeks
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INTERVIEWS ON LBC
DOREEN TOUTIKIAN ON ‘HELWE AL HAYAT’ & ‘BIBEIRUT’
Two interviews conducted on LBC with Doreen Toutikian about Beirut Design Week on program ‘Helwe Beirut’ and ‘BiBeirut’.
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PRESS ADS Beirut Design Week was advertised in Local & regional print magazines.
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PRESS ARTICLES
Beirut Design Week was covered by the following local and international newspapers, magazines, and blogs.
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LOCAL NEWSPAPERS
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A SPECIAL 27 PAGE REVIEW IN CURVE MAGAZINE
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ONLINE ARTICLES
LOCAL & INTERNATIONAL PRESS
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Beirut Design Week was featured on dozens of local, regional and international online magazines , these are some samples.
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MAIN PARTNERS
INSTITUTIONAL PARTNERS
MEDIA PARTNERS
The Mapping Company
MENA Design Research Center 2nd floor Block D, Lazarieh Bldg Riad El Solh, Beirut, Lebanon T +961 1 980 089 (ext 117) E hello@menadesignresearch.com