Design Wales Forum visits The South West Design Forum

Media and Innovation Awards in Plymouth


Design Wales Forum was able to secure some funding from the HEFCW SIP Programme fund to make a  visit with South West Design Forum. The Strategic Insight Programme (SIP) was launched to help university staff develop and build relationships with external partner organisations. Design Wales Forum is currently looking at ways to create a sustainable model for the forum. The visit with South West Design Forum enabled Design Wales Forum co-ordinator Victoria Jones to open a dialogue between the South West Design Forum and Design Wales Forum. A further meeting has been arranged in order to discuss future potential for collaboration.

During her visit Victoria shadowed Tim Burley chair of the South West Design Forum. She attended the Media and Innovation Summit, the South West Design Forum AGM and the Media and Innovation Awards.

"This was an opportunity to gain insight of another design organisation: how it is structured and how its activites are run. The only way to have gained this information was by spending time with them." Victoria Jones, Design Wales Forum.

Colour and Trend Event A/W 2011/12

Booking Now Open!

Design Wales Forum Presents
Colour and Trend Event A/W 2011/12

October 2010 sees the return of Design Wales’ much missed colour and trend event. Presented by Jaana Jatyri CEO of Trendstop, the event will cover the A/W season 2011/12. The inspirations behind the trends and their practical application will be covered.

The event will feature a round up of the developments in the fashion and textile sectors in Wales in the past year. If you have any developments/ awards/ facilities you would like others to use/  in your business, organisation or network and you would like to share them with your peers, please forward the information to Victoria Jones at vjones@designwalesforum.org

who should attend: fashion, textiles, product and graphic designers
date:15th October 2010
venue:Central Cardiff
cost: £50 (including lunch)

To secure a place contact Victoria Jones on 02920 417 018

Practical insight to design careers from the DESIGN WALES FORUM

The audience.

Professional "mingling" after the interviews.

The panel.

We’ve been receiving great feedback about the Design Wales Forum event we held earlier this week (20th July) at the Wales Millennium Centre.

"Help I’m a graduating designer…what do I do next"? brought together a panel of established creative professionals from the design sector in Wales to talk about their career paths since graduation to provide insight to those just finishing their degree. The panel revealed their personal stories whilst being interviewed, chat-show style, by Design Wales Forum Coordinator Victoria Jones. If there were common threads about how their creative careers had developed, it was probably in maintaining a singular focus and desire to work in the creative sector. This along with making sure they were ready to take advantage of every opportunity they came across – which frequently came from unexpected places and had results they could never have foreseen.

After a rapid 90 minutes of interviews the audience, panel and Design Wales team were encouraged to “mingle”, swapping contact details and exchanging ideas – because you never know where your next opportunity or even a possible business partner might come from!


We have to thank the panel for their time and being prepared to tell their personal professional stories. They were:

Felicity Sawkins (fashion)
http://www.tinkersinfinity.com/,

Carla Reynolds (ceramics and creative business advice),

Dominic Eggbeer (product design and research)
http://www.pdronline.co.uk/whatwedo_research.php,

Tim Harling (graphic design)
http://www.keepdesigntidy.com/,

Kate Vaughan (copywriter)
http://www.the-proofreader.co.uk/
http://www.blindspotdesign.co.uk,

Ollie Wells, (interactive media)
http://www.sequence.co.uk/,

Emma Luczyn (interactive media)
http://www.sequence.co.uk/.

This event was a partnership between the Design Wales Forum and the Wales Millennium Centre, who expertly provided the venue, sound engineer and house staff.

Design Wales Forum and the Wales Millennium Centre Present....

Help I’m a Graduating Designer… What Do I Do Next?
After all the stress and activity of finishing your degree… you begin to realise that you have to think about what you are going to do next. Should you get a job? Start a business? Study further? There are a myriad of possible paths to take and decisions to make… it can all be a bit bewildering. You are not the only new designer to have gone through this…
We have invited a panel of designers from different disciplines and other creatives to share their experiences of what happened to them after they graduated, and what they did next. This chat show style event will also include an opportunity for you to ask questions of them yourself.
This FREE event would be useful for recent design and other creative graduates. For further details and to book a place email vjones@designwalesforum.org / 02920 417 018
Date: 20th of July 2010
Time: 6:30pm – 8:30pm
Venue: Wales Millennium Centre