Seoul Design Olympiad Oct. 9-29

Global event to display various “i-Design” products to bring design closer to everyday life

The Seoul Design Olympiad 2009, running from Oct. 9-29, will be an occasion for the world to see the dynamic changes that have been made in Seoul, Korea’s capital for over six centuries, as it will display and hold a variety of festivities on the streets of Seoul in a festival of design.
The festival will take place in a variety of locations in Seoul, including the Jamsil Seoul Olympic Main Stadium, along the banks of the Han River and in downtown Seoul with the main theme of “i-Design,” meaning that we all are designers.
The event breaks down to the Seoul Design Conference, the Seoul Design Exhibition, the Seoul Design Collection Display and the Seoul Design Festival.










The Seoul Design Conference will offer solutions to the global economic slump as world design experts and opinion leaders will gather to discuss “designomics.”
Also to be held is the Citizen’s Design Forum, which will help boost the economic value of design and solve problems in an interesting manner. It will be open to the public free of charge. Along the lines of helping senior citizens, physically handicapped and other isolated brackets of people, an international design competition will also be held to offer design solutions made with warm ideas.
The Seoul Design International Conference is designed to offer a blue print for overcoming the economic slump by focusing on the economic value of design as a new growth engine by inviting well-known designers, design institute operators and opinion leaders from around the world with “Designomics” as the main theme of the event.
The event will take place from Oct. 9-11 with Gianfranco Zakai, chairman of Design Continium; Paul Kelly, a British furniture designer; Kenya Hara, a Japanese designer; Dominic Perrault, a French architect; Dan Formosa and Devin Stowell, joint representatives of Smart Design in the United States; Kim Young-se, representative of Inno Design in Korea; Song Hyo-sang, an architect in Seoul and others.
The Citizen’s Design Forum is an event to show that design is for everyone and not just limited to designers, in an effort to broaden public understanding for design and expand the average person’s horizons. The forum will display a mixture of cultural contents from the daily lives of the people to convey design’s social and cultural values in an easy way.
The event is scheduled for Oct. 15-16 and Oct. 22-23 at the Airdome inside the support athletic facility inside the Jamsil Olympic Stadium.






















Invited speakers include Professor Lee Won-bok of Duksong Women’s University; Broadcaster Ida Dorcey; Critic Ha Jae-bong; Director Pae Soon-hoon of the National Modern Fine Arts Museum; Violonist Cho Yun-bom; and Dr. Lee Shi-hyung, among others.
The Seoul Design Exhibition will display design products at a market place to be staged at Jamsil Olympic Stadium, which is made to look like a big-bowl marketplace where viewers can buy designers’ products directly, an experience one cannot get from downtown shopping.
The event is to be held from Oct. 9-29 at the Jamsil Main Olympic Stadium indoor track and at a special exhibition hall, which will be divided into a number of sections such as the design market exhibition, where design products are sold; the Seoul Future Vision, showing Seoul’s future as the center of design activities; the World Architect Design Invitational Exhibition where new architects and designers will show their products in their own way; the Exhibition on Daily Life in Korea, China and Japan; and the Exhibition of Prize-winning Designs at Seoul Design Competition, which is divided into a number of different themes.
The Exchange Exhibition of Design will feature the ‘Seoul Designers’ Dream,’ where designers will show their passion and dreams for the future in diverse areas of design. The 2009 World Design Market Seoul will display and sell design products by designers from both Korea and overseas. The World Design Culture Exhibition is an occasion for viewers to compare design products from a number of cities with many design-related activities. The Seoul Design Public Collection Exhibition is to be held under the theme of “The design market to beat the economic downturn,” and is not just an exhibition, but an event designed to make a contribution to job creation for young designers in cooperation with large businesses so that young designers can get jobs even as interns and get added points as a benefit of participating in the exhibition with the participating firms.
‘Sustainability’ and ‘Environmentally-friendly Value’ and other creative ideals are mixed in the design products that won prizes, which will be displayed at the Seoul Design Olympiad 2009. With a main theme of Interflow and Consilience, the event will be held at the Jamsil Main Stadium main floor from Oct. 9-29. nw

An exhibition hall scene of Index Awards to be presented at the Seoul Design Expo 2009.

A scene from the international conference at the Seoul Design Expo 2008.

A view of the exhibition hall of “i-sky” design at the Seoul Design Expo 2009.

(Clockwise) Children playing with various shapes of toys to be on display at the Seoul Design Expo 2009, part of Excellence, Design Search and Design Market.
The design of future vision of Seoul to be on display at the Seoul Design Expo 2009.