Rebecca Ejifoma
Design Week Lagos (DWL) is set to host Africa’s first virtual design festival from Thursday October 1 to Sunday October 11 this year to promote creativity and innovation.
DWL virtual design festival will be showcasing vernacular designs to a global audience this year.
Design Week Lagos was established as an annual citywide celebration held in Lagos Nigeria over 11 days promoting creativity and innovation across disciplines including architecture, industrial design, interior design, furniture design, graphic design, and technology.
While it aims to create a recognisable design culture of Africa, DWL visual design festival will be bringing the African creative community together in a festival term vernacular design.
With a large part of the world still in lockdown due to the COVID-19 pandemic the design industry Africa is facing immense challenges.
The festival is on the quest to promote innovation and covers a range of design disciplines including architecture ,product design interior design, furniture design, graphic design and technology.
According to the Founder of DWL, Titi Ogufere, the festival will be a celebration of African vernacular design. “The continent is rich in designs, architecture and crafts inherited from previous generations are unique unlike anything found anywhere else”.
She expressed that vernacular designs based on local names materials and traditions is what gives a place it’s character.
The founder further hinted that they would be rolling out online tasks, a roundtable an auction, exhibitions, a concert, an awards programme, product launch and more.
“We cannot act like these are normal times. We can, at least, explore ways of doing business connecting our design community and helping Africa creatives find their voice, Ogufere added.
The organisers also noted that there would be a pre-festival round table on August 15 this year bringing together some Africa is critical thinkers like Dermas Nwoko, Joe Addo, Kunle Adeyemi, Jumoke Adenowo, Victor Ekpuk and Jomo Tarik.
