DesignPhiladelphia
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news + commentary on design

Believe it or Not…It’s time to start thinking about the DesignPhiladelphia Festival 

By Tiffany Mercer Robbins on Apr 04, 2022

Preparations are underway for this year’s DesignPhiladelphia festival.  What are you going to do? As always, there are lots of ways to get involved this year.  Registration is now live, so login/create an account and start thinking about what your exhibit or event will be. We are bringing back our Festival Hubs at Cherry Street Pier and the Center for Architecture and Design for the festival from October 12-23rd.  We pushed the festival back a week this year to respect Yom Kippur.  Our Kickoff Party is Wednesday, October 12th at Cherry Street Pier, and we are hoping to highlight more designers this year at the Pier and at the Center for Architecture and Design—stay tuned in the coming weeks for more details about how you can show off what you’ve been working on.  Deadlines! This year we are asking our event partners and sponsors to provide us with…   Your event title; and one sentence describing your event  …by the Early Bird Deadline of May 20, 2022 ($300 fee) or June 24th ($500 fee).  It’s really important for us to know the types of events that are happening with enough time to organize our communications strategy and to sometimes suggest collaborations or strategize about dates to minimize conflicts between... Read more »

Design for Manufacture: How Companies Are Saving Money and Launching Their Product More Quickly

By Tiffany Mercer Robbins on Oct 25, 2021

In every industry, there are hurdles to getting a new product to market. This is especially true in the pharmaceutical and biotech industries. They are highly regulated—and not just the products, but the packaging too! As a result, it can be easy to default packaging design to follow the status-quo, bypassing the opportunity for innovation. This is where Oliver Design can help. Mark Foster, General Manager, and the Oliver Design team know these industries inside and out. Because of their niche expertise, they can push the envelope while still designing for manufacture (DfM), which is the foundation of all their work. DfM is an extremely important concept, but one that is often overlooked in packaging. It has a long history of simplification in the manufacturing process. In the pharmaceutical and biotech industries, efficiencies are extremely important, and packaging should never delay when a product is launched to market. DfM can help with that. In this interview, Mark Foster answers questions about DfM, specifically the common advantages, benefits, and challenges. Q: What do you mean when you say design for manufacture? FOSTER: Design for Manufacture is exactly what it sounds like—designing with the manufacturing process in mind. This ensures your sketch... Read more »

There’s Treasure Everywhere at The Design Center

By Tiffany Mercer Robbins on Oct 17, 2021

Among the Design Center’s vast collection is this South American painted textile from as early as the 12th century. Jefferson’s textile and costume collection features 150,000 pieces with some objects dating back to the 4th century. For curator Jade Papa, some of the most rewarding parts of her job come from discovering hidden treasures in the vast textile and costume collection at Jefferson’s Design Center. And with some 150,000 pieces housed in the mid-20th-century ranch home on the edge of East Falls Campus, these special moments come frequently. The other day, Papa was combing through boxes of South American pieces—part of the University’s effort to categorize and digitalize the collection’s non-Western objects—when she spied a large piece of woven cloth in a natural tone. Papa had a feeling something stood out with this textile covered with painted designs of people and fish. After researching the fabric, she discovered it came from the Chancay culture, circa 1100-1400. Design Center curator Jade Papa sets up an 1880s bustle dress, part of the “Behind the Seams” exhibit at Hayward Hall. “We’re always making new discoveries, so it’s almost like we’re getting new stuff,” Papa says. The museum-quality collection spans the world and stretches back in time. Its... Read more »

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