SAN FRANCISCO DESIGN WEEK 2023
“PLOT TWIST” June 6-11, 2023
“Plot Twist” Theme Leads Conversations,
Workshops and Tours
(May, 2023 – San Francisco, Calif.) San Francisco Design Week (SFDW) returns for its 17th edition from June 6-11 with a series of in-person talks, gatherings, tours, and online programming, bringing people and ideas together across the region. Celebrating with the transformative theme “Plot Twist”. The design festival highlights the Bay Area’s global reputation of design leadership and its distinct culture of innovation, one which advances the lives of billions of people across the world. This year’s timely concept is an opportunity to gather and discuss inspiring stories through the lens of design – complete with unexpected turns, chance encounters, bold characters, and thrilling outcomes.
San Francisco is a city built on twists and turns around a convergence of factors: a strong culture open to new ideas, extensive research and development, a long history of investor start-up funding, all of which have created the ripe conditions for its flourishing world class design leadership. Whether intentional or unexpected, change in these factors presents new opportunities for invention and creativity.
The Bay Area boasts a legacy of fostering creativity in the digital realm. The festival explores the Bay Area’s “secret sauce” of entrepreneurship and innovation, and how design plays a pivotal role within it.
Highlights of SFDW 2023 include:
Design x Venture Track
Produced by Creative Capital
SFDW 2023 has a rallying cry as its theme this year: Plot Twist (Embracing change and taking charge). As part of this year’s theme, the design festival is launching a Venture Track for one of the most creative acts of all—entrepreneurship.
The Design x Venture Track will feature a series of events around design, startups, and venture, and will cover topics such as the in-and-outs of starting a company, fundraising, and angel investing.
Design x Venture Track Program:
A Rollercoaster Ride: A Design x Venture Panel with Founders & Funders
Hear from founders, funders, and design executives at some of the most exciting startups and funds in the Bay Area in an exciting fireside chat.
Bring The Jams: Design x AI Hackathon
How might we leverage AI to design things for the better? Jam with fellow creatives and engineers in a dynamic hackathon that seeks to explore and expand possibilities in this new frontier.
Money Matters: All of the Questions You’ve Wanted to Ask (Digital)
When should I fundraise? What do VCs look for? In a live Q&A session, dive into the nuts-and-bolts of money matters, from fundraising to operating budgets to revenue projections.
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“Dynamic Minds” Series:
Led by best-selling author and leading interior design blogger Diane Dorrans Saeks, this year’s expanded interior designer program follows on the great success of last year’s program.
The program offers a rare opportunity to tour top architecture and interior design studios, meet with designers and architects one-on-one, as well as attend talks and seminars led by Dorrans Saeks, including:
Each highly accomplished designer and architect will speak of works in progress, new work, and what they see happening in the near future. The studio visits celebrate achievement, creativity, the power of ideas, and the power of optimism.
About Diane Dorrans Saeks:
Diane Dorrans Saeks is an editor, design journalist, lecturer, and instructor. She has written for the New York Times, Harper’s Bazaar, Australian Vogue, C Magazine, the Times, London. She is the founder of THE STYLE SALONISTE blog, and posts on her Instagram @dianedorranssaeks and #mylifetimelibrary. She is the author of 24 books on design. Her publisher is Rizzoli.
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Gantri X Bay Area Made:
The Gantri brand will be introducing a new Independent Creator product line during SFDW partnering with Bay Area Made who is creating a curated and styled living space with everything made in the Bay by 40-50 brands. The installation will be open to the public with an opening event. Dates/times TBD.
The 2023 San Francisco Design Week Awards:
Where Innovation Meets Social Responsibility
Not just another design competition. The San Francisco Design Week Awards is an international design competition seeking to encourage thought leadership by supporting designers whose works can contribute towards a positive future for society. SFDW is the premier gathering of the world’s most active design community. Entries for the prestigious SFDW Awards will be judged by a jury composed of leading Bay Area design professionals; those selected will be showcased and have a permanent presence on the SFDW Awards website. For more than 17 years SFDW has provided design professionals with the opportunity to grow their networks, enhance their visibility, find investors for future products that are shaping the future and build their careers. We welcome applicants from across the entire range of design industries.
Submission Deadline May 10, 2023
Juried by top industry professionals:
Audrey Liu: Executive Vice President, Head Of Design at Lyft
Kit Hinrich: Founder and Creative Director at Studio Hinrichs
Suzanne Tucker: Founder of Suzanne Tucker Home
Britt Lindberg: FAIA, Technical Director at Gensler and AIA Secretary
Vincent Braitwaithe: Executive Design Leader & Sr. Program Manager, Design Operations Github
Shujan Bertrand: Founder of Aplat
About San Francisco Design Week
The Future Started Here:
Launched in 2006, San Francisco Design Week (SFDW) is an essential week-long regional festival that showcases the unique intersection of ideas, design, business & entrepreneurism that makes the Bay Area the birthplace of the future.
Now a global phenomenon, San Francisco’s international success is born from a historically free-spirited entrepreneurialism, coupled with the imaginative vision of contemporary design and state-of-the-art technology. Pioneers of new ways of looking at the world, nimble Bay Area start-ups are now among the world’s most influential design-led companies, producing products, services and experiences that profoundly influence the daily lives of billions of people globally.
Through approximately 150 events, SFDW celebrates this spirit of newness by providing approximately attendees unique access to conversations and virtual tours with the designers who are shaping the future — from architecture to fashion, product design to digital services, and everything in between.
SFDW is produced by nonprofit organization Design Bay Area in partnership with IDSA, Center for Architecture+Design, AIA, SFFAMA, SEGD, SDN, IXDA, local consulates, design universities, neighborhood associations and museums.
2023 THEME PARTNER:
The SFDW theme, visual identity, and campaign has been created in collaboration with design firm Pact Studio, a San Francisco-based branding studio committed to developing distinct and strategic brand identities with intentional points of view.
2023 Major sponsors include: Adobe, Mucho, Pact Studio, Robert Half, and others.
@sfdesignweek #SFDW #sfdesignweek #PlotTwist
