Upcoming Events

A celebration of the DesignTO Awards presented by Herman Miller

The DesignTO Awards recognize design excellence at the DesignTO Festival, an annual festival that celebrates design as a multidisciplinary form of creative thinking and making. Featuring the work of hundreds of designers each year, the Festival showcases locally made furniture, lighting, products, graphic and experiential design, interiors and architecture, accessories, ceramics, and more.

Presented by DesignTO and Herman Miller, this 3-part event celebrates the DesignTO Awards and its 2020 awardees through a deeper dive into 3 distinct projects and practices.

1. The Archive

Take a virtual visit to the Herman Miller Archives and learn how the company uses its history to inform the present, and future. Amy Auscherman, Head of Archives and Brand Heritage at Herman Miller, will share ways the corporate archive is used—from product development to brand marketing—and how designers like Charles and Ray Eames and Alexander Girard documented their own design processes.

2. The Glyph

Join designer Mia Cinelli and arts manager Anahita Azrahimi for a conversation about Mia’s typographic work that won Best in Festival for New Work at the DesignTO Festival earlier this year. They will discuss Mia’s hybrid practice, speculative design, and designing experience, as well as the process of creating Mia’s glyphs (letterform symbols) that capture human emotions and gestures.

3. The City

Hear from Ana Rita Morais, Chair of Design at George Brown College, and Institute without Boundaries graduate Samira Matan about the exhibition ‘Playroom.TO: Towards an Ethical Smart City’, Juror’s Choice for Community Wellbeing. Playroom.TO showcased the students’ research insights and scenarios on Ethical Smart Cities, allowing visitors to learn how an Ethical Smart City develops with values, technology and challenges, while also giving them an opportunity to give input on how they think Toronto’s major challenges should be solved.