Chen Xiaochun

654789759@qq.com

THE opening ceremony of the first Shenzhen Design Week wowed the audience with a spectacular 3-D stereoscopic effect that employed 14 high-definition projectors at the Shekou i-Factory on Friday.

More than 2,000 works by over 200 designers from home and abroad are on show at the exhibition.

The presence of well-known international designers and officials from authoritative international institutes, such as David Grossman, president of the International Council of Design (ico-D), and Luisa Bocchietto, president-elect of the World Design Organization, is also one of the highlights of the design week.

The design week, themed “Design for the Future,” is an important project of the Implementation Measures for Shenzhen’s Cultural and Innovative Development by 2020. In total, it encompasses 45 events including the “Design•Future” themed exhibition, Global “City of Design” Exhibition and Design Tour.

Li Xiaogan, a member of the Standing Committee of the Shenzhen Municipal Committee of the CPC and the city’s publicity chief, said during a speech at the opening ceremony that Shenzhen has always attached great importance to the organic combination of creative design and economics, science, culture and society.

“We have held events for the design industry, such as China Design Exhibition, Shenzhen Design Award for Young Talents in association and cooperation with the UNESCO Creative Cities Network, Shenzhen International Industrial Design Fair and Bi-city Biennale of UrbanismArchitecture, which greatly promoted the development of the cultural and creative industries,” said Li.

Li added that holding Shenzhen Design Week under the new circumstances was an important decision

 by the Shenzhen Municipal Committee of the CPC and the Shenzhen Municipal Government, and it is expected that the design week will become a top-notch event in the international design field, facilitating the process of building Shenzhen into a modern, international and creative city with a matching level of culture.

Currently, Shenzhen is home to over 100,000 creative design professionals. The cultural and creative industries contribute to over 10 percent of the city’s GDP. The city witnessed added value of 194.9 billion yuan (US$28.3 billion) in the cultural and creative industries in 2016, up 11 percent from the previous year.

The government strives to build Shenzhen Design Week into another cultural brand for the city, following China (Shenzhen) International Cultural Industries Fair and Shenzhen Reading Month.