On your way to or from IDSA’s Northeast District Design Conference 2017 from March 31 to April 1 at the Rhode Island School of Design in Providence, drop by Boston Design Week 2017! IDSA is a non-profit partner of the 12-day citywide design festival, as it returns for its fourth year from March 29–April 9, 2017, with most activities free of charge. Many require an RSVP to attend.
Last year, more than 70 groups offered 84 events that were attended by more than 11,000 people in nine Boston neighborhoods and 10 cities and towns in the surrounding area.
This year’s festival will have three Special Focus Tracks. Events that fall into these tracks will receive a special designation online to help audiences find and follow the tracks that interest them. The three tracks for 2017 are Designing Boston, Design and Social Impact and Professional Focus. Designing Boston will include programs on the future design of our city, urban planning, historic preservation, public art and Boston’s architecture. Design and Social Impact includes sustainable and renewable design, design with a social purpose and related areas. Professional Focus incorporates industry-networking events, new product applications, design education and student contests.
Boston Design Week kicks off with events in the Back Bay, Seaport, Metro West and other areas. Room & Board will host a panel in their Back Bay show room on social media influence while EM NARI hosts the CoTY (Contractor of the Year) awards at the Clarke showroom in Milford. For the Fort Point Channel Kick-Off Event, Artists for Humanity will welcome the public to an Open Studio event showcasing inspired works of art and design by teenagers. The Cambridge Kick-Off event will be held at BoConcept on Massachusetts Avenue. Also in the Seaport, Boston Design Center will host events on April 4 centered on kitchen design, as well as several other events throughout the festival.
wo featured galas will be held March 31, when ASID New England hosts its annual award ceremony at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum and April 6, when the AD20/21 art and design show at The Cyclorama hosts a preview. Boston Design Week culminates with AD20/21: Art & Design of the 20th & 21st Centuries and The Boston Print Fair at The Cyclorama, Boston Center for the Arts. The 10th anniversary show and sale also hosts the closing programs of Boston Design Week, with almost 50 exhibitors featuring modern to contemporary fine art and design.
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