Dutch Design Week (DDW) virtual edition was a success. It reached several hundreds of thousands of people, mainly professionals.
“The organisers are proud of what they achieved, along with the design community” reads a DDW press release. “And in a short amount of time. The diversity of interesting design content resulted.” The Dutch Design Foundation (DDF) organises DDW.
“There were many relevant connections made over the past nine days. Those involved managed to find one another during the week to exchange ideas. These included the business community, professionals, governments, media, and designers.”
Future
However, the live part remains indispensable. DDW sees its future as a hybrid festival with online and offline components.
Last week, DDW became the online centre of the creative industry. There were over 1.500 DUtch and international designers and 750 3D Viewing Rooms. There were also virtual tours and DDW TV. And live streams by partners and designers, among other things.
DDW Virtual in numbers:
Designers: 1500
Events: 600
Livestreams by designers: 400
Programmes, DDW TV: 125
Number of minutes, DDW TV: 3500
Viewers, DDW TV: 50.000
The festival reached hundreds of thousands of people via several outlets. There weren’t only many website visitors and DDW TV viewers from all over the world. The programme got a lot of attention in the Dutch and international media too.
Two weeks before the start of the festival, the organisers were told they couldn’t continue with the live component of the festival. That was based on the advice of the Region’s Safety Council. They decided to concentrate on creating an entirely virtual DDW.
‘Resilience’
That required enormous flexibility from everyone involved. “One of the most special things we have seen this week is the resilience of the design community,” says Martijn Paulen, the DDF’s director. “They managed to create a fantastic online programme in a short time. And they used all the virtual possibilities to the fullest.”
Partly for this reason, the organisers decided to make the 750 3D Viewing Rooms available online for 90 days. That’s instead of just the DDW’s nine. All video content and DDW TV programmes would already remain available on the platform. “So much valuable content has been created.”
“We consider it important to ensure that this content remains accessible throughout the year. People must use it in different ways. We want to continue to work with our partners and the community towards new valuable connections and stories,” concludes Paulen.
