Cities For All – Tallinn For All
On 23 September at 10.00 the Estonian Association of Designers will organise a seminar Cities For All – Tallinn For All, introducing the megatrends of this century that should be known by all designers, architects, producers, public service employees as well as service designers.We will discuss the issues of social involvement and the challenges arising from the needs of users in the process of creating new products and services where problems are turned into new possibilities and profitable innovations.Â
In the development of the society, changes have always been driven by technologies and market, relying to a great extant on products, means of production and the attractiveness of brands. Users as people with their needs and variances have started to play an increasingly important role in this process lately. The era of social innovation and design has dawned. In addition to globalisation, digitalisation, changing values, economic growth and immaterialisation of the industry, the megatrends of this century include demographic changes as the society is gradually ageing. It has been estimated that by the year 2025, there will be approximately 113.5 million people of more than 65 years of age living in the European Union.
If our days of retirement or ways of continuing our lives or the lives of our loved ones after braking some bones or becoming paralysed is not on our minds now then when will we ever start to think about it? The elderly and handicapped people are also very keen to travel. Prolongation of life expectancy dramatically increases the number of retired travellers.Â
Tourism is one of the leading global industries with a significant rate of employment. There is a ruthless competition going on between tourism destinations, as the industry is constantly trying to find new ways to draw travellers towards different countries with various attractions such as history, entertainment or travelling comfort. Travelling comfort is established by good design of products and services: flawless information systems, carefully planned and communicated traffic systems, easy-to-use ticket vending terminals, accessibility of transport and buildings to persons with special needs, hotels that consider the wishes of their guests, free WiFi, considering the needs of children and older people, etc.Â
The Estonian Association of Designers has started a project Tallinn For All with the purpose to make the city easily accessible and comfortable to use to all age groups, nations, mothers with small children and persons with special needs by means of social involvement. This initiative is aiming to improve the quality of everyday life of local people as well as tourists. With the help of students from different countries, specialists, interest groups of persons with special needs and others, a dozen new products and services are about to be created during the course of a year. These solutions will concentrate on accessibility and they will be introduced at the Innovation Festival held in the year 2011. The universal design platform of Design For All, which gains more and more supporters from around the world, gives Tallinn, the prospective European Capital of Culture, a chance to modernise, become friendlier towards people and open to all.
The pioneers of Design For All will perform at the seminar. Finn Petren (Sweden), the president of EIDD Design For All, will give an opening speech and Pete Kercher (Italy) will answer the question ‘Why Design for All?’. Francesc Aragall will talk about a city without barriers and explain that the success that Barcelona has in the tourism sector is not only due to its old town; Julia Cassim (England) will provide examples of service design and talk about the difficulties associated with finding the right way in a strange environment. Italian designer Avril Accolla will tell us what to regard as important when looking at products and packaging in order to make them useful for left handed and handicapped people. Based on an example of Estonia, participants will be free to decide whether our country is open to all groups of people.
The seminar will be held in the Rotermanni block, Rotermanni 5 / Roseni 10 (1st floor of the Rotermanny Department Store).
Seminar registration: edl@edl.ee
Participation fee 350.-; for students 150.- (includes a light meal)Payment for participation:Estonian Association of Designers 1120185723 Swedbank
PROGRAM. SEPT 23,10-14.45 SEMINAR: Cities For All – Tallinn For All User needs - design guidepost! Rotermanni Kvartal (Kaubamaja I korrus) Rotermann Quarter (Departement Store,groundfloor)
10:00-10:15 Greetings and description of the project Cities For All – Tallinn For All, Ilona Gurjanova (Estonia) 10:15-10:30 Introduction and greetings from EIDD president, Finn Petren (Sweden) 10:30-11:15 Why Design For All, keynote Pete Kercher (Italy) 11:15-11:50 Wayfinding, Julia Cassim (UK) 11:50-12:30 Lunch
12:30-13:05 Cities without barriers, Francesc Aragall (Spain) 13:05-13:40 Freedom of mobility, Villu Urban (Estonia) 13:40-14:15 Good design enables, bad design disables, Avril Accolla (Italy) 14:15-14:45 Discussion moderated by Pete Kercher
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