Perched on a sea of scarlet ottomans at the Arabella Sheraton Monday afternoon, the press invitees of the 8th International Design Indaba were extensively briefed by host and founder, Ravi Naidoo, on the exciting design proceedings for the week.
It is hard to keep track, the mainstream Indaba, will be held from Wednesday 23rd - Friday 25th this week, with the Design Indaba expo starting on Friday and running over the weekend. In between a plethora of sideshows, fashion shows, movies, workshops and collaborative initiatives will be on offer.
Jewellery in particular will be under the spotlight as a major South African resource as yet untapped. Since the discovery of gold on the Witwatersrand 119 years ago, a global South African jewellery brand has yet to emerge. A whole Pavilion devoted to local jewellery displays at the Expo and encouraging support from JSE listed mining companies BarlowWorld and Metalon respectively, is sure to help in this regard. International expertise will come in the form of master Italian goldsmith GianCarlo Montebello whose glittering CV is as long as your arm. His Indaba presentation is billed as being about jewellery and body ornaments from 1967 until today!
Also workshopping intensively, with a stellar cast of local and international gurus, are architecture, fashion and new media. This is where it gets tricky - delegates will also have to choose between no less than three added value workshops - "Culture Jamming" with Laugh it Off's Justin Nurse, Running a Design business - featuring Garth Walker and others or Design in Media with Patrick Burgoyne, the celebrated Ed of UK design bible, Creative Review...Eeny meeny miny mo...
The list of speakers from around the world looks incredible, particularly the colour and ingenuity of fellow Southerners - Brazil, who seems to come in pairs, with Fernando and Humberto Campana of celebrated street art fame and brother and sister team, Paula and Paulo Feferbaum, whose edgy fashion outfit is now based in Barcelona. Surprises include South African Pierre Terblanche originally from Uitenhague in the Eastern Cape - who today holds the position of chief designer at Ducatti in Italy! Always a hard act to follow will be the Dutch and Japanese designers and with great minds like Li Edelkoort, Richard Rodriguez and Chip Kidd the Indaba is sure to live up to its reputation as a world class event.
Hopefully it will be well patronised by the public as well as business and brand owners, in support of its raison d'etre - to leverage a market for South Africa¹s burgeoning creative output and create the thriving economy that will result from a global market hungry for all things African.
Can't wait to see you, bright and early Wednesday, at the Indaba!
