Luisa Bocchietto: “Design is a tool for change and it will serve to improve Valencia”

The president of the World Design Organization (WDO), Luisa Bocchietto, has emphasised at Feria Hábitat València that being named World Design Capital 2022 is a great opportunity for Valencia, since the potential of design as a tool for change “will serve to improve” the city.

“You need to consider what the city is like now and how you want it to be in 2023. The World Design Capital is not a one-day or a weekend event. It is an opportunity to create change. And the scope of this change will depend on the project promotors, designers, companies, authorities and citizens. You have all the elements to do great work,” emphasised Bocchietto at a meeting in Ágora NUDE.

The president of the WDO praised the “excellent work” for preparation of the bid by the Associació València Capital del Disseny. In her opinion, this project will serve to “generate a connection between the designer and the citizen” at a local scale but also to project the image of Valencia internationally, linked to design, a factor that generates returns from the point of view of the economy and tourism.

“We want to use the methodology of industrial design to generate services and products that contribute to creating a better world. We use creativity to create real solutions for current problems,” she underlined.

Round table

At the end of her presentation, the president of the WDO exchanged points of view with the co-director of the Valencia World Design Capital 2022 project, Xavi Calvo; the president of the Associació València Capital del Disseny, Marisa Gallén; the designer Vicent Martínez, one of the main driving forces of the bid; and María Lapiedra, communication director of Valencia World Design Capital.

Calvo insisted that the bid has worked with sustainability goals from day one, and he highlighted projects that were presented to the WDO committee on its visit to Valencia in July last year such as, for example, the future of the Fallas with the use of new materials that protect the environment, the Eólica Wind Tower project by Fran Silvestre and the initiative of the company Closca, with its reusable bottles.

Regarding the capital bid, Marisa Gallén underlined that the project aspires to favour public spaces to create a more empathetic, welcoming, greener city, with appropriate furniture and lighting and better signposting thanks to good graphic design. “And for all of this we need the support of politicians,” she indicated.

“We have already achieved the impossible. What remains is difficult but we will be able to do it. The future is going to improve the viability of companies, communication and people’s quality of life and society is beginning to understand us,” added Vicent Martínez.

World Design Organization

A designer and architect by profession, Luisa Bocchietto has held the Presidency of the World Design Organization since 2017 and this is her last year as president.

The World Design Organization (WDO), which arose in 1967, initially to represent industrial designers, has undergone a considerable evolution with regard to the number of members, aims and representation around the world. The institution works in alignment with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, especially the search for solutions of sustainability and wellbeing. Since 2008, the year of the first design capital, this recognition has been given to the cities of Turin, Seoul, Helsinki, Cape Town, Taipei, Mexico City and Lille (2020).