World Design Capital Valencia 2022 is a partner of the New European Bauhaus

World Design Capital Valencia 2022 has become a partner of the New European Bauhaus (NEB), the initiative set up by Ursula von der Leyen, president of the European Commission, to initiate a green transformation movement within Europe that is able to change our environments and daily practices, through co-creation and interdisciplinary actions.

The New European Bauhaus is a creative and interdisciplinary initiative that offers a meeting place to design future ways of living. This initiative, launched in September 2020 by Ursula von der Leyen, president of the European Commission, aims to generate a collaborative and participatory debate among creative entities throughout Europe to propose, from art, culture, design, architecture, science and technology, a new European paradigm that will promote a green transformation, able to change our environments and daily practices through collective and interdisciplinary action.

“We have joined this project with design as the lever of change and with the aim of generating a national debate on how to improve our lives with an outlook that is collaborative, inclusive, lasting and beautiful, key values of our World Design Capital,” explains Xavi Calvo, director of World Design Capital Valencia 2022.

“World Design Capital Valencia 2022 is fully aligned with the principles and aims of this initiative. Our own programme and our challenges as World Design Capital are very much based on the same pillars as the New European Bauhaus: sustainability, co-creation and beauty. Our role as partners in this first stage is to generate a dialogue with our whole ecosystem and propose local solutions that can become international references in the following stages of the programme” he adds.

“We currently have available some very powerful communication tools that enable us to generate attendance-based dialogues but which can be broadcast internationally via the major hubs of the NEB and can include social groups that previously had no voice. We are talking about the professional sector – architects, designers, interior designers – but also companies and society in general, with a special look at childhood. We want to reflect on how the city should evolve to become integrated in this new green paradigm, with debates and meetings that examine global challenges in a local manner. We also want to include our institutional partners, our Creative Supporters, schools and adhered entities in these debates and to offer, from Mediterranean design and creativity, solutions that can easily be applied in other parts of Europe,” explains Xavi Calvo.

In this respect, the programming of World Design Capital Valencia 2022 will include activities under this umbrella and other partners of the NEB will be invited to take part in the debate, such as La Marina, Barcelona Centre de Disseny, La Pinada Lab, Non Architecture or other international entities such as the Dutch Design Foundation or Triennale Milano. In this respect, Xavi Calvo has already participated in different international events, talking about the project of World Design Capital Valencia 2022 aligned to the NEB values in forums organised by the city of Helsinki and the conferences of the Triennale Milano.

“We have great expectations of being an active participant of the New European Bauhaus not only in this first stage of the development of ideas, but also in the subsequent stages of prototyping and implementation of projects, resulting from this preliminary work of co-design. We want to position the city as a World Design Capital committed to and aware of the implementation of the values of the NEB, thus forming a perfect laboratory that brings together all the social agents in this implementation stage,” says Kike Correcher, member of the Associació València Capital Mundial del Diseño 2022 and representative of READ in the BEDA (Bureau European Design Association) and one of the first partners of the NEB.