Core77

Design Festival Hamburg 2007
The Design Festival Hamburg 2007 is initiated by the local hamburgunddesign organization. Unlike other design events, any Hamburg based designer can participate at the design festival. Very democratic but on the other side, with over 400 participants the dedications towards the visitors has its ups and downs - reflected by a too general theme ("Design is Everything"), unexpected program changes, and visitors walking into a few closed doors. Being only two years young we are sure this is just part of the growing pains and look forward to next year's event.

During the last days, we selected five highlights - both recognized companies and promising newcomers - that gave this year's festival a worthy profile. Hamburg, being Germany's Nordic design metropolis, has an enormous design base so we are looking forward to see more of this next year(!)

More photos and designlinks after the jump!

Peter Schmidt Group
The Peter Schmidt Group is probably Hamburg's most recognized design agency for corporate and packaging (re)design with over a hundred employees. Monday night, founder Peter Schmidt joined us at 'Dreiklang' ('Three Tone'), an event presenting new packaging for the delicious Baumkuchen cake by Juchheim in Japan. Tonight's show was less about a discussion about the export of German design and more about a relaxing experience supported by Japanese finger foods, atmospheric lighting and relaxing beats by DJ Raphael Marionneau (abstrait), or better, the in-house DJ who happens to work at the Peter Schmidt Group himself.

Material Stories at the Phoenixhof
During the weekend, the Material Stories crew hosted a two-day exhibition at the Phoenixhof focusing on the different strategies for using materials in design to support branding and identity. "Material & Identity" presented insights by design managers and design directors in the context of everyday products to make the exhibit inspiring for both designers and non-designers. With a few hundred visitors the exhibition can be considered one of the weekend's highlights enjoying similar response as Bill Clinton.

Designersliebe
Designersliebe is a local initiative by Sybille Piechura who supports the need for exclusive design and marketing of ideas by Hamburg's creative professionals. At the headquarters/shop we talk about the challenges in getting product prototypes realized with one of the designers. Designersliebe already features an inspiring range of products including tableware, lighting, furniture and interior objects - proving she's been a great support for local designers and knows how to get things done.

Fashionshow at the Stilwerk
Design comrade Bjorn gives us a ride to the Stilwerk, Hamburg's home for high-end products and interiors. For instance, Tobias Grau's famous lights are displayed here - but for many designers this is still a long way to go. Wednesday night at the Stilwerk is not that much about products but all about fashion featuring an enormous catwalk throughout the building where loud beats are guiding the new collections by ten local labels such as Garment, SIUM and Anette Rufeger.

P.S. Hamburg's fashion scene has a lot of labels based in the Marktstrasse - in case you ever end up without a suitcase at the local airport.

Mutabor
We end our five-day design tour with a visit to Mutabor, a graphic design agency with a top location in Hamburg's harbor area. The designers used one the thousands of containers - continuously stapled by robots on the other side of the Elbe river - with a condensed overview of their impressive design work. They have been touring all over town and parked in front of their head office last night where we could enjoy the final hours of this year's design festival with some cold drinks and a panoramic look along the Elbe river which is continuously feeding Hamburg's design scene with people, products and stories from all over the world.