We have just concluded our very first stop on the P*DA global tour in New York last month! Two of our P*DA recipients Hans Tan, P*DA Designer of the Year 2018, and Phua Hong Wei of WOHA Architects, lead designer for P*DA Design of the Year 2016 Enabling Village and 2018 for Oasia Hotel Downtown, were invited to New York to lead a workshop and a panel talk at the Smithsonian Design Museum to represent Singapore design.

Hong Wei and Hans conducted an introductory workshop on architecture and product design on 16 April 2019, where they shared about their works and the design process to about 25 students who were part of Cooper Hewitt’s Design Scholars programme.

On 17 April, they presented at the panel talk titled “Thinking through Making: A Panel Discussion”, together with featured NDA winners, John Christakos, Founder, Blu Dot and Mikyoung Kim, Founding Principal, Mikyoung Kim Design. The panel talk was themed around the role of the design making process in the digital era where they shared their thoughts on the future of design and designing for future-readiness. They also shared relevant projects, past and ongoing, that deals with these themes and had an interactive Q&A segment with the audience!

After the talk, both Hans and Hong Wei attended a networking dinner event at Sfoglia Restaurant, which brought together NDA winners, other Cooper Hewitt stakeholders and Singaporean designers based in New York. The dinner, co-hosted by Dsg and Cooper Hewitt, was intended to build friendships and foster connections across the Singapore and US design communities.

If you’d like to know more about the latest crop of P*DA 2018 recipients’ winning projects, visit here. You can also head over to DesignSingapore Council’s Youtube channel and our Award Recipients’ page to find out more! For more on our P*DA outreach programmes with other international partners, visit our stories page here.

Do watch this space for out next stop in London!