World Design at Princess Vlei

17 December 2012

The World Design Capital is to be hosted by Cape Town in 2014, with the theme “Live Design, Transform Lives”. The previous events and the current one in Helsinki have shown that the notion of ‘design’ as a tool can be interpreted widely. It encompasses the creative way of conceiving objects, places and spaces, as well as processes.

The City’s vision is for us to work together to transform our city into one of the most inclusive, sustainable, liveable and productive on the African continent. For this to happen, the activities of WDC 2014 should have meaning to ordinary people and designs must be relevant to the needs of society. It thus begs the question, what are the key challenges we face, and how do we use design as a transformative medium to achieve our objective?

The WDC platform offers a wonderful opportunity for our communities to build partnerships with NGO’s, academia, professionals, business, designers, and government to promote, nurture and transform the conceptual people’s plan for Princess Vlei into a design for a high quality multi-purpose district urban park. This idea has already been mooted in the now approved Cape Town Spatial Development Framework, as well as the District Spatial Plan. The efforts of the Princess Vlei Forum  to-date have served to highlight the cultural value of the landscape, bridge historic divides, build partnerships, reconnect people with the meaning and spirit of place, and rebuild social and economic inclusion.

But how do we harness the problem-solving powers of our designers, and the creativity and resourcefulness of our communities, to create innovative solutions that will improve the quality of lives through design? This is our challenge, and we invite you to participate in the discourse of how we can best celebrate overcoming our own problems in the face of adversity. You might have the energy, an innovative idea, information, inspiration, a dream, or resources that can be shared to invent practical design solutions to on-the-ground problems in a collaborative way.

We encourage you to join hands with the PVF and to visit our website as well as that of the WDC 2014 – get involved, help inspire the youth, help build a legacy, make our area safe, celebrate our diversity, experiment, and be creative.