Off Grid 18: The Experiential City

Events

Off Grid 18: The Experiential City

This February head to Wellington, New Zealand for Off Grid 18: The Experiential City. Extra ‘stopovers’ in Melbourne, Sydney, and Brisbane will help you break up your travel and experience a local design event. Off Grid 18 will engage you in a conversation about designing for the ‘experiential city’, using exciting locations the city becomes the auditorium so you won’t feel trapped in a lecture theatre or conference hotel. Off Grid 18 is a must for all people who connect people to place, be that through architecture, urban design, planning, signage, experience design, art or activism, and everything in between!

Last year the Wellington Chapter organised a conference that not only brought the design community together but two existing chapters —Brisbane and Wellington— and welcomed a new one in Sydney. This year they are doing all again and will be welcoming a new chapter in Melbourne.
‘The Off Grid organisers deserve accolades for pulling together this amazing content. It was wonderful to experience the museums, coffee shops, pubs and connect with design professionals from around the globe.’ —John Lutz, 2016-17 President, SEGD
Off Grid 18 takes place once again on the 26–27 February in Wellington with four provocateurs: Louise Vogel Kielgast from Gehl in Copenhagen, Matt Checkowski from the Department of the Fourth Dimension in LA, Susan Mavor from Public: Architecture + Communication in Vancouver, and Sean Perkins from North in London. They will be joined by many local speakers including Johnson Witehira and Soren Luckins from Büro North.
Louise is social anthropologist, urban development planner, and strategic thinker. Matt is a visionary designer, filmmaker and creative executive. Susan shapes brand identity and weaves cultural messaging into the built environment. Sean creates the building bricks of an organisation’s DNA. Each provocateur speaks at a different venue and attracts a range of local presentations. You will explore the city, visit new locations, hear from international voices and discover local talent — perhaps you will present too!
‘I really enjoyed the format of the Off Grid conference. Hiking off to different locations throughout the city not only helped to get a sense of the place, but was an excellent way to experience the different types of design happening in Wellington’ —John Lutz
Start or travel via Sydney, Brisbane, or Melbourne and participate in a local ‘stopover’ event.
‘Expand your Design Thinking’ is an ideas workshop hosted by Dotdash in Brisbane and forms part of a discussion exploring how Experiential Design can reinvigorate a neglected, but important urban corridor in the heart of the city. Dotdash will take you through the process of solving a particular urban pedestrian challenge using Experiential Design.
‘Choose Your Own Melbourne Adventure’ lets you discover and delight in this uniquely unearthing experience of Melbourne as you divert from the mains streets and uncover hidden treasures with Büro North.
‘What Makes A Great Design’ is a talk in Sydney and is a must for anyone interested in the design process and the reality behind delivering internationally recognised design. Hear from Carlo Giannasca (Urbanite, Frost* Collective), Charlie Bromley and Paul Tabouré (THERE) as they take you though some of their SEGD award winning work.
‘it was great to finally make it down under and meet these designers that have been doing such amazing work! Wellington was a gem’ —John Lutz
The two days in Wellington will be split into four sections: Design and the city, Storytelling and the city, Technology and the city, and Brand and the city. Through the provocateurs and other speakers we will explore what the experiential city is.
Off Grid sits at the intersection of urbanism, placemaking, wayfinding, and design; if you work in, or are intrigued by these areas, make sure you join us! Through insights from social anthropologists, urban planners, strategic thinkers, visionary designers, contemporary artists, filmmakers, brand identity designers, augmented reality experts, and smart city researchers Off Grid explores what really connects people to place.
‘I have to say Off Grid 17 is one of the best trips I’ve had for a design conference’ —Stephen Minning, Managing Director, Brand Culture/Pam Wayfinding