Anne Zhang

zhangy49@gmail.com

THE fourth Hong Kong-Shenzhen Culture and Creative Forum will kick off Thursday at the InnoCenter in Kowloon Tong, Hong Kong.

Co-organized by Shenzhen Industrial Design Profession Association, the Hong Kong Federation of Design Associations and Hong Kong Design Center, the annual forum has alternated between the two neighboring cities since 2010 to promote creative and cultural exchanges.

This year’s forum will center on creating design partnerships between the two cities and exploring the development of Qianhai into South China’s “Manhattan.” Qianhai is a 15-square-kilometer coastal strip in western Shenzhen that the two cities are developing into a modern service industry hub.

Also during the forum, a delegation from Shenzhen’s design industry and representatives of Qianhai will share their vision for Qianhai’s development and discuss cooperative proposals with their Hong Kong counterparts.

The forum will be highlighted by the Inclusive Design — Asia Conference 2013, in which design professionals will talk about how to use inclusive design to build a better social environment that fits people of different ages and health conditions. They will share their opinions on how to build Qianhai into a creative cooperative pilot zone of modern service industries including finance, modern logistics, information services and technology services.

Nine well-known international designers will share cutting-edge design ideas and information in three themed workshops. They include Dr. Stephen B. Wilcox, founder of U.S. company Design Science; Dan Formosa, consultant at U.S.-based Smart Design; Jeremy Myerson and Rama Gheerawo, with the Helen Hamlyn Center for Design at Royal College of Art in the United Kingdom; and Keiji Kawahara, president of Japan-based KIDStudio Corp.

During the forum, the Shenzhen delegation will have a chance to visit some of Hong Kong’s established design companies, including James Law Cybertecture International, KES Interior Design Co. and POSH Network Center.

In addition, an online design information platform will be launched during the forum. The platform will provide comprehensive international design resources for Shenzhen and Hong Kong designers. It will also enable other companies to choose designers for their projects and help governmental agencies gather resources for future design-related activities such as seminars and exhibitions.