Anna Zhao

anna.whizh@yahoo.com

THE human imagination has been constantly refreshing the boundaries of ease and relaxation in life by turning out new designs, and now at the 4th China (Shenzhen) International Design Fair, the next stage of development will be revealed. The fair will be held from Sunday to Tuesday at the Shenzhen Convention and Exhibition Center.

Themed “Design·Connecting All Possibilities,” this year’s fair will host pioneering designs in seven display areas, 15,000 square meters in total, in Hall 2.

Products to be showcased will include the latest designs for robots, drones, wearable devices, virtual reality (VR) and smart gadgets as well as shared design technologies, incubators and platforms.

With a rising influence in the global industrial design industry, this year’s fair will see 234 exhibitors from more than 30 countries and regions bringing about 6,000 designs to the city. Space set out for 175 overseas exhibitors accounts for 75 percent of the total exhibition space, with award-winning designs from Germany, Denmark, Italy, the Netherlands, the United States, South Korea, Japan and more.

Fair highlights include designs that have won coveted awards, including Italy’s A’Design Award, Japan’s G-mark award, the IDEA award from the United States and Germany’s iF award.

The fair will host 19 different product launches, such as new wrist watches jointly developed by Britain’s Michael Young and Shenzhen-based CIGA Design; smart household surveillance cameras, noise-cancelling headphones and interactive picture books by Chinese makerspace LKKER; and new products from Canadian company InstruMMents.

An interaction area at the fair will let visitors experience the world’s first 3-D cinema and the first VR theme park to visitors with the latest Augmented Reality (AR) and VR technology from Shenzhen companies.

In addition, designers with international acclaim will share their ideas on the latest developments in industrial design and how design can drive technological innovation in the era of the Internet of Things (IoT) at several forums during the fair.

Leading speakers will include Luisa Bocchietto, president elect of International Council of Societies of Industrial Design; Ralph Wiegmann, Chairman of iF International Forum Design; Dutch designer Richard Hutten; British designer Michael Young; Jonathan Nelson, CEO of Silicon Valley-based technology group Hackers & Founders; Italian desiger Alessio Abdolahian; and more.

Products that won praise from Premier Li Keqiang at the National Mass Innovation and Entrepreneurship Week in mid-October will also be displayed, including the aerial photograph drone AEE Condor Elite, a mini laser projector, the Nano 360 degree VR camera, and the 3-D headset cinema.

Aside from arrays of dazzling new products, the exhibition hall may also please visitors’ eyes with a mastermind design from Danish design team Holscher Design, who aim to present the fair’s practical and functional perspectives with simple but elegant designs.

The fair’s organizer, Shenzhen Industrial Design Profession Association, said the fair will promote integration between design and artificial intelligence, genetic engineering, the Internet of Things and smart housing.