Vienna Design Week

No prizes for guessing the topic of this festival: the Vienna Design Week does what it says on the label, with an eclectic array of events across the city.

• Annual international festival of design held throughout Vienna
• Features both regular themes and one-off tracks
• 10 days or so of events for both professionals and the curious layperson
• 2024 dates: Sept 20-29
• See also:
  • Fesch’Markt Wien
  • Blickfang Design Fair
  • Edelstoff design market
  • WAMP design market
  • Vienna in September

What’s the DESIGN WEEK all about?

(Urban Food track 2022; press photo © Herd Open Kitchen – Vienna Design Week)

Design Week showcases design projects, innovations, processes, and approaches through a wide range of exhibitions, workshops, lectures, tours, and more.

In doing so, the festival presents design as an interdisciplinary endeavour, where aesthetics, sociopolitics, and practical application all meet (perhaps for coffee served out of remarkably elegant yet entirely practical mugs).

Regular tracks include, for example:

• A guest Viennese district: Brigittenau carried the baton in 2021, for example, and 2022 saw the honour pass to the 6th district (Mariahilf). In 2023, the 2nd district (Leopoldstadt, home to the Prater) found itself the focus of attention

• Urban Food & Design: a track exploring new concepts in the realm of local food production, distribution, and consumption

A strong international flavour always runs through the programme, and the main location changes each year.

2023 had its HQ at Laufbergergasse 12 in that lucky sliver of land sandwiched between the giant Prater park and the Donaukanal arm of the Danube.

The 2022 HQ spread across three locations:

• The “Gasse” at Esterházygasse 22
• The “Gewölbe” at Rahlgasse 8
• The “Gstätten” at Mollardgasse 50

The 2021 HQ set up store in industrial and office premises on Sachsenplatz square (named for the participation of troops from Saxony on the Austrian side at the 1866 Battle of Königgrätz).

Design Week events typically take place throughout the city, however, with numerous programme partners contributing everything from exhibitions to one-off talks.

For full details of the festival and the myriad of associated activities, visit the official website.

2024 dates

The 2024 festival is set to run from September 20th to 29th.

How to get to the HQ

We shall have to see which city district provides the HQ home for the 2024 edition.