Talks and events

Can outdoor wayfinding information increase activity and improve user satisfaction?

Professor Michael Hornberger explains current research on spatial orientation and navigation deficits in people with Alzheimer’s disease, and how wayfinding problems impact people’s outdoor activities, such as driving and walking safely.

In an era when we increasingly rely on technology to navigate – and get lost when it fails – Tristan Gooley’s fascinating knowledge of navigation using natural cues and signs gives us ideas to incorporate into wayfinding system design and help us find our way on our walks.

Our October event takes two different perspectives on how people respond to space, interact with it and move through it, and how wayfinding success or failure can impact our wellbeing.

Denmark-based Urgent.Agency explain their approach to wayfinding and place activation at the Designmuseum Copenhagen and share ideas on how typography has evolved in response to wayfinding needs.

Mark Janetzki shares wayfinding work from the Diadem design studio in Melbourne. Dr Andrew Haig gives an overview of his doctoral research into how we build spatial knowledge, why using paper maps is good for us, and what his research revealed about using landmarks with mobile maps to improve pedestrian navigation.

On the 70th anniversary of the Festival of Britain, Naomi Games gives an illustrated talk about her father Abram Games’s emblem design for the 1951 Festival of Britain.

Pip Hall and Erik Spiekermann both work with letters that are physical objects in the real world. Pip works cutting letters in stone, and Erik is currently involved in letterpress printing. Both will be telling us about their work.

The focus of this event is on colour and its role in the process of navigation, whilst acknowledging that it is just one element of wayfinding systems; others being typography, sign layout, and visual and textual information.

This talk presents insights from a two-year project ‘Repositioning Graphic Heritage’ looking specifically at urban graphic heritage in its setting. It explores the relationship between graphic heritage and heritage interpretation, between presentation and representation, through case studies of a multitude of ‘signs’ in their urban settings.

Caroline Walker, great-niece of MacDonald ‘Max’ Gill and author of MacDonald Gill: Charting a Life  (Unicorn Publishing, 2020) celebrates the artistic legacy of this versatile and multi-talented artist, architect, draughtsman, letterer, mural-painter, and standout mapmaker.

Acclaimed wayfinding designer and theorist, David Gibson reflects on what he has learned since publishing ‘The Wayfinding Handbook: Information Design for Public Places’ (Princeton University Press) in 2009, and why it’s now time for a new edition.

The design of our environment has the power to enable or disable all of us. How intuitively we’re able to navigate that environment impacts all aspects of our lives: how we live, work, and play. For people who are vision impaired, there is yet to be a fully integrated, intuitive solution that enables independent navigation and wayfinding. Many technological innovations entering this space focus heavily on technology, rather than considering the user experience and neuropsychology of how visual information can be perceived through other senses.

oin us to hear specialists from Buro Happold’s Inclusive Design, People Movement and Smart Buildings teams — Jean Hewitt, Elle Beange, and Becky Hayward — who will be exploring in turn: the diversity of humans in the way places are navigated; and the use of analytics to solve complex wayfinding challenges.

This event explores how ‘green thinking’ can be applied to wayfinding design and manufacturing processes and the lifecycle of products. The evening’s speakers include Erik Sørensen Ruiz from Modulex providing insights into the company’s approach. We will also hear from Adele Orcajada from MaterialDriven about ‘future proofing’ and the types of materials and innovation that can provide the toolkit for better and more environmentally sustainable architecture, urban environments, wayfinding, and smarter products. Nick Hughes from UCL will introduce two important framing concepts, ‘the circular economy’ and resource management hierarchy, for understanding resource efficiency. 

Join us for a discussion with SEGD’s CEO, Cybelle Jones, who will discuss ideas on embracing the future rather than fearing it as our global call-to-action, and employing experiential communication design thinking as a means to solving small and large-scale problems. 

Join us at the Sign Design Society for a talk by Professor Kate Jeffery (University College London) exploring how cognitive mapping and other spatial processes underpin wayfinding in both humans and animals.

Sander Baumann, an Amsterdam-based designer will share his experiences of wayfinding and sign design during lockdown, how his business changed overnight and how he found new opportunities to keep moving on.

The mission for February’s talk is to provoke the status quo and encourage new thinking to solve everyday navigation and wayfinding challenges.

Simon Borg examines how the practice’s cross-disciplinary design approach informed the development of authentic and long-lasting experiential spaces at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium London.

Two of the three finalists in the British Sign Awards 2019 wayfinding category will join us to talk through the brief, challenges and inspiration behind their winning commissions.

Professor Paul Stirton explores the influence and work of ‘Die Neue Typographie’ movement through the lens of typographer Jan Tschichold’s life and work.

Simon Yewdall, Lead Strategist at dn&co. talks about place branding, what it is, and why it is needed. He will share some insights into dn&co.’s work for Digbeth in Birmingham, the Royal Docks in London and St James’s.

We celebrate the role that art and light play with two speakers at the forefront of their fields, Paul Arad (Acrylicize) and Jason Bruges (Jason Bruges Studio).

An opportunity to enjoy a full afternoon / evening of design related activities to inspire and challenge. The SDS itinerary takes in two free Birmingham Design Festival talks and a unique Sign Design Society workshop, all hosted by Birmingham City University.