After a whirlwind of a year in 2011, with six DesignMeets in Toronto, Ottawa, Waterloo and Montreal we’re so humbled and excited to begin a brand new year.

The beautiful sofa’s and furniture at the Umbra Concept Store in Toronto set the stage for a more intimate evening at our last DesignMeets. As a follow up to RGD’s DesignThinkers (DT12), instead of having speakers come up to present in the usual DesignMeets format (5-images and 5-ideas, in 5-minutes), November’s meet-up was a bit more of an open-mic opportunity for people to share their thoughts about the presentations at DT12. Playing on the theme of “connectedness”, there was an overwhelming sense of camaraderie that night as one by one, people stepped up to share a thought , a story, a question or an idea.

 

The discussion stemmed from design and business, to design and education, to design and inspiration and finally rested on design and discourse. At the end of the night, it’s safe to say we all left with a stronger sense of community and a hungering for more dialogue. (See more photos.)

So, with this in mind, we welcome 2012!

Let’s kick off this year with more dialogue among designers. Let’s share our experiences so that we can learn from each other and build a bold Canadian design identity. Let’s inspire one another in a playful atmosphere so that we can improve the design that we do. Let’s challenge organizations to inject design into planning, process, and creation to strengthen our competitiveness, sustainability and our quality of life.

We’re always looking for contibutors and volunteers to help and host, so drop us a line at rsvp@pivotdesigngroup.com if you’re interested and let’s chat. Happy 2012, everyone!