To all members of the press
November 9, 2023
WDO World Design Assembly Tokyo 2023 Administrative Office

192 design professionals from 32 countries and regions

WDO World Design Assembly Tokyo 2023 Closes
Discussing the future of society through design
The World Design Assembly (WDA) is presented by the World Design Organization (WDO),
an international organization in the design field. At this year, for three days from Friday,
October 27 to Sunday, October 29, the WDO World Design Assembly Tokyo 2023 was held by
the Administrative Office of World Design Assembly Tokyo 2023 (parent organization: Japan
Institute of Design Promotion). This conference, held in Japan for the first time in 34 years,
upheld the slogan DESIGN BEYOND and gathered 192 design professionals and otherspecialists in a wide range of fields including ecology, engineering, communication, science,and technology from 32 countries and regions. The participants discussed the new roles andpossibilities of design for three days. In addition, a total of 1,300 people visited the site orwatched the conference online.

Group photo of the speakers after the conference: David Kusuma, WDO President (frontrow, fifth from left), Kazuo Tanaka, Executive Committee Chairperson of WDO WorldDesign Assembly Tokyo 2023 (front row, fifth from right)

For media inquiries, please contact:
PR Office, WDO World Design Assembly Tokyo 2023 Public Relations Committee(Dentsu PR Consulting)E-mail:wda2023.tokyo@sec.dentsuprc.co.jp

27th (Friday) Research and Education Forum Agenda (titles omitted)●Opening Remarks
Presented by David Kusuma (WDO President), Kazuo Tanaka (Executive Committee Chairpersonof WDO World Design Assembly Tokyo 2023, CEO of GK Design Group, Inc.), Pier Paolo Peruccio(Professor of Design Faculty, Polytechnic University of Turin), Toru Yamamoto (Mayor of SumidaCity)●Keynote SessionsAyse Birsel (Co-founder of Birsel + Seck, industrial designer): “DESIGN FEINT”; Jian Liu(Associate Dean, Professor, School of Architecture, Tsinghua University): “People, Nature &Policy: Planning for Sustainable Human Settlement Development with Design Thinking”●Paper Presentations
Presentations by 19 groups from every part of the world on three themes: Design for Humanity,
Design for Human-Centred Technology, Behavioural Design for Planet●Panel Discussion
Presentations by Jacob Mathew (Senior Design Principal, Srishti Manipal Institute), Kenta Ono(Professor, Design Research Institute, Chiba University), Hyungkun Yoon (Director, Korean
Society of Design Science), Michal Ziso (Architect, Founder & CEO of ZISO and The SLEEP),
followed by a discussion moderated by Tadanori Nagasawa (Former President of Musashino ArtUniversity)●Closing Keynote
Katja Forbes (Design Leader & DEI Director, Data Visualization Society): “How Design Can
Regenerate the Earth”
27th (Friday) Research and Education Forum

Opening remark by Kazuo Tanaka,
Executive Committee Chairperson

Keynote speaker Ayse Birsel

Panel discussion

Paper presentations

28th (Saturday) International Design Conference Agenda (titles omitted)●Opening Remarks
Presented by David Kusuma (WDO President), Kazuo Tanaka (Executive Committee Chairpersonof WDO World Design Assembly Tokyo 2023, CEO of GK Design Group, Inc.)
Video messages from Yuriko Koike (Governor of Tokyo) and Nobuhiro Yoshida (Parliamentary
Vice Minister of Economy, Trade and Industry)●Keynote Sessions
Moderator: Seiichi Saito (Panoramatiks Principal)
Tim Ingold (Emeritus Professor of Social Anthropology, University of Aberdeen, social
anthropologist): “DESIGN FOR HUMAN TO COME”
Ana Arriola-Kanada (Executive Director of IDEO Tokyo): “Multiplicity Abstracted”
Marianne Mensah (Founder, CEO, the Climate Innovation Education Lab [CIEL]):“Towards a REGENERATIVE, NET-ZERO, RESILIENT FUTURE”●World Design Medal Laureate Special Address
The World Design Medal honors an individual selected by WDO who has contributed to theadvancement of industrial design. Patricia Moore (FIDSA President, designer of Moore DesignAssociates, gerontologist) won the award.
●Breakout Sessions
Divided into 4 sessions: Humanity, Planet, Technology, Policy. Presentations by groups of 4-6
members, followed by discussions.
Humanity
Moderator: Minako Ikeda (Associate Professor, Kyushu University)
Speakers: Dominique Chen (Professor, Faculty of Letters, Arts and Sciences, Waseda University),
Junichi Rekimoto (Professor at the University of Tokyo, Deputy Director at Sony ComputerScience Laboratories), Cameron Sinclair (Founder, Worldchanging Institute)PlanetModerator: Daijiro Mizuno (Professor, Kyoto Institute of Technology)
Speakers: Dwinita Larasati (Lecturer/researcher, Faculty of Art & Design, Bandung Institute ofTechnology, Indonesia), Monika Koncz-MacKenzie (Senior Design and Innovation Manager atEllen MacArthur Foundation), Eisuke Tachikawa (President of Japan Industrial Design
Association [JIDA], CEO of NOSIGNER)
Technology
Moderator: Suzanne Mooney (Associate Professor, Tama Art University)
Speakers: Yutaka Matsuo (Professor at Graduate School of Engineering, the University of Tokyo),
Koji Sasaki (Chief Researcher, Research and Development Group, Hitachi, Ltd.), Miyuki Tanaka(Curator/Producer)
PolicyModerator: Kinya Tagawa (CEO, Takram)
Speakers: Takashi Asanuma (Vice-Minister for Digital Transformation, Chief Officer of DigitalAgency), Chi-Yi Chang (President of Taiwan Design Research Institute), Hiroshi Harakawa(Deputy Director, Design Policy Office, Commerce and Service Industry Policy Group, Ministry ofEconomy, Trade and Industry), Muhammad Neil El Himam (Deputy Minister for Digital Economyand Creative Products at the Ministry of Tourism and Creative Economy, Indonesia), Anna
Whicher (Associate Director of Research at PDR)
●Afternoon Plenary Session
Five moderators including Seiichi Saito summarized the meeting.
Major topics included departure from human-centered design, respect for locality, and the needfor a bridge to close the gap between local designs and designs by large businesses and thegovernment.

28th (Saturday) International Design Conference

Keynote speaker Tim Ingold

World Design Medal Laureate (left: Patricia Moore,
right: David Kusuma)

Breakout Session (Humanity)

Breakout Session (Planet)

Breakout Session (Technology)

Breakout Session (Policy)

Plenary Session 1

Plenary Session 2

WDO World Design Assembly Tokyo 2023 Overview
Dates: Friday, October 27 ‒ Sunday, October 29*Open to the public only on October 27 and 28
・ October 27 [Research & Education Forum]
Forum on design research and education(Research/study presentations, poster display, and discussions)
Venue: Design Research Institute, Chiba University (Sumida, Tokyo)
・ October 28 [Design Conference]
International design conference featuring speakers from each country(Keynote speeches, breakout sessions, and panel discussion focusing on sub-themes)
Venue: Roppongi Academy Hills (Roppongi, Tokyo)
・ October 29 [WDO General Assembly]
Private meeting for WDO members onlyVenue: Roppongi Academy Hills
Number of speakers (general meeting participants) 27th: 25, 28th: 50, 29th: 117
1,300 visitors in total

Resources: About the World Design Organization (WDO)The World Design Organization (WDO) is an international design organization working towardʻDesign for a Better World.ʼ As a special advisory body of the UN Economic and Social Council,
WDO embraces the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), with the goal of contributing totheir achievement through design. The former body of WDO, the International Council ofSocieties of Industrial Design (Icsid), was founded in 1957 with the aim of promoting theimportance of industrial design. In 2017, the organization changed its name to the World DesignOrganization (WDO). Presently, WDO includes about 180 member organizations, educational
institutions, and corporations from about 40 countries and regions. WDO members from Japan
include the Japan Industrial Design Association, Chiba University, Musashino Art University, andTama Art University, International Design Center NAGOYA Inc,Toshiba Corporation,Yamaha
Corporation, in addition to the Japan Institute of Design Promotion.