"As we continue to expand on our non-profit mission to support, empower and grow the city's design community, we’re excited to offer impactful year-round programming that builds on the Festival's influence and creates more inclusivity and equitable opportunity for the city’s most creative minds and businesses to flourish,” says Elissa Black, Executive Director, NYCxDESIGN. "This 10th Anniversary of the Festival is a particularly meaningful moment as we connect the national and international design community to NYC’s diverse array of design talent that is shaping our collective future during this critical period of economic recovery.”

“We are proud to celebrate NYCxDESIGN’s 10th Anniversary Festival showcasing the work of New York City artists and designers,” says NYCEDC President and CEO Rachel Loeb. “It is essential for the City to continue to support and invest in the creative economy.”

“Last year we brought the Festival back through successful hybrid events, which were strong indicators of New York’s design spirit and the spirit of the design industry at-large,” says Valerie Hoffman, NYCxDESIGN Program Director. “As we look ahead to this year’s special anniversary edition and future iterations, we will continue to bridge the gap between live and virtual experiences, driving powerful connections and exposing audiences near and far to New York's incredible design ecosystem."

NYCxDESIGN Festival Anchor Events

Bringing together hundreds of established and emerging design brands from across the country and the globe, the city’s marquee events invite members from the industry and the public to witness the best of what’s new in design with inspiring installations, immersive exhibitions, product and project introductions, and more.

• ICFF: The International Contemporary Furniture Fair, North America’s leading platform for contemporary furniture design, will host its annual show from May 15-17, 2022 at Javits Convention Center.
• WantedDesign Manhattan will co-locate with ICFF once again, presenting high-end North American studios (Look Book) and international emerging designers (Launch Pad) from May 15-17, 2022.
• Design Pavilion, New York’s Premier Public Design Exhibition, returns with “Open to the Sky”, a new series of inspiring installations presented across city landmarks like Times Square, the Pulitzer Fountain Plaza, Flatiron Plaza, and more. Aligned with the citywide exhibition, Design Talks NOW 2022, in partnership with Neuehouse New York, will present a new series of provocative conversations, roundtable, and panel discussions.
• The 7th Annual NYCxDESIGN Awards honor outstanding projects and products in categories that span major areas of design and celebrate the spirit of NYC Design. Winners of the NYCxDESIGN Awards will be announced in a special ceremony with Interior Design magazine Editor in Chief, Cindy Allen, published in Interior Design, and promoted on Interior Design’s and NYCxDESIGN’s digital channels. Enter today at nycxdesignawards.com.

Special Initiatives: Design in the NYC Cultural Landscape

Celebrating design’s important thread in New York City’s cultural DNA, physical landscape, and overall creative economy, NYCxDESIGN will present new and revamped initiatives that reconnect the public with some of the city’s most inspiring restaurants, hotels, and public spaces.

• In May, NYCxDESIGN will unveil the winning design installations from its inaugural competition, IMPACTxDESIGN in partnership with Caesarstone. Designers Karim Rashid and Kickie Chudikova developed compelling concepts for Dumbo Brooklyn and Downtown Manhattan, showcasing how dynamic design can enhance public space, one of the city’s most valuable resources, and foster engagement. The two structures will be on view at these public plazas through Winter 2023.
• Building on its successful introduction during the November 2021 Festival, NYCxDESIGN will present the next edition of Open Studios. On select days during the Festival, NYCxDESIGN will host special tours in five design neighborhoods - Clinton Hill & Fort Greene, Nomad & Flatiron, Red Hook, Long Island City and Harlem - offering a behind-the-scenes look at some of the city’s most innovative design studios. Each limited-ticket tour will provide a unique opportunity to meet leading studio designers and witness live demonstrations of their work. The walking tours will each end at a local hot spot to enjoy a spirited cocktail with members of the industry and design enthusiasts alike.
• DRINKSxDESIGN will return in May with exciting new partners and an expanded footprint to support New York City's dynamic culinary and bar scene. As part of this signature Festival program, a group of restaurants, curated by NYCxDESIGN with Eater and Punch, will each prepare a bespoke, design-inspired cocktail for attendees to enjoy as they gather once again. The cocktails served will draw on the creative energy of the Festival, exploring themes from architecture to sustainability in their design.
• With STAYxDESIGN, NYCxDESIGN aims to connect its traveling Festival visitors with local hotels where design is at the heart of the hospitality experience. Early confirmed partners include CIVILIAN, Ace Hotel Brooklyn, Ace Hotel New York, Arlo NoMad, Arlo Midtown, and Arlo SoHo. These special properties will offer welcoming discounts for NYCxDESIGN attendees and will become design destinations during the Festival.

Spotlight on the Next Generation of Design

Coinciding with the end of the school calendar year, the NYCxDESIGN Festival offers a valuable platform for rising design talent to showcase their skills through capstone projects and presentations and engage with the professional design community.

• The annual NYCxDESIGN Student Showcase Night, in partnership with The Cooper Union, The Fashion Institute of Technology (FIT), Parsons, Pratt and The School of Visual Arts (SVA), will return in May for the highly anticipated collaborative event of presentations from each school’s leading design students.
• NYU’s Architecture and Urban Design Lab will present ChangeMakers, the thought-provoking final group project by undergraduates in Professor Louise Harpman’s course.

Discover the Best of NYC Design Across All Five Boroughs

In addition to NYCxDESIGN’s custom programs, a slate of special events is underway for the 2022 Festival – from pop-up exhibitions and tours to immersive and thought-provoking group shows like CURRENT, the Radiator Show, Pink Essay, and DesignLab 2022 featuring independent artists and designers across a range of disciplines. Early highlights include:

• Rockwell Group will host a Walking Tour exploring the unique evolution of NYC’s Theater District, with stops highlighting Broadway's architectural and cultural landmarks, followed by a tour of the new CIVILIAN Hotel, a Festival STAYxDESIGN partner. A natural extension of David Rockwell’s decades of work designing sets for Broadway and theaters, the hotel celebrates its locale by paying homage to the ephemeral art form.
• The Madison Avenue B.I.D. will celebrate its annual Art & Design Weekend with its Spring Gallery Walk and a landmark building architectural tour with the American Institute of Architecture New York from May 14-15.
• IDSA: The Industrial Designers Society of America will celebrate the tenth anniversary of NYCxDESIGN by celebrating the many facets of Industrial Design. Join IDSA section and chapter leaders for this hybrid event (virtual and in-person), and learn more about diversity in industrial design.
• The Interior Arts Building, New York’s premier boutique design destination will host its bi-annual Design61 Program on May 12. Festivities will include a series of panels and keynotes followed by a book signing for featured designers.
• CURRENT is a 3 week pop-up exhibit curated by Marcus and Tess De Paula, showcasing the path between contemporary fine art and design.
• Radiator Show spotlights a group of curated furniture, lighting, and home objects by independent designers to support the new generation of designers.
• Pink Essay, the creative studio by David Eardley, Anna Theroux Ling, and Matt Pecina, will continue its Physical Education event series with its largest group show yet including artists and designers from their growing community.
• DesignLab 2022, at the exhibition loft of Bergdorf Goodman’s Home floor, is a show curated by Culture Object that will spotlight the unbridled innovation in technique and materials by independent designer-artists.
• Museum of Arts & Design (MAD): Flower Craft, presented by top designers at the forefront of the field, is an invitation into the world of floral artistry.
• Nature by Design: Botanical Expressions at Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum, features interpretations of botanical forms winding their way through the decorative arts of the late 18th through the early 20th centuries.
• Key areas dedicated to showcasing their thriving creative communities like SoHo Design District, Industry City, South Bronx, NoMad Design District, and the Brooklyn Navy Yard will also activate throughout the ten days.

Concurrent with this year’s Festival are leading art exhibitions and events such as:

• Frieze New York will be hosted May 18-22, 2022 at The Shed in Hudson Yards where attendees can explore hundreds of works from renowned names to the most exciting young spaces.
• “Jean-Michel Basquiat: King Pleasure'' will feature over 200 never-before and rarely-seen paintings, drawings, multimedia presentations, ephemera and artifacts by the artist in the landmarked Starrett-Lehigh Building in Chelsea with an immersive-style exhibition.
• Whitney Biennial 2022: Quiet as It’s Kept, presented by Tiffany & Co. and supported by Sotheby’s, will showcase a constellation of artworks and ideas by influential and innovative artists to celebrate the Biennial’s 80th edition.

Navigating The 10th Anniversary Festival

• The Official NYCxDESIGN Guide

Produced by the editors of Metropolis, The Guide will include a narrative of what to see and do during the Festival, in addition to the full roster of events, showroom listings, and more. The Guide will be distributed in print to NYCxDESIGN Festival locations and showrooms next May, and digitally distributed to Metropolis and NYCxDESIGN subscribers next Spring.

• Curated Itineraries

Within The Guide and on NYCxDESIGN’s new Festival website, festival.nycxdesign.org, will also be Curated Itineraries - event tracks by theme, geographic location, and time to help guide Festival visitors on fully-integrated and expansive design journeys. The itineraries will each be curated by a local NYC design thought leader that has their finger on the pulse of the latest and greatest in our city’s cultural scene. One Curated Itinerary, in particular, sponsored by High Point Market, will have a focus on diversity, bringing together events that highlight the ways in which diversity, equity, and inclusion powers momentum and creativity in the design sector. Further itinerary themes, geographic tracks, time-based clusters and curators will be announced in the weeks leading up to May.

• Event Registration

NYCxDESIGN invites organizations to join the 10th Anniversary Festival celebration through original programming hosted during the Festival dates (May 10-20, 2022) and within the five boroughs. Event types may include exhibitions, installations, talks, product launches, trade shows, open studios, workshops, tours, and more. Register events at festival.nycxdesign.org/event-registration.

• Important upcoming dates: