2018 Taiwan Design Expo has been opened from 15th August and lasted until 16th September at the Taichung cultural creative park. The theme of the exposition will be based on「Software versus Hardware—the future of the industry out of imagination」with 12 top exhibition planners, more than 700 designers to have near 700 artworks from 14 countries; the ideas of the artworks have covered digital technologies, smart material, skillful masterpieces and urban design etc. Also, there will be more than 400 interesting events worth of waiting and anticipating. Mayor Lin, Chia-lung, said, Taiwan Design Expo will present you the hard skills on the manufacturing and the soft skills on design in Taichung. And Taichung will recruit the first「Chief designer of the city」and everyone is welcome to recommend the candidates to build Taichung as the world class city and f design.

The opening ceremony of 2018 Taiwan Design Expo was conducted today (16th) with the Minister of Ministry of Economic Affairs, Jong-jin Shen, Taichung City Mayor Chia-lung Lin, Miaoli County Deputy Mayor Kuei-jui Deng, Chairman of Taiwan Design Center Gee-yi Chang, Legislator Dai-hua Lin, Councilors Su-chen Chiu, Kung-jin Cheng and the representatives from the offices of Legislators Guo-shu Huang, Wan-jeng Chang-Liao, Councilors Ming-chen Ho, Ya-ling Tsai and many exhibition planners etc. to attend the great event.

Mayor Lin mentioned, Taiwan Design Expo of this year conducted in Taichung has reflected the hard skills on the manufacturing and the soft skills on design in Taichung; there would be two breakthrough points in this exhibition, including the longest exhibition period with 33 days and the joint exhibitions of Taichung, Changhua, Nantou and Miaoli. Moreover, the universal design to reflect the needs of living now and in the future will be incorporated into the exhibition, for example, the care of the elderly and management with humanities.

In「Taichung hall」, people will see「99+1」of Taichung image, precision machinery and artworks so the life style and the industries in Taichung will be found to be linked with each other. And all of these will be presented to the audience under the delicate arrangement of the exhibition planners.

Mayor Lin pointed out, Taichung is a city full of designing elements, including National Taichung Theater, Luchuan and Liuchuan public facilities in addition to the cultural creative products with good taste around us, all of the designing elements are observed to be embedded in our daily eating, dressing, living, transportation, fun and music.

He also mentioned, Taichung is fighting for being the host for the 2022 World Design Capital by addressing the municipal administration strategy with the design concept incorporated in to demonstrate the people centered designs; no matter National Taichung Theater, Luchuan and Liuchuan public facilities or the future Shuinan smart town, all of them will experience the changes brought by design. During the upcoming Taichung World Flora Expo, both of the hard and soft skills of designing will be presented to the whole world.

Mayor Lin announced formally, Taichung will have Taiwan number one project of「Chief designer of the city」which has been officially organized and budgeted so everyone is welcome to recommend the candidates to build Taichung as a world class city of designing.

Minister Shen of Ministry of Economic Affairs said, Ministry of Economic Affairs has been working with all the local governments to facilitate Taiwan Design Expo since 2003. The most important objective of this is to to implement the design idea in our daily lives, make it to be seen every place where people are living in and add values to the industrial innovation to elevate the overall economic value and benefit of Taiwan. The visitors in the past 16 years have accumulated to near 6 million of people flow.

Minister Shen mentioned, Ministry of Economic Affairs has collaborated with Taichung to conduct Taiwan Design Expo in 2009 so the old wine brewing factory in Taichung of Taiwan Tobacco and Liquor Corporation is successfully transformed to be the current Taichung cultural creative park. After 9 years later, we worked with Taichung City Government again to conduct such an event with the longest exhibition period of 33 days, 14 countries and near 700 artworks exhibited; it’s definitely an unusual great event.

The officer of Cultural Affairs Bureau, the City Government, pointed out, 2018 Taiwan Design Expo theme parks includes 8 major exhibition halls, including「Theme hall」where 4 key ideas from the living surrounded by technologies, the cooperation between human beings and technology, living materials and the future triggered by imagination are exhibited; these dimensions will inspire the future design and industries of Taiwan. The companies, including HIWIN, SONICMAZE！, Sakura, DARFON, gogoro, Architchen and Sunstar etc., have their products exhibited there.

「Taichung SPIRIT hall」has the theme based on「Designing for living」 to plan a series of topics, including「Possibilities of Life」to show the living possibilities under such multicores ecological cultures in Taichung;「Voice of Life」 to show the energy and attractiveness of fashion culture in Taichung through a popular and powerful music concert held in Taichung.「Taichung LIFE hall」is organized by Fantasy Story to have「Cut to living scenes」as the core of exhibition because it’s very important to change the living scenes around the Taichung city. It’s not only the physical space change but also the life scans change, i.e. designs of community, relationship and living atmosphere etc. are all the invisible soft designs.「Taichung FUSION hall」has presented the fusion of new and old Taichung by mixed classical and innovation to generate the old classical but new innovative cultural creative spirit of design of Taichung, also, the unique and meaningful story of Taichung.

「INTERNATIONAL hall」is based on「Urban Pulse: capturing the rhythm of cities」as the theme to introduce the meanings of all the international events and design capitals, the young designers from Torino, Helsinki, Mexico, Cape Town, Seoul, Taipei, Netherlands, Toyama, Kobe and Lille have proposed the design point of views from the young generation aspect.

「EXPLORATION hall」tries to lead the people to see the big picture from the trivial point and see through the recombinant secrets of how the industry transformed by the tourism factories of Taiwan; auto-motorbike will easily guide you through the crowds by「New pattern of moving」to explore the「city affairs」 and the exhibition of 3D printing will make you experience in person and learn more about the current diversified application and development of 3D printing in depth.

「LOHAS hall」will show how to apply the concept of「Building new lives through creativity and building new industries with stylish approaches」; with the plentiful creative soft capabilities and the solid hard skills on manufacturing energy of Taiwan, we can make all the new imaginations about lives of the people to come true. We’ll apply the local resources and have fun locally to see the innovative privileges we have on industrial development in Taiwan.「Arts linking hall」will connect the visible activities with invisible values through 「linking, arts」and link the beautiful lives, the values of people and land around 4 cities in central Taiwan, including Taichung, Miaoli, Nantou and Changhua, to form the critical power to support the sustainability and symbiosis of city development.

In addition to the theme parks of the exhibition, there are two satellite exhibition area, including the special exhibition of wood and lacquer arts (Hulutun cultural center) and the special exhibition of old school galaxy (Donghsi Hakka cultural park). Besides, some holiday markets, famous master lecture room and creative workshop etc., total 435 events are planned in the theme parks as well. Also, 4 supplementary activities as international forums, Taichung laboratory of design, good products and shops link and the packaged tours are planned as well. All the detailed information about exhibition and events will be available on the official website, please visit the website as required.