Following the release of the Brexit Design Manifesto, which was released in September in response to the Brexit vote and its potential impact on the design and architecture community, U.K. culture minister Matt Hancock called the industry “vitally important to our future as an outward-looking, creative nation.” The design and architecture industry is the country’s fastest-growing creative sector, bringing in over £70 billion in goods and services and employing 1.5 million people.
A dinner was held earlier this month to open conversations between the design sector and the government’s Department for Culture, Media & Sport. The attendees included Hancock, along with architects Amanda Levete and Sadie Morgan, industrial designer Paul Priestman, designers Ilse Crawford and Nicolas Roope, fashion designer Roksanda Ilincic, and Dezeen editor in chief Marcus Fairs, the creator of the manifesto.
Since the release of the manifesto at the London Design Festival in September, industry leaders and groups have come together. There have been a number of developments: 339 designers, architects and other industry pros signing the manifesto; monthly meetings between policymakers and the industry; partnership programs with institutions throughout the U.K.; a new series of events planned for 2017; discussions identifying ways to hire foreign workers; and other dialogue-promoting initiatives and programs.
