Probably The Best Conference In The World

You might remember that last week we wrote about The Design of Prosperity conference that was soon to be held in Borås, Sweden. According to friends of ours who attended, it turned out to be “possibly the best conference in the world”. We didn’t get the chance to go ourselves, but a conference that couples design, change and innovation and how this has the potential to give rise to prosperity is certainly going to be a world changing event.

It focused on the processes influencing change and innovation and how these give rise to new patterns of prosperity. And in particular, it challenged the "over-designed product world where design is just addressing customers’ wishes" rather than creating new needs that support prosperity. The dream of Modernity has made us ever richer in the West, but it has not made us happier.

Our friends at live|work have written a review of the conference and responded to some of the important issues raised at the event in an article at Treehugger.