Recently, China Daily, Yangguang Newspaper website, China Media Group Mobile, China Education Online, Toutiao, NetEase News, and many other media reported the Design Week Activity of the XJTU-POLIMI Joint School of Design and Innovation.
On Oct. 13, the Silk Road International Design Industry Conference and Design Week Activity of the XJTU-POLIMI Joint School of Design and Innovation was held in Xi’an. The Design Week this year, themed on “Design for the Future”, focused on grand design industry, design innovation, and design consumption and expected to continuously demonstrate the multiple values of industry, science and technology, economy and trade, and humanity through extensive and diversified dialogue and cooperation.
At 11:00 a.m., the Joining Ceremony of the Design Sub-alliance under the University Alliance of the Silk Road (UASR) was held in the Conference Building of Xi’an International Convention & Exhibition Center and attended by Politecnico di Milano, Tongji University, Zhejiang University, Northwestern Polytechnical University, Xi’an University of Architecture and Technology, Chongqing Jiaotong University, Shaanxi University of Science & Technology, Zhongyuan University of Technology, and Xi’an Academy of Fine Arts.
The UASR Design Sub-alliance was initiated by XJTU and jointly established under the UASR framework through the consultation of the heads of architecture and industrial design disciplines in many universities to boost the development of design discipline, serve the construction of Xi’an as a capital of design, implement XJTU’s idea of “taking root in the west and serving the country”, promote the talent cultivation cooperation, scientific research and innovation, industry-education integration, and cultural inheritance among universities in the alliance in the field of design, and facilitate the economic development along the Silk Road and in Eurasia.
Yang Shuming, Executive Dean of the XJTU-POLIMI Joint School of Design and Innovation, delivered a keynote speech titled “Inheriting Culture, Designing the Future”. He said that the UASR Design Sub-alliance would lay a foundation for the countries and regions along the Silk Road to cultivate interdisciplinary innovative design talents with international vision and play an irreplaceable significant role in spurring the exchanges and cooperation among universities in different countries and regions. The Design Sub-alliance would uphold and carry forward the spirit of the Silk Road, constantly innovate and improve the operating mechanism, carry out in-depth brand activities, and continuously enhance international influence. It would deepen connotation construction, actively integrate into and serve the establishment of a new social development paradigm, let “grand design” release its “charm” in various fields, achieve resource sharing and industry-education integration, and contribute more wisdom and strength to serving the Belt and Road and building a community with a shared future for mankind.
As one of the important joining unit of the Xi’an Design Week this year, the XJTU-POLIMI Joint School of Design and Innovation, after six months of liaison and planning with the Xi’an Municipal Government, launched the “Design · Future” Theme Exhibition together with the Department of International Cooperation and Exchanges, the School of Mechanical Engineering, the School of Humanities and Social Sciences, and the School of Human Settlements and Civil Engineering. Oriented to the cross-integration of science and technology with design discipline and through the exhibition design and immersive user experience of digital and real fusion, the exhibition built the future life scenes and explored the design changes brought by new technologies such as artificial intelligence, intelligent interconnection, ecological energy, and high-end equipment from the humanistic perspective.
The exhibition space was designed by teachers and students together, and the exhibition area was located at A01, Exhibition Hall 3, Xi’an International Convention & Exhibition Center and set with energy, life, and work zones. It presented the university-enterprise cooperation and systematic design innovation achievements of XJTU and POLIMI under the development goal of “emerging engineering, grand design, and interdisciplinarity emphasis”, aroused new thinking of multi-dimensional linkage and systematic development of design and technology under the concept of holographic ecology, and led visitors to imagine a better and desirable future.
At 15:00, the Design Discipline Development Seminar of the XJTU-POLIMI Joint School of Design and Innovation was held at Xingqing Campus and attended by the member universities of the UASR Design Sub-alliance. At the seminar, in-depth exchanges and discussions were conducted around major cultivation scheme, evaluation and appointment criteria for design teachers, and development of design discipline.
“Amity between the people is the key to state-to-state relations, and it lies in the bond of hearts”. This year marks the 10th anniversary of the Belt and Road Initiative and the eighth anniversary of the UASR. Aiming at strengthening the friendship and serving the BRI proposed by the General Secretary, in the context of today’s profound changes unseen in the world in a century, the XJTU-POLIMI Joint School of Design and Innovation will continue to uphold the ideas of openness, inclusiveness, mutual benefit, and win-win development, carry out all-round in-depth cooperation with POLIMI, and contribute to the higher education and scientific research cooperation between China and Italy and the development of the National Belt and Road Strategy.
