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The official International Design Day 2026 (IDD2026) theme designed by London-based Holmes Studio
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The Spaces In Between
What happens between us matters.
Design mediates the physical, digital, and emotional spaces where human connection becomes possible. It challenges us to facilitate genuine connection—not just efficiency, but the quality of human interaction.
International Design Day 2026: The Spaces In Between invited designers to look beyond objects and outcomes and toward the shared experiences that shape how we belong, communicate, and coexist. Design lives in the in-between—the thresholds where ideas become experiences and strangers become communities.
While International Design Day is marked on a single day each year, the ideas explored here are ongoing. The questions raised in these conversations continue to shape how designers think, work, and connect. This page remains a place to return—to revisit the conversations, share them with colleagues and students, and continue engaging with the themes long after the day itself has passed.
To explore this year’s theme, The Spaces In Between, SEGD CEO Cybelle Jones sat down with leading voices across architecture, branding, cultural institutions, social innovation, and experiential design.
Together, these conversations examine the thresholds where connection happens—between people and place, memory and meaning, systems and human experience.
Across eleven talks, designers reflect on empathy, curiosity, responsibility, and the evolving role of design in shaping environments where people feel seen, welcomed, and connected.
Leaders from the International Council of Design reflect on the global role of design and the importance of International Design Day as a platform for advancing collaboration, advocacy, and the cultural impact of the design profession.
Melike Taşçıoğlu Vaughan — President, International Council of Design (ICoD)
Jonas Liugaila — Board Member, International Council of Design (ICoD); Founder & Creative Director, Studio Airport
Jacques Lange — Former President, International Council of Design (ICoD)
Lucy Holmes shares how this year’s theme, The Spaces In Between, was translated into a visual identity and explores how design can reveal the invisible thresholds where ideas become experiences.
Lucy Holmes — Founder & Creative Director, Holmes Studio
Ashley Lukasik and Sue Walsh explore how designers can navigate uncertainty with imagination and hope, using creativity as a tool to move people and organizations from present challenges toward future possibility.
Ashley Lukasik — Founder & CEO, Murmur Ring
Sue Walsh — Principal of Design, SYPartners
Carole Wedge reflects on how architecture shapes the way communities gather and belong, highlighting the importance of mentorship, civic spaces, and designing environments that foster connection.
Carole Wedge, FAIA — Executive Vice President & CEO, American Institute of Architects (AIA)
Aki Carpenter discusses the responsibility of designing for places with deep cultural and historical meaning, and how experiential design can help people connect more deeply with shared heritage.
Aki Carpenter — Vice President & Chief Creative Officer, RAA Global Studios; SEGD Board President
David Schwarz examines the deeper purpose of experiential design, arguing that meaningful experiences often emerge not from spectacle but from subtle moments that resonate with people over time.
David Schwarz — Co-Founder & Creative Director, HUSH
Nu Goteh explores how design shapes power, belonging, and representation, urging designers to consider who is centered—and who is excluded—when creating spaces and experiences.
Nu Goteh — Founder, Room for Magic; Co-Founder, Deem Journal
Lee-Sean Huang reflects on radical empathy as a design practice, emphasizing research, cultural understanding, and education as tools for creating spaces where people genuinely feel they belong.
Lee-Sean Huang — Co-Executive Director of Learning & Programs, AIGA
Cheryl Durst discusses how the environments we inhabit shape clarity, dignity, and connection, revealing how thoughtful design influences behavior, collaboration, and human experience.
Cheryl S. Durst, Hon. FIIDA — Executive Vice President & CEO, International Interior Design Association (IIDA)
Llisa Demetrios reflects on the enduring legacy of Ray and Charles Eames, exploring how curiosity, learning, and experimentation continue to inspire designers to think expansively about the future.
Llisa Demetrios — Chief Curator, Eames Institute of Infinite Curiosity
Joanne Chan explores how brand design shapes emotional connection and cultural memory, revealing how thoughtful identity systems transform everyday interactions into meaningful relationships between people and brands.
Design is not just what we make. It is what happens between people.
The spaces in between include moments of transition, exchange, and encounter. They shape how people feel welcomed or excluded, how trust is built, and how meaning is shared. These spaces are often the least discussed and least consciously designed, yet they quietly influence how we move through the world together.
At a time of constant communication and increasing disconnection, design has the power to rebuild the spaces that bring people together, across streets, screens, museums, objects, and cities.
