DIA RMIT Industrial Design Event

31 August 2006

In what was probably the biggest get together of industrial designers ever assembled in Australia, the DIA's RMIT Industrial Design Reunion, was held on Friday 25 August. The Melbourne Order, opposite RMIT's famous Storey Hall in Swanston St was heaving with approximately 150+ designers catching-up with fellow graduates many of whom they hadn't seen in years.


Denis Smitka, Kate Bissett-Johnson both lecturers, and myself within my capacity of DIA Practice Group Co-ordinator for Industrial Design, formed a self-styled committee to organise the event.

The evening was a huge success in bringing together graduates and lecturers from a diverse range of ages (the earliest graduates I found were Jon Beck and Phill Zmood from the early sixties). It was interesting to anecdotally hear the diverse range of occupations people are now involved in; some completely outside design but most in related fields. Denis Smitka is planning to conduct further research into the careers profiles of RMIT Industrial Design graduates and the Reunion will be a valuable starting point for this.

Highlight attendees included legends of the design industry in Australia, such as Rob Pataki and Gerry Musset, and academic heavyweights Helmut Lueckenhausen and Harold Mead. CobaltNiche was well represented with all of our 4 RMIT graduates attending.

A visual highlight of the night was the slideshow of images compiled by Ian Wong and Kate Bissett-Johnson, presenting some classic student work (and awful eighties haircuts).

This DIA event (generously sponsored by ARRK) was organised to promote grass-root connections between designers, many of whom have no regular links within the broader design community. Despite the numbers there were still over 800 graduates that didn't attend, but hopefully now that a database has commenced we can make the next event even more inclusive. There are plans to hold a similar events for Swinburne and Monash courses during 2007.

Pictures Above (clockwise from top-left)
1. Class of ’85, Jack Magree, Warwick Brown, Ian Kirk and Steve Martinuzzo
2. Ian Wong and Marc Pascal
3. Denis Smitka looking pleased with himself with Megumi Mizukami and Catherine Chong
4. Celina Clarke, Nicholas McColl and Warwick Brown (again)

LINKS
Design Institute of Australia (www.design.org.au)
ARRK (www.arrk.com.au)