Time is a personal experience. Notions such as the passing or lack of time, speed and slowness, evoke subjective responses, varying between individuals, countries and continents.
Taking this argument as departure point, Pace of Design looks at a group of designers and studios from different parts of the world and reflects on their personal pace of design. By understanding their work methodology, the goal is to better understand time, rhythm and speed and their impact on the process of designing and making things.

Pace of Design is an exhibition about process, such as requires a certain amount of time and is therefore of itself a representation of time. It is not just about different work paces, but also about different production rhythms. The specific culture in which a designer lives, works in and with (and probably was trained as well) has an effect on the way he/she approaches his/her creative practise. From this perspective, we may even encounter tangible, objective notions of time and speed that are characteristic to a certain geographical area and shared by its inhabitants. Although globalization is a given in our lives and the way the world functions today – design included – this exhibition will steers us in the opposite direction, looking at its underlying, ever surprising diversity.

Akin to an ethnologist’s fieldwork, Pace of Design will attempt to research and record the designers’ individual production cycle, the staggered development of their products and how each connects to local work contexts, from small manufacturers, traditional techniques and craftsmen to informal distribution circuits and grassroots networks. As the designers’ work unfolds according to its own timeline, the exhibition shines a light on how these uses of time signify distinct cultural subtexts and socially established narratives of temporal appropriation, management and appreciation.