The day got off to whirlwind start with what was at first a dirge--but then a critical celebration--of design and design enterprise through the lens of architecture. Peter Higgins of Land Design Studio delivered what can only be called an opus--touching down on everything from Chernobyl tourism to Diller and Scoffio's Blur to Olafur Eliasson's Weather Project at the Tate to James Wine to Jenny Holtzer, Roland Paoletti, and Robert Lapage. Whew! There were several threads through it all though: It's critical to be aware of the legacies and left-over artifacts of the built environment; there is a need for interlopers to infiltrate the process of city and master planning; we all need to think "scriptwriters" instead of "managers" (indeed, Higgins argues that you literally need actual scriptwriters in the room if you're serious about designing around a narrative). This was a BIG presentation, moving just a little faster than our collective morningmind, and drawing connections (intersections?) between disparate topics, all corralled through a consideration of the built environment. Strong start.

The next presentation was a group presentation of Jeremy Myerson, George Cox, and Andrea Siodmok, all targeting the business considerations of design rather than the craft or the practice. It started with a discussion of Innovation, got off that treadmill, but then seemed to run out of time. The panel acknowledged the higher profile of the profession, natch, but there were some great quotes on top. Favorites were "Designers love strategy; many designers would have a strategy meeting about where they'd go for lunch if allowed"(Siodmok); and "No business can survive with what they were doing yesterday. No business." (Cox, emphatically).

All Intersections posts: Intersections Conference and Dott'07 underway! Intersections Conference: More pics and blasphemy! Intersections Conference, Day 2 Intersections Conference, Day 2 - more highlights