The Mission of Design Today According to Six International Design Museum Directors

A design museum, through its collections and programs, has rediscovered various purposes compared to the recent past: it serves as a platform for communication and education, demonstrates a range of human skills, proposes a hypothesis of coexistence that integrates memory and innovation, and legitimizes a concept of civilization through what might be termed civic objects/projects. Furthermore, the dimensions of research by and through design are becoming increasingly important, as our discipline is now recognized for its importance not only culturally, but perhaps even more so socially and politically.

Civic objects encompass projects that often adhere to a collective logic and a spirit of community (e.g., road signage, public communication, urban furnishings, equipment for individuals with disabilities, sports facilities, and gear provide only the most obvious examples). These objects are prevalent in public administration, sports events, healthcare services, education, and transportation. 

The museum can be reimagined as a mechanism that mitigates inequalities, an amplifier of memories, a repository of data and case studies, and a laboratory of possibilities. It must also be the repository of the rights and duties of living together through all the forms that design offers in the management of our existence. Design, as a dynamic and agile form, is embodied through artifacts, ideas, and lines of thought and is the ultimate proof of the courage to state and take charge of our destiny.

Owing to the nature of its collections and programs, deeply rooted in human life and everyday experiences, a design museum should be an ideal forum for dialogue between no longer polarized but contiguous realms: natural/artificial, real/virtual, community/individual, author/collective, trend/behavior. For us, a design museum must be an agora that recognizes as walls only those that define the enclosure of the building that houses it – and yet, it is a reality that countries are man-made buildings as well.

For the legacy of socio-cultural phenomena to become a salve for society, institutions' organizational and horizontal power is required. Which institutions? Museums, universities, theaters, academies, research centers, and cultural venues are catalysts of energy and physical spaces for communal presence and expression. Notably, migrant communities, increasingly polarized between shame and pride, must be engaged not merely as sources of opportunity and knowledge but as integral participants in society’s cultural discourse.  A museum with collections and programs constitutes a nimble instrument of cultural policy with global outreach because it functions as a seismograph for phenomena, a thermometer for local conditions, and a medium to convey a territory's "distinctive essence" while fostering international relations.

The historian Alessandro Barbero stated: "In studying the first twenty-five years of this century, I would focus on the reasons why democracies have ceased to function effectively. Democracy exists so that individuals may have a voice, yet in the West, this is increasingly less perceived." 

A design museum is also a synthesis of knowledge and a socio-economic mediator across a vast territorial scope. Shouldn’t this type of institution be ideal for embracing practices characteristic of cultural diplomacy, performing a renewed public function by exercising soft power over political and administrative institutions? And indeed, this is achieved by displaying existing and initiating new objects, creative and productive processes, material culture, and innovation. All our five institutions activate an extensive community of individuals. These individuals are united by shared values such as work ethics and the dissemination of minimum standards that promote dignity, security, and accessibility in housing, transportation, healthcare, and education. This branch of cultural diplomacy is referred to as Design Museum Diplomacy.

Europe must reassert itself as a guardian of democracy and coexistence. It must achieve this, in part, through design, offering new images, content, and ideas to facilitate the social rebalancing process. New narratives must emerge to affirm that our futures are still possible. To this end, as Sergio Mattarella stated on February 5, 2025, in Marseille: "New ideas are needed, not the application of old models to the new interests of a select few. It is necessary to serve individuals, as history is inscribed in human behavior. Universities and museums are best suited to bring forth these ideas."

Among these essential measures are education and mutual understanding, which are the foundations of coexistence, as well as the free circulation of information. It is imperative to reaffirm the foundational principles of European thought, including the aspirations of those who feel marginalized. Today, it is therefore more necessary than ever to reassess the concept of a group's or a network's sphere of influence in response to figures who seek to assume public office and manage common goods. These new oligarchs operate through tools developed within industries intrinsic to design: communication, digital innovation, transportation, logistics, and services. 

But museums have great potential. We have seen it historically. When the world's first design museum was established in 1851 in London following the first world exhibition held in the same place, it was with the ambition of making the world a better place. After the Victoria & Albert Museum, a long series of European museums for decorative arts and crafts followed, carried forward by the same idealism. It was the dream that modern civilization had put war and military battles behind it, and would instead compete based on diligence, skill and quality. All with the aim of creating design at all scales that could set the framework for a modern society where resources benefited as many people as possible.

Although the past 175 years have by no means left war and unrest behind us, we note that design has the potential more than ever to be an agent of change. And to solve global challenges. Design museums carry this knowledge and insight daily in their encounters with people.

Design may not change the world, but at the same time the world as a whole has been designed, and we define our society by its material manifestations. We think the design museums par excellence can seduce new groups in society. A new (visual) culture that is now increasingly and clearly developing, for young people in particular, has strong roots in design rather than in, for example, the visual arts.  The design museum is perhaps the type of platform that can ideally contribute to a new form of communication and a 'call to action'. A museum that is about design still raises the expectation for many to see a parade of beautiful and sometimes well-known historical objects. There is nothing wrong with beauty, but covering the important topics that concern everyone in our rapidly changing world can ideally be addressed by a new kind of design museum.