From 12 to 14 September, the Global Design Forum comes back to the Lydia and Manfred Gorvy Lecture Theatre at the V&A South Kensington. This is the thought-leadership programme at the heart of the London Design Festival, and it brings together voices from many fields to talk about where design is heading next.
This year’s theme is Worlds in Motion, curated by Rhiarna Dhaliwal. Over three days, speakers from different disciplines and different parts of the world will sit down and talk about the exchange of ideas, culture and know-how — and about how design can act as a driver of change on a global scale. The programme is backed by Bowmore and Sun Media Group as Programme Partners, and by L-Acoustics as Session Partner.
Discover London Design Festival 2026
The Shape of Colour
What to expect
The line-up mixes practice and theory. Es Devlin CBE opens the forum with a keynote on Saturday, right after a session called Shared Intelligence and a screening of Planet City and When Forgiving the Sunlight. Liam Young, who co-directs Planet City, is among the speakers too.
Es Devlin, keynote speaker
Sunday moves into colour, sound and material culture, with talks such as The Shape of Colour and Activating Objects, plus a session built around L-Acoustics and the role of sound in design. The day closes with a conversation between Snarkitecture’s Alex Mustonen and Bowmore’s Dr Calum Fraser.
Monday brings the forum to a close with a conversation between Sun Media Group’s Yang Lan and Natalie Melton, Executive Director of the Crafts Council — a pairing that says a lot about how the festival wants to link London’s design scene with a wider, international audience. The last two sessions, Civic Futures and After Extraction, take the conversation into questions of resource use and collective responsibility.
Why it’s worth watching from an Asian point of view
For readers who follow the design conversation between Italy and Asia, this year’s forum offers a useful window. Sun Media Group’s involvement, and the presence of Yang Lan on the programme, point to a growing overlap between London’s design institutions and Chinese media and cultural platforms — a trend worth keeping an eye on for anyone working across these two markets. The forum’s broader theme, about the exchange of ideas across geographies, fits well with what’s already happening on the ground at events such as CIFF and CBD Guangzhou, where Western and Asian design worlds increasingly share the same stage.
Global Design Forum 2026 Speakers
Adam Nathaniel Furman, Alex Mustonen, Anna Franklin, Baum & Leahy, Betty Zhiqin Lu, Brendan Cormier, Claudia Pasquero, David Miles, Dr. Calum Fraser, Es Devlin CBE, Eunjo Lee, Francesca Perry, Grace Xu, Harry Kumar, Hideki Yoshimoto, Hollie Buhagiar, Janice Li, Justina Alexandroff, Kassia St Clair, Lakwena Maciver, Liam Young, Marina Blake, Ms. Yang Lan, Mykola Kabluka, Natalie Melton, Pita Arreola, Ruth Lloyd, Sahra Hesri, Sam Ghantous, Sam Jacob, Samta Nadeem, Seetal Solanki, Stephen Dobbie, Sultan Albadran, Tobais Revelle, and Yasaman Sheri.
Talks Programme
Saturday 12 September
- Shared Intelligence – 12:20 pm
- A screening of Planet City and When Forgiving the Sunlight – 1:40 pm
- Shared Ecologies – 2:40 pm
- Keynote: Es Devlin CBE – 4:00 pm
Sunday 13 September
- The Shape of Colour – 10:30 am
- Activating Objects – 11:45 am
- L-Acoustics: The Power of Sound – 1:00 pm
- In conversation with Snarkitecture’s Alex Mustonen and Bowmore’s Dr. Calum Fraser – 3:00 pm
Monday 14 September
- In conversation: Sun Media Group’s Yang Lan and Crafts Council’s Natalie Melton – 10:20 am
- Civic Futures – 12:35 pm
- After Extraction – 1:50 pm
Tickets & Program
The talks programme is free to attend, and tickets can be booked through Eventbrite. The full speaker list and schedule are available on the London Design Festival website
Global Design Forum
V&A South Kensington
Lydia and Manfred Gorvy Lecture Theatre
September 12-14, 2026
