DTI-Design Center powers IDC 2025: A global platform for design-led transformation
The Design Center of the Philippines, an attached agency of the Department of Trade and Industry, proudly announces the 9th edition of the International Design Conference (IDC), taking place on 26 September 2025 at Samsung Hall, SM Aura Premier, Taguig City. As the flagship event of Design Consciousness Week and a co-branded highlight of Philippine Creative Industries Month, IDC 2025 reasserts its role as the region’s premier thought leadership platform for design-driven innovation and strategic foresight.
With the theme “Holding the Whole: Designing for Collective Flourishing,” IDC 2025 invites designers, entrepreneurs, policymakers, and business leaders to explore how design can reframe systems, restore relationships, and unlock shared agency across sectors. This year’s program challenges participants to move beyond aesthetics and functionality – embracing design as a life-centered, regenerative force for transformation.
The conference will also underscore the urgency of systems change, recognizing that climate change, economic inequality, and social crises are deeply interconnected and cannot be addressed in isolation. Addressing these challenges requires redesigning how systems operate and evolve, so communities and the planet can thrive together. Design, in this context, becomes a strategic tool for reimagining outcomes at scale.
Now in its ninth year, IDC has become a cornerstone of ASEAN’s design ecosystem, convening global and local voices to interrogate the intersections of design, technology, business, and governance. In 2023, IDC was honored with the Silver Anvil Award in the Arts, Culture, Heritage, and Tourism category – recognizing its impact in shaping national conversations and catalyzing creative industries toward inclusive growth, cultural resilience, and design-led policy innovation.
“Design is not a luxury. It is central to how we build economies, shape policy, and imagine futures. IDC 2025 is our call to action: to design with courage, with care, and with consequence. The Design Center is proud to convene this platform for collective flourishing, where ideas move beyond inspiration and into individual, societal, and economic transformation,” said Rhea Matute, Executive Director of the Design Center of the Philippines.
IDC 2025 features two powerhouse keynote speakers whose work has redefined the boundaries of design and innovation. B. Joseph Pine II, co-author of The Experience Economy, is a globally renowned business theorist whose frameworks have transformed how companies create value. His concept of the Transformation Economy – where businesses stage experiences that guide personal and societal change – has influenced Fortune 500 strategies, national policy dialogues, and academic institutions worldwide. Pine’s work has been published in over 15 languages and cited as one of the most important contributions to modern business thinking.
Joining him is Professor Eisuke Tachikawa, founder and CEO of NOSIGNER, a design strategist whose work spans disaster resilience, climate adaptation, and social innovation. A recipient of over 150 international design awards, Tachikawa pioneered Evolutional Creativity, a methodology inspired by biological evolution that empowers changemakers across industries. He currently serves on the Board of the World Design Organization and led the Japan Pavilion concept for Expo 2025 Osaka-Kansai.
Alongside these global voices, IDC 2025 will also feature leading Filipino designers, strategists, and institutional leaders whose work reflects the country’s evolving design landscape. Among them are Jen Horn, facilitator, writer, and creator of Pagbubuo & Ugnayan Cards; Sarah Queblatin, founding executive director of Green Releaf Initiative; Carl Cervantes, author of Sikodiwa; Bella Tanjutco, co-founder of Kids for Kids Philippines; Erwan Heussaff, founder of The Fat Kid Inside Inc.; Maisie Littaua, country manager of Canva Philippines; Marga Valdes, head of sales & marketing at BEAVALDES; Raf Dionisio, co-founder of Making a Difference Travel; and Dr. Nikki Carsi Cruz, department chair at Ateneo de Manila University.
Their contributions will deepen the dialogue around design’s role in shaping inclusive economies, resilient communities, and culturally grounded innovation.
Through immersive sessions – Break, Make, and Become – IDC 2025 will surface emerging practices, provoke critical reflection, and build shared understanding across disciplines. These sessions are designed not just to inform, but to activate; enabling participants to dismantle outdated paradigms, prototype new possibilities, and commit to design as a tool for systemic change.
The IDC 2025 is free and open to professionals across design, policy, enterprise, and education.
For program updates, visit www.designcenter.gov.ph/international-design-conference. ♦
Date of Release: 23 September 2025
