Meet Fast Forward Presenter >> Alyssa Blank

What is your Big Idea for Philadelphia?

Rethinking a Museum for Design

Philadelphia would greatly benefit from a centralized hub, bridging the profession of Design and Design thinking to the greater community of Philadelphia. Philly has countless museums that pay tribute to the fine and modern arts, various arts and crafts, not to mention our roots in the provenance of America herself. We also have prominent educational institutions but no one consolidated place for all of our design efforts to call HOME. While anchoring a space for Design in Philadelphia is important, geography can often play an important role in accessibility, so bringing Design to various communities would be an integral part of the plan. 

 

I’d love to see the design our city puts out advocate for itself a little more on a regular basis, as well as invite contemporary design happenings from around the country into our city as not just a resource but a building block between our city and the design outside our county.  

 

The Design Box ( Building of Exchange ) would break through the boundaries of typical museum format to become a portal, a community connection point  between active design and anyone (from kids to clients) who’d like to learn more, or engage more with Design in Philadelphia.  

Email: Alyssa.Blank.Design(at)Gmail.com

Web: AlyssaBlank.com

Twitter: @Ablankdesign

Instagram: @Alyssa.blank.design

DesignCal Instagram: @Designcal_PHL

Alyssa Blank is an award-winning designer with a decade of industry experience. Her current practice centers on a research-forward approach, which opens up conversations between designers and non-designers alike. She has designed for a variety of successful projects, with clients including Fortune Top 10, Top 100, and Global 500 list-makers, a Forbes Top 100 Digital Company, and worked with organizations that have ranged from a National Endowment For the Arts major grant-recipient, to seed-funded startups. When she isn't designing, she's populating the Design Calendar Philadelphia instagram feed with the best socially distant design happenings around the internet. The groundwork for all these endeavors was laid by attaining a B.A. in Sociology from Boston University ('06), with a focus was the the construction of community, and identity through 'Race', Ethnicity, and Culture and a minor in Art History, as well as a Post-Graduate Degree in Design from Portfolio Center ('12) in Atlanta, Georgia.