Design weeks take place in cities all over the world as a way to celebrate the role that design plays in our lives. Past WLU design week trips have included Portland, Oregon and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. This time we visited Washington DC for four days of art, fun, and great food!

We began the trip with a visit to Gannett Headquarters where WLU grad Miranda Pelicano works as an illustrator and designer. Miranda and her boss Jerald gave us a tour of their design studio with stops at USA Today’s news hub and interactive center.

From Gannett we headed downtown to Cherry Blossom Creative’s pop-up design shop. We also toured the Foundry Gallery and Washington Arts Center.

The next day we headed to the Museum of the American Indian where we received a great tour from Eric Christiansen, Director of Exhibits, and Madeline Wan, Senior Designer. They informed us about 3D exhibit design, and the ways that graphic designers work with 3D artists.

Madeline designed the entire Ocean Of Wonders exhibit in the Natural History museum.

After eating lunch at some food trucks we made our way to Project Design Inc. They are a small design company that has an office in a cool old renovated laundry warehouse. They showed us examples of their great work and talked about their design processes. They were very friendly and a lot of fun.

Next stop was Suns Cinema – a funky 32 seat theater in an El Salvadoran neighborhood. We were there to see Stephan Sagmeister’s new movie “The Happy Film.” Hilarious and brutally honest. A must see for designers.

On Saturday everyone hit the metro and toured more of the Smithsonian, neighborhood markets, and more delicious food trucks! Bring on Design Week 2018!