Het Nieuwe Instituut and designer Elisa van Joolen introduce EVJ, a series of tote bags made from used plastic bags that will be available to borrow. In the second edition of Design Dialogues on 6 May, Van Joolen will be joined by philosopher Patricia de Vries, designer Karim Adduchi, designer Baby Reni, journalist Lynn Berger and experienced bag-caretakers Youngeun Sohn and Witho Worms at Het Nieuwe Instituut. With a contribution by archaeologist Maikel Kuijpers. The conversation will be about taking care of things that aren’t ours, imbuing the disposable with value, and answering the question: what happens when an ordinary object becomes something in our care?

This Design Dialogue focuses on the shifting position of the designer within the global geography of freelancing and current economic climate in the creative sector; one where labour is increasingly outsourced, delegated, masked and displaced. With Stefan Stefansson, Lara García Díaz, Fanfare (Freja Kir and Miquel Hervás Gómez) and Silvio Lorusso.

Solar power is one of the great hopes of the so-called clean energy transition to renewables. This TNL! Design Dialogues event brings together solar designers Marjan van Aubel and Pauline van Dongen and Het Nieuwe Instituut’s Anastasía Kubrak and Flora van Gaalen to talk about making the transition a reality.

This Design Dialogue looked critically at the role of locality in the context of design, bringing together practitioners who are based outside of their city of origin and thus have the opportunity to analyse their designer identity as a construct traversing national borders, cultures and histories. With artist/designer Silvio Lorusso, architect/researcher Mohamed Elshahed and designer Rachel Jenkins.

On 3 March 2017 Design duo Formafantasma presented their research into global ore flows, from overground mining to e-waste. In conversation with curator Natasha Hoare, they investigated the relationship of designers and institutions in highlighting the landscape of mining and manufacture. This dialogue questioned the “immateriality” in digital design enabled by metal ores. Curator Natasha Hoare and artist Giuseppe Licare joined the discussion.