UNESCO City of Design Status – Five City Awarded

Dundee, Bilbao, Curitiba, Helsinki and Turin cities located in Scotland, Spain, Parana, Finland and Italy respectively have been considered as the cultural epicenters of their countries. These cities are rich in culture and have a large amount of cultural heritage. Due to this reason, it is no more a surprising news that these five cities have gained the status of UNESCO’s city of design. These cities have now joined the list of 12 cities which have already been designated as the City of Design status by UNESCO. The new city of design selections have been recognized for influences by international world on design.

It is expected that the selected cities/metropolis will further develop the creative industries and will encourage the cultural exchange between the cities after the awarding of city of design status. These cities are considered to be the five of total 28 cities which have been selected for UNESCO’s Creative Cities Network. The UNESSCO’s Creative Cities Network covers seven thematic areas.

Image source: nexthelsinki.org

The categories include:

• Crafts and folk arts involving the cities of Jacmel, Jingdezhen, Nassau, Pekalongan and Suzhou
• Design involving the cities of Bilbao, Curitiba, Dundee, Helsinki and Turin
• Film which involves Busan, Galway and Sofia cities
• Gastronomy involving Florianopolis, Shunde and Tsuruoka.
• Literature which involves Dunedin, Granada, Heidelberg and Prague
• Media arts involve the cities of Dakar, Gwangju, Linz, Tel Aviv-Yafo and York
• And music involving the cities of Hamamatsu, Hanover and Mannheim.