The new display of the design collection of the Kunstgewerbemuseum has a collaborative and multi-perspectival slant: the entire team of the museum has been included in the process of selecting and presenting the objects, and have contributed perspectives from their own areas of expertise to the exhibition project – what’s more, visitors can also actively add their own perspectives on the objects.

The exhibition will be on display for an extended period of time and will grow to accommodate other objects from the collection, which will constantly provide new fodder for debate and discussion. One of the themes of the exhibition is the question of when and why “design” emerged, and who the protagonists of this strongly consumerist and enormously economically significant industry actually are. In the process, the role of museums of design and applied arts – which by selecting the objects to be exhibited in their museums have played a major part in this development – will be analysed, as well as the canon they have helped to create.