CSD to participate in Halifax Initiative debate

The Chartered Society of Designers has agreed to take part in the Halifax Initiative to review representation within the design industry.

The decision, taken by the CSD executive committee and conveyed to members by letter last week, means it will now pay 5000 towards the cost of the preliminary review handled by change management consultant Kinsley Lord. This was originally pledged by former CSD president Nick Jenkins (DW 9 May).

CSD president Adrianne LeMan will join the core review team, with Jenkins, Design Business Association chairman Jonathan Sands, DBA president-elect Colin Porter, Design Council design director Sean Blair and Design Week editor Lynda Relph-Knight.

Jenkins says he is “absolutely delighted” with the decision. “It’s what I’ve always wanted. It’s the only way forward,” he says.

In a separate move, interior designer Patrick Goff has called a meeting of London CSD members in a bid “to breathe some life into a moribund corpse”- his description for the CSD’s London Region.

Goff, who has served on CSD Council for two and a half years, has invited London Region chairman Brent Richards to the event , to be held at Morley College in south London at 6.30pm on Thursday 11 September. The agenda includes discussions with London Business Links about injecting better business skills into design groups and the Design Trust about “design mentoring” for young designers.

“I’ve called a meeting because there are a lot of things happening in London which need the CSD’s support,” says Goff. He is keen to create “a pressure group in London” to look at issues affecting designers working in the capital.