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Toronto Design Offsite Festival, operating under the business name DesignTO.
DesignTO is a registered charity (Charitable Business #: 803833300RR0001).
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2025

Festival Schedule

January 24 – February 2, 2025

DesignTO Festival isn’t just about events, it’s about making real change. Celebrating 15 years of impact, DesignTO brings people together to design a better future that’s sustainable, just, and joyful. As Canada’s largest non-profit design festival, the 10-day event features 100+ free events and exhibitions, both online and in-person, across Toronto. Most events and exhibitions are free, but some require an RSVP or purchased tickets. All window installations are viewable from the outdoors.

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A pile of fresh fish from Mark Krebs. Hand-woven fish-shaped body pillows filled with shredded memory foam, woven in three colourways and made of fibre-dyed wool yarns.
In-person
window installation
A Fine Kettle of Fish
Jan 21
–
Jan 31 2025
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'A Name To It' by Boris Yu confronts buried pasts to illuminate the complex sentiments of (un)narrating the language of manhood. A space of rest commemorates past versions of manhood that have protected while building space for the versions to come.
In-person
exhibition
A Name To It
Jan 24
–
Feb 02 2025
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‘A Tribe Called Sagrada’ is a series of sculptural lamps by Amulette that celebrates heritage architecture through bold forms and refined textures. Each piece, entirely handmade, merges contemporary design with cultural legacy.
In-person
exhibition
A Tribe Called Sagrada
Jan 21
–
Feb 02 2025
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‘About Time’ is a collaborative exhibition exploring how the passing of time and changing of contexts alters our ideas—six Sheridan Craft and Design Alumni present works of furniture, lighting, sculpture, and interactive design.
In-person
exhibition
About Time
Jan 24
–
Feb 02 2025
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'Agape' features a collection of ambient lamps designed and produced by Simone Aslan for PERPETUAL ITCH. With inspiration taken from tongue, tooth, and mouth, these lights seek to impart a sense of stillness and awe upon the viewer.
In-person
window installation
Agape
Jan 23
–
Feb 02 2025
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Discounted prices and unprecedented convenience come at a great cost. With a nod to Warhol's Brillo boxes, these screen-printed boxes use humour to draw attention to the corporations crushing small businesses. This installation by Christopher Rouleau is an urgent reminder to shop local.
In-person
window installation
Amazon Sucks
Jan 24
–
Feb 02 2025
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Inspired by Camus' quote, “In the midst of winter, I found there was, within me, an invincible summer,” this installation by SUMOfc embodies the quiet resilience of the human spirit.
In-person
window installation
An Invincible Sun
Jan 25
–
Feb 07 2025
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'Artifacts of Place' by Christian Maidankine is an exploration of the relationship between us and our objects — a look at how we identify and settle within the spaces we occupy in our never-ending process of inhabitation.
In-person
window installation
Artifacts of Place
Jan 24
–
Feb 02 2025
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‘At the conjuring of roots, I wished to meet Me…’ is an exhibition of photos that explore ideas of the self through costuming by Toronto-based, Ghanaian-Nigerian photographer and visual artist Delali Cofie on five digital screens at Sankofa Square.
In-person
exhibition
At the conjuring of roots, I wished to meet Me…
Jan 01
–
Jan 31 2025
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Visit the Andreu World Toronto Showroom to see a textile installation by industrial designer Laura Carwardine made from repurposed berry baskets and nylon rope. This study in repetition allows the process of prototyping to be shared with the viewer.
In-person
exhibition
Berry Baskets
Jan 24
–
Feb 02 2025
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'Beyond the Body' by Pixel Heller transforms costumes into sculptural extensions, blending wearable art and abstraction. These pieces explore the fluidity of masquerade and evoke rituals, memory, and ancestral ties, bridging identity and time between the past and present.
In-person
exhibition
Beyond the Body
Jan 24
–
Feb 02 2025
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'BIPOC Portfolio Collaboration' is an opportunity for BIPOC students to engage in conversations with professionals within the fields of Architecture, Interior Design, Landscape Architecture, Architectural Technology, Experiential Design (Signage & Wayfinding and Environmental Graphic Design)to discuss portfolios.
Hybrid
event: Portfolio Review
BIPOC Portfolio Collaboration 2025
Jan 30
–
Jan 31 2025
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'BLOOD, WATER & BATHURST STREET' is a participatory, textile-based mapping project by Naomi Daryn Boyd that explores the histories, communities, and journeys that have shaped these lands. Visitors are invited to engage with the tactile map and contribute their own stories of place.
In-person
exhibition
BLOOD, WATER & BATHURST STREET
Jan 13
–
Mar 01 2025
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'Bubble Quilt' by Studio Rat is an immersive inflatable installation and lighting concept quilted from reclaimed waste plastics. Hand-crafted inflated modules form a soft-glowing grid, illuminating surface patterns inspired by traditional quilt motifs.
In-person
exhibition
Bubble Quilt
Jan 24
–
Feb 02 2025
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A collection of stacked, hollow ceramic forms inspired by the ancient tradition of stacking stones. Made by Toronto-based ceramicist Vicky Pratt Becker of Vicky Makes Things.
In-person
window installation
Cairns for Home
Jan 24
–
Feb 02 2025
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An immersive installation by Nadira Narine that uses light, mirrors, metal and colour to evoke memories and emotions to create ∼*memory landscapes*∼ titled 'Colour Fields'.
In-person
window installation
Chromatic Echoes
Jan 24
–
Feb 02 2025
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'City Blocks' is a textile installation by Sarah Aranha that is informed by the built environment around us. Drawing on the traditions of quilting and patchwork, 'City Blocks' features unique quilt blocks that reflect the changing landscapes of our city.
In-person
window installation
City Blocks
Jan 24
–
Feb 23 2025
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Join a public forum on the topic of housing and youth. Panel of civic leaders, community activists, and design and economic thinkers, followed by an open mic to explore a next generations lens on the future of urban housing.
In-person
event: Talk
CommunityStreets: A Youth Lens on the Future of Urban Housing
Feb 01 2025
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A fun and approachable salon-style community gathering designed to help you meaningfully connect with fellow design enthusiasts, share your work and ideas, and be open to possible future creative collaborations.
In-person
event: Workshop
Connect & Collaborate: A Design Salon
Jan 25
–
Jan 31 2025
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'Connections' by Chloe Begg features modular ceramic sculptures inspired by architectural forms and themes of authenticity. Each piece explores balance, connection, and belonging through improvisational techniques, inviting viewers to engage with and interpret the work’s layered meanings.
In-person
exhibition
Connections
Jan 24
–
Feb 23 2025
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An installation at Evergreen Brick Works, 'Consumed!' invites viewers to reconsider their relationship with material goods. Jennifer Coghill imagines a world where style is measured not by newness or trendiness but by sustainability and creativity.
In-person
exhibition
Consumed!
Jan 23
–
Feb 27 2025
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The humble tree participates as a vital part of our ecosystem and built environment yet its intrinsic beauty often goes unnoticed. ‘Daylighting Trees’ reveals this beauty through a collection of sculptural objects made from weathered and reclaimed wooden architectural beams.
In-person
window installation
Daylighting Trees
Jan 24
–
Feb 04 2025
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SvN’s 'Deconstructing TOD: Transit Roots' exhibit peels back the curtain to show how good quality transit can be delivered in our cities to support healthy, thriving communities. This exhibit showcases an approach for delivering positive social change through major transit projects.
In-person
exhibition
Deconstructing TOD: Transit Roots
Jan 24
–
Feb 01 2025
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'Delirious Facade' is a design project that uses image processing artificial intelligence as a generator for architectural form and ornament. The resulting facade proposals are inherently contextual, relating to historical precedent in ways not tied down to dominant formal narratives.
In-person
window installation
Delirious Facade
Jan 24
–
Feb 02 2025
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Tour Eventscape’s offices, R&D Fab Lab, and custom manufacturing facilities for a look behind the scenes. Learn how Eventscape, an award-winning architectural fabrication company works with the latest technologies, machinery and materials to create custom features.
In-person
event: Tour
Design + Fabrication Shop Tours
Jan 28
–
Jan 29 2025
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The Design Collection @ STACKT launch event featuring TechnoSalon.
In-person
event: Reception
Design Collection @ STACKT Launch Party
Jan 25 2025
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A conversation featuring a panel of designers, architects, and artists about the stories that are told through function and form. Moderated by Nadeem Malik, Aesop Head of Store Design, Americas.
In-person
event: Talk
Design in Dialogue: A Narrative Approach
Jan 30 2025
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Join us for the official 2025 DesignTO Launch Party as we kick off our 15th Festival and celebrate DesignTO's legacy of fostering belonging and sparking vital conversations about design’s role in shaping a better world.
People dancing at party with art and light installation
In-person
event: Party
DesignTO Launch Party 2025
Jan 24 2025
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Through expressive works in glass, Lauren Rice and Nadira Narine navigate community connections current and past, evoking nostalgia for what has been, and a celebration of what is. Join DesignTO for a presentation and discussion with the artists as they explore identity, memory, and emotion.
In-person
event: Talk
DesignTO Talks: Material Expressions
Jan 26 2025
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‘Net Positive’ brings together eight multidisciplinary experts to explore innovative responses to the climate crisis from a perspective of abundance. Speakers include Aaron Budd, April Barrett, Deepikah RB, Juan Erazo, Judith van den Boom, Netami Stuart, Reza Nik, and Tura Cousins Wilson.
In-person
event: Talk
DesignTO Talks: Net Positive
Jan 31 2025
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This walking tour invites you to take a closer look at three temporary artworks in the Yonge + St. Clair neighbourhood. With firsthand insight from the artists and designers behind the projects, delve deeper into the installations, their stories and how they came to be.
In-person
event: Tour
DesignTO Tours: Dualities
Feb 02 2025
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‘Story Story’ is a group exhibition featuring 7 emerging artists and designers from the annual DesignTO Youth program. Through diverse mediums, materials, and forms, the showcased works present reflections on themes of family, identity, femininity, cross-generational traditions, and the ‘self’.
Collage of a rocking chair, television mat and adire textile
In-person
exhibition
DesignTO Youth: Story Story
Jan 24
–
Feb 15 2025
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Discover the historic Arts and Letters Club, located in the iconic St. George’s Hall, through self-guided tours. Founded in 1908, the Club is a vibrant social hub dedicated to the appreciation and celebration of the arts, including architecture, drawing, film, literature, music, painting, sculpture, and theatre.
In-person
event: Tour
Discover a Hidden Gem: The Arts and Letters Club
Jan 24 2025
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A performative textile installation, where the artist/designer will hand-tie modular units of naturally dyed, fused, laser etched, and laser cut silk fabrics together. The finished yardage will be on display for the duration of Toronto design week.
In-person
exhibition
DO: MAKING AS AN ACT OF ENDURANCE
Jan 23
–
Feb 01 2025
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Experience 'DOT DIALOG: The Human Senses', an interactive multisensory exhibition by DIALOG for DesignTO 2025. Explore how design engages sight, sound, touch, taste, and smell to create sustainable, human-centred spaces. Free and open to all hosted at DIALOG’s Toronto studio.
In-person
exhibition
DOT DIALOG: The Human Senses
Jan 24
–
Jan 28 2025
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A collection of works on paper alongside wooden furniture pieces. Despite differences in materiality, they share a common theme — a process-based design whereby repetition leads to variation and standardization yields an organic quality—furniture making as drawing.
In-person
exhibition
Drawing and Improvisation in Paper and Wood
Jan 24
–
Feb 02 2025
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'Duelling Dualities: From Indigenous Filipino Packaging to Industrialized Canadian Realities' explores the intersection of tradition and industry, highlighting how packaging reflects cultural values, sustainability, and the potential of indigenous knowledge in shaping a sustainable future. Curated by Robert Joel Cortez.
In-person
exhibition
DUELLING DUALITIES: From Indigenous Filipino Packaging to Industrialized Canadian Realities
Jan 24
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Feb 28 2025
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DUSKSHAPED, a New York-based sculptor who creates design objects from metal, the most sustainable common building material, is thrilled to show a selection of works from the 'Bad Graces' collection, including plant stands, jewelry hangers, bowls, and small tables.
In-person
exhibition
DUSKSHAPED: Bad Graces
Jan 24
–
Feb 02 2025
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‘Dwell’ is a design exhibition that offers opportunities to slow down and connect in the hustle and bustle of Union Station – Canada's busiest transportation hub. Five artists and designers explore what taking pause amidst the rush of urban travel looks like.
In-person
exhibition
Dwell
Jan 24
–
Feb 02 2025
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'Multiple Endings' is a group exhibition co-curated by the Dying.series collective. This exhibition aims to look into existentialism across the realms of fragility, death, dying, loss, and grief through socially engaged art pieces that embrace diverse cultural and spiritual lenses.
In-person
exhibition
Dying. Multiple Endings
Jan 23
–
Feb 03 2025
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'Emovere' by Carrie Perreault is a sculptural series of drystone casts from HVAC ducts. Unpolished and raw, they evoke incomplete spaces and home, inspired by "emovere," meaning to move through. Displayed en masse, they render air and space tangible.
In-person
window installation
Emovere
Jan 24
–
Feb 02 2025
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Highlighting the dynamic talent of Montreal’s design community, this exhibition celebrates both individual creativity and the collaborative spirit that fuels it. Together, it showcase a diverse range of furniture pieces, reflecting Montreal's forward-thinking and vibrant design scene.
In-person
exhibition
Ensemble
Jan 24
–
Jan 28 2025
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Learn low-fidelity prototyping to tinker with physical materials (crafting materials, electronics, etc.) and bring creative ideas to life! Diverse participants of all ages, including those with sensory disabilities, are encouraged to attend.
In-person
event: Workshop
Everyone Is a Designer Workshop
Jan 28 2025
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'Fables in Yarn' is a collection of six hand-punched tapestries by Alisa McRonald that weave together the vibrancy of Scottish and Irish fairytales and folklore with the artist’s unique narratives.
In-person
exhibition
Fables in Yarn
Jan 24
–
Feb 04 2025
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'Family Stories' by Diana Watters is a textural study of materials blended and bound together through macrame and weaving.
In-person
window installation
Family Stories
Jan 19
–
Feb 12 2025
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Rolls of felt six feet wide by eighty yards long in total are turned into an interior environment that crosses installation with functional design with forms that evolve from the inherent qualities of the material—felt rolls, felt folds, felt puckers, felt pleats, felt pads, felt cushions felt bulges, felt creases. Drop in during gallery hours or join us at one of the free events.
In-person
exhibition
FELT unfurled
Jan 18
–
Feb 08 2025
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'Filamentous', 2020-2023, grew out of the daily rituals and art practices of the pandemic. Cyanotype portraits hang in individual net canopies connected by rope nests against a backdrop of solar-dyed teabag tapestries that chronicle seasons passed during lockdown.
In-person
exhibition
Filamentous
Jan 24
–
Feb 02 2025
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This series of furniture is displayed in the window of the flodström office and showroom in Roncy. The flodström x Woyote collaboration brings a combination of refined and bold furniture that is as unique as you are.
In-person
window installation
flodström x Woyote
Jan 24
–
Feb 02 2025
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'Fluid Connectivité' by Gabrielle Lasporte reflects on life, knowledge that our individual stories meshing into wider expanse of flow and connectivity brings expansion, understanding to our collective experiences.
In-person
exhibition
Fluid Connectivité
Jan 24
–
Feb 02 2025
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Trauma-informed artist Olivia Mae Sinclair explores forgiveness, devotion, and healing through screen-printed textiles and poetry. 'FORGIVENESS/RESENTMENT' uses transitional space to examine memory, pain, and recovery, inviting viewers to reflect on the tension between letting go and holding on.
In-person
exhibition
FORGIVENESS/RESENTMENT
Jan 24
–
Feb 02 2025
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This exhibition of artworks by Catherine Chan delves into entanglements with the more-than-human. Recontextualizing materials of deep time with those made within human timescales, these artworks aim to unearth embedded histories and our interwoven relationships with the biotic and abiotic.
In-person
exhibition
Fractures and Futures
Jan 24
–
Feb 15 2025
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'Fragments of a Disappearing Landscape' by POLYMETIS (Michaela MacLeod & Nicholas Croft) captures clay impressions of Ontario's Oak Ridges Moraine, reflecting its fragile state under environmental pressures. This immersive installation invites viewers to consider the urgency of protecting disappearing landscapes.
In-person
exhibition
Fragments of a Disappearing Landscape
Jan 24
–
Feb 15 2025
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In this workshop, Laura Carwardine will guide you through the process of stitching her 'Fried Egg Magnet 3D Embroidery Kit'. Enjoy a comfortable social afternoon at The Drake Hotel as you’re stitching and learning about the tactile joys of embroidery.
In-person
event: Workshop
Fried Egg Embroidery Workshop
Feb 01 2025
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'From the Ground' is an art exhibit by OCADU students Christina da Graça and Songshu Liu, featuring woodworking and ceramics. Their work celebrates the natural beauty and imperfections of clay and wood, hosted at the Bulthaup Toronto Showroom.
In-person
exhibition
From The Ground
Jan 20
–
Feb 01 2025
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Studio Bimbi is a creative practice and space for exploration. This exhibition showcases a collection of hand-made furniture for home.
In-person
exhibition
Home
Jan 24
–
Feb 02 2025
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NEUF architect(e)s displays an architectural installation showcasing typical residential spaces in Toronto within their storefront window that directly faces St. Lawrence Market. This display showcases design interventions that Torontonians can do to improve their homes for multi-generational use.
In-person
window installation
Homes That Care
Jan 24
–
Feb 02 2025
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'Homing' is an ongoing performance, relational, and research piece by Toronto-based artist Maddy Young. Pigeons are the ultimate urban survivors and, for DesignTO, they will become stoic observers in the lobby of 95 St. Clair Avenue West.
In-person
exhibition
Homing (Pigeon Store)
Jan 24
–
Feb 02 2025
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Organized by DesignTO in partnership with the Toronto Society of Architects, ‘Ideas Forum: Labour in Architecture’ features five fast-paced presentations (20 slides shown for 20 seconds each) exploring the practice of architecture.
Online
event: Talk
Ideas Forum: Labour in Architecture
Jan 28 2025
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'Iluminación' by Desiree Martinez explores the recession of daylight during winter. It represents the feelings of humans confined in the shortness of daylight. Often finding ourselves in urge to immerse in any kind of illumination.
In-person
window installation
Iluminación
Jan 24
–
Feb 02 2025
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The Interior Design Show celebrates and promotes the best in global and Canadian design, from emerging designers to legacy brands. IDS is not just a fair — it’s a total design experience.
In-person
exhibition
Interior Design Show Toronto 2025
Jan 23
–
Jan 26 2025
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