Though Lollapalooza, the height of Chicago’s summer festival season, is still weeks away, visions of a different kind of creative collaboration are dancing through the minds of some Chicago innovators this week. This version of Lolla, however, has nothing to do with music, and everything to do with interior and commercial design.
Both NeoCon, North America’s largest design show at Merchandise Mart, and Fulton Market Design Days, a parallel design show in Fulton Market, take place this week. There, multiple showrooms, activations and programming will be open to the public and members of the design community.
This year, the International Interior Design Association (IIDA), a membership organization for commercial interior designers, is bringing the two concurrent events under its umbrella in hopes to expand design events to create more participatory involvement and visibility with professionals and non-professionals alike.
“I would love a design version of Lollapalooza,” said Cheryl Durst, IIDA’s executive vice president and CEO. “This comprehensive celebration of design — music, food, art — all the aspects that Chicago does so well. Lollapalooza happens in lots of other cities, but it is quintessentially Chicago. That’s how we feel about Chicago Design Week. You can’t talk about Chicago and not talk about design.”
To that end, City Council approved a resolution in 2025 declaring the second week of June “Chicago Design Week,” a celebration of Chicago as a premier design city, unifying existing efforts and helping fledgling efforts gain traction. Durst said one doesn’t need to be a practicing designer to enjoy the event’s festivities, which run from June 7-10. If you’re a lover of design, curious to learn more about Charles and Ray Eames or interested in NeoCon’s keynote talks, Chicago Design Week is for you.
“Design isn’t just about aesthetics. Design affects us heart, mind, soul, but also our body. Design is so much of an art, but it’s also a science,” Durst said. “We should all be concerned about the materials that are in the products we surround ourselves with, whether we’re living with those materials in our homes or commuting to our offices, and we’re surrounded by those materials in our flooring, seating, and lighting.”
Lydia Moya, brand manager at OFS, a commercial furniture manufacturer for modern offices, healthcare and hospitality environments in Fulton Market, said her team asked how they could feature art, interior design, and architecture as a single form of creative expression and artistry for the week. Their response was partnering with Chicago-based artist Liz Flores and Alkemis Paint (a mineral-based paint brand that touts itself as the world’s first wellness paint) to create a number of art pieces that anchor OFS’ office, lounge and play spaces. Flores’ dark greens, blues, yellows and reds set a tranquil vibe in one part of the studio where home and workspace exist, while new furniture for healthcare, senior living and wellness environments sit in an area prominently featuring the OFS brand Carolina’s tagline: “Design is the quietest form of care.”
“We’ve been thinking a lot about neurodiversity … Doing a lot of research,” Moya said. “People have different needs. How can we create furniture that can flex and support? Thinking about textures on the arms of chairs, because sometimes fidgeting, you get the feel of a certain texture, and it will help soothe you.”
More Top Picks Best Gooseneck Desk Lamps For Crafts
Tony Karman, EXPO Chicago founder, was an advisor to Chicago Design Week. He said when he created Expo Chicago, Expo Art Week followed, creating an umbrella for the cultural community to rally, organize, and schedule around a week of arts activities. The same thing is happening with Chicago Design Week. “It’s a natural extension of creating a moment to herald all that’s happening in Chicago,” Karman said. He suggests folks get out to the free workshops and panels to learn something new.
Maya Bird-Murphy, founder and executive director of Mobile Makers Chicago, a nonprofit that focuses on making design accessible to underrepresented communities, thinks the week is a huge opportunity to have all types of design conversations. She feels it is an occasion to bring in different audiences and broaden the types of design that’s celebrated, including those of Black and Brown creators. Her organization spearheads the biannual Design Summit for Friends of Friends, which amplifies diverse voices in the design field that otherwise may not be heard in the mainstream.
“Continuing to bring people together on a regular basis to break down barriers of entry, to hang out with folks that look like you, who are also excited about the same subjects, people finding their people who are interested in being creative and need that extra little help to find the space to learn more, to engage more — that is what I’m really excited about,” she said.
IIDA runs Design Your World, a free, two-week summer program for high school students where design professionals teach fundamentals, and take youth on field trips to firms, projects, and showrooms. Durst said the program started in Chicago in 2020 and has since extended to St. Louis, Miami and Dallas-Fort Worth. “Design starts close to the heart, close to the home,” Durst said.
This year, NeoCon is holding space for students of design, according to Nubia Henderson, director of programming at Merchandise Mart, where she oversees NeoCon. Students will hold a panel on Monday and participate in student day on Wednesday, where they will have an opportunity to both map out career paths led by architects and get tours of three showrooms.
Henderson is excited about Inside Design, which, according to its website, features “a curated series of exclusive, design-driven events throughout the city.” In partnership with the Design Museum of Chicago, registrants experienced behind-the-scenes looks at Steppenwolf Theatre, Home Court at the Obama Presidential Center and Urban Growers Collective through Sunday. (The Design Museum runs Designing Better Chicago, a grant program that funds individuals and organizations who are using design to impact their communities for the better.)
“Here’s an opportunity for us to showcase some of the stories that make Chicago great,” said Design Museum interim executive director Kevin Reader. “We’re curating our own lives with the small iterative choices we make everywhere we go,” he said. “Sometimes that feels more capital D-design (buying a new car or something flashy), but at the end of the day, those choices … The stories that we create in our lives become designed through that.”