Deyan Sudjic OBE

Director Emeritus, curator, editor, writer

 

EMPLOYMENT AND ACTIVITIES

Director
the Design Museum 2006 –2020

Director Emeritus
the Design Museum 2020 - ongoing

I was appointed as director of the museum with a brief to deliver a much larger and more centrally located building, while at the same time running the existing museum at its original dockland site.

After evaluating sites at Tate, the V&A, Kings Cross, and Tower Bridge, I led negotiations with the developer of the former Commonwealth Institute to acquire a rent-free 175-year lease. I led the design, fund raising, construction staff recruitment and programming process and devising a business plan to operate the new museum.

This included successful applications to the Heritage Lottery Fund, and the Arts Council Lottery Fund, selling the museum’s original building, and securing donations from a number of individuals, trusts and foundations, totalling £80m in cash and the value of the site. I personally made several successful asks for sums in excess of £1m.

The new museum is 10 000m2, has an operating budget of £10m, and a staff of 105, not including the contract staff who maintain the building. Of this budget, the Arts Council accounts for £170 000, all the rest is self-generated, through a combination of ticket sales, philanthropy, sponsorship, and trading activities. Since opening, the museum has received in excess of 1.5m visitors. Our activities include staging six exhibitions annually, learning – aimed at groups from schools to a masters’ programme in curating contemporary design, run with Kingston University, publishing and retailing. We were named European Museum of the Year for 2018, our conversion won an RIBA award in 2017.

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  • Honorary Trustee, the Norman Foster Foundation: 2017 - ongoing

  • Director, the Design Museum: 2006 - 2020

  • Director Emeritus, the Design Museum: 2020 - ongoing

  • Distinguished professor Design and Architectural Studies Lancaster University 2019 - ongoing

  • Commissioner, Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment:
    Co-chair design review panel: 2006 - 2011

  • Member, Advisory Committee the Urban Age, at the London School of Economics:
    2007 - 2020

  • Dean at the Faculty of Art, Design and Architecture, Kingston University: 2005-2006

  • Visiting professor, Royal College of Art: 2005- 2010

  • Director, Venice Architecture Biennale: 2002
    (first British director)

  • Editor-in-Chief, Domus magazine: 2000-2004
    (first British editor of this Milan magazine founded by Gio Ponti)

  • Architecture critic, The Observer: 2000-2006

  • Director, Glasgow 1999 UK City of Architecture and Design: 1996-2000

  • Architecture critic, The Guardian: 1992 -1998

  • Visiting professor, University of the Applied Arts Vienna: 1992-1996
    Running a course in Design History and Theory

  • Founding Editor, Blueprint magazine: 1983 -1996

  • Architecture critic, The Sunday Times: 1981-1985

Director, Glasgow 1999
UK City of Architecture and Design
1996-2000

 

This year, sponsored by the Arts Council, involved three capital projects:

  • the transformation of the former Glasgow Herald building designed by Charles Rennie Mackintosh into The Lighthouse, Scotland’s Centre for Architecture Design and the City, Homes for the Future

  • the creation of a demonstration housing project on Glasgow green involving 100 homes and 12 architectural practices

  • six new public spaces in peripheral parts of the City

In the year itself, which had a £45m budget, there was a programme of more than 100 exhibitions and events, aimed at a wide range of audiences. There was, at its peak, a staff of 60.

 EDUCATION

Edinburgh University: BSc (Soc Sci) Diploma in Architecture

HONORARY DEGREES

  • Glasgow School of Art

  • Brighton

  • Lincoln

  • Dundee

  • University of the Creative Arts

  • London Metropolitan

  • Royal College of Art Senior Fellow

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MAGAZINES

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 From 2000-4 Deyan Sudjic was the editor in chief of Domus, the distinguished Italian monthly magazine originally established by Gio Ponti. He followed such leading figures as Alessandro Mendini, and Mario Bellini as editor

 
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Deyan Sudjic was the founding editor of Blueprint in 1983, an agenda setting magazine for contemporary architecture and design

 

ARCHITECTURAL JURIES

  • BBC Scotland HQ, Pacific Quay, Glasgow
    (won by David Chipperfield)

  • Warsaw Museum of Modern Art (won by )

  • Business School Bocconi University Milan, (won by Kazuo Sejima)

  • Olympic Swimming Pool London (won by Zaha Hadid)

AWARDS

  • Bicentenary Medal of the Royal Society of Arts for the promotion of design

  • Honorary Fellow of the Royal Institute of British Architects

  • Honorary Fellow, Royal Incorporation of Architects in Scotland

Deyan Sudjic and Sir Terence Conran present plans for transforming the former Commonwealth Institute to HM The Queen in 2011

 

 SELECTED EXHIBITIONS

  • Foster, Rogers and Stirling, Royal Academy

  • Metropolis, the ICA

  • Contemporary, the V&A

  • Identity and Design, the Louisiana Museum Copenhagen

  • Design Cities, Istanbul

  • Modern Mario Bellini, Milan Triennale

  • Next, Arsenale Venice

As director of the Venice Architecture Biennale in 2002, he was the first British curator of this exhibition. It was an exploration of new work from around the world, from China and Australia to the UK and Japan