We aim to drive a sustainable transformation of the post-hospital space into a cultural cluster. We will support young Wesoła residents in developing their own identities and, through them, the identity of the city of the future and building relationships between them and the piece of city they hold in their hands. In recent years we have hosted numerous outdoor events, including the Wianki Music Festival, family picnics, outdoor cinema, visual arts exhibitions and alternative concerts. This year, we have also included activities supporting the environment, such as running an apiary and a community garden.
In 2023, we will launch a revitalised former pharmacy in Wesoła. The post-modernist building stands out against the 19th-century architecture of Kopernika Street. The interiors are divided into four storeys; the ground floor and mezzanine will hold office space, a reading room, a shop and a Toy Clinic which will host exhibitions and demonstrations of making and repairing toys.
The lower ground floor will be used for conducting experiments and making prototypes, aimed at circles from the Academy of Fine Arts, designers working on the floor above and anyone who might need access to workshops space. We want to dedicate the venue to design, and in the coming future to other spheres which may seem less obviously tied to it. Our goal is for the Design Pharmacy in Wesoła to become a place of encounters between arts and sciences, architecture, web design, state-of-the-art technologies, industrial design and activism. It will be open to all regardless of age and experience with design; it will serve as an incubator of thoughts and experiments for innovators seeking collaborations and hoping to get involved with some of the most pressing issues of our time, especially environmental concerns.
The Design Pharmacy will provide space for permanent residents including start-ups, activists and professional designers. The regular programme will include educational events for kids and host a museum corner focused on toy design, a workshop, reading room, bookshop and lecture rooms.
We will soon announce enrolment to workshops for resident designers. It will be up to them whether they are part of the Design Pharmacy for three months, a year or two years. We will also provide offices and shared-use workspaces. Our terms and conditions make us certain that the Design Pharmacy will be an active space for creative thought.
This year’s activities will culminate with a festival held at the site in November. It will also be the latest instalment of the cyclical event A Thing For Art. Design in Kraków. The few weekends spent surrounded by passionate amateurs, theorists and practitioners of design will be the perfect opportunity to search for an identity for the Design Pharmacy. The event includes practical workshops, fairs of independent publications and prints, lectures by theorists and practitioners of design from Germany, France, Ukraine and Poland, networking meetings, visual arts events outside the building, an exchange of books on design and communal meals. All events will be streamed online, bringing them to an even wider audience.
