Design POP food and design festival has been cancelled

After much deliberation, following the recent government restrictions around COVID19, it is with a heavy heart that Cork’s Design and Food Festival, Design POP, has made the decision to cancel this year’s event, which was scheduled to take place next week from August 28th to August 30th.

The 3-day event, which had carefully planned social distancing guidelines in place based on the previous government guidelines, would have injected creativity and colour across the city, with 3 pop-up pavilions supporting Designers and local food producers, an Irish Design Shop, exhibition, a furniture-designer showcase, and discussions from special guests MASER, WhyDesign Founder Kim Mackenzie-Doyle, plus over 16 free talks and workshops.

Festival Director Amy McKeogh commented:

“Design POP is about creativity, interaction, and brings joy to the public realm and under the current government restrictions, we would not be able to do so. With the confusion, and conflicting information from the Government, and the fact that the festival HQ, Thompson House, is not deemed to be a gallery, theatre, or cinema, we have come to the really difficult decision to cancel the event. 

The outdoor pavilions are about fun, engagement and design, and with the number of people reduced to 15 people, I feel it becomes more about restrictions and less about the intentions of the festival.

I would like to extend a huge thank you to all designers, food producers, sponsors, speakers and makers who have already invested so much of their time and energy in the making of this event over the past few months. All ticket holders will be refunded their money in the coming days.

The Design POP team is already making plans and gearing up to make our 2021 festival bigger and better. We thank everyone for all the support over the past year. Take care and stay safe.”