Public Programs

In conjunction with the exhibition Joris Laarman Lab: Design in the Digital Age, curator Andrea Lipps will sit down with Laarman to discuss how his boundless curiosity and experimental design thinking informs the creative output of Joris Laarman Lab.  Known for their pioneering and elegant applications of digital technologies, Joris Laarman Lab straddles tradition and... View full event details here.

Join us for a conversation with musician and four-time Grammy Award–winner Esperanza Spalding, and Caitlin Condell, Associate Curator and Head of Drawings, Prints & Graphic Design at Cooper Hewitt. Spalding is guest curator of the exhibition Esperanza Spalding Selects, which features nearly 50 objects from the museum’s permanent collection, including drawings, prints, textiles, jewelry and... View full event details here.

Ilonka Karasz: Elusive Modernist Though best known for her covers for The New Yorker and home furnishings of the late 1920s, Ilonka Karasz (1896–1981) expressed her modernist voice in a remarkable range of media, from wallpapers to railroad china, children’s chairs to book jackets, printed silks to paintings. She arrived in New York from Hungary... View full event details here.

As part of National Design Week, the 2017 National Design Award winners will lead concurrent salons for discussion of new ideas and advancements in design. Forge valuable connections with the brightest minds in the design world and network with fellow attendees. Light refreshments will be served. View full event details here.

Join us for tea and a guided tour of Joris Laarman Lab: Design in the Digital Age. The program will be led by the exhibition’s curator Andrea Lipps, who will discuss key themes and exciting new developments in digital technology and furniture design. Find out about Cooper Hewitt’s accessibility services. Joris Laarman Lab: Design in... View full event details here.

The Rhode Island School of Design Glass Department is celebrating the launch of its new book, Wonder: 50 Years RISD Glass, with a panel discussion, book signing, and reception. This comprehensive publication brings together contributions from scholars, cultural critics, and makers, giving context to the breadth of the field of glass, and supports a deep and expansive understanding of... View full event details here.

Join us for an opening reception, exhibition viewing, and book signing with collector Susan Grant Lewin and contemporary jewelry scholar Ursula Ilse Neuman, who will discuss works on view in Jewelry of Ideas: Gifts from the Susan Grant Lewin Collection. Celebrating a major gift of contemporary jewelry from Susan Grant Lewin to Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian... View full event details here.

In conjunction with the major gift of contemporary jewelry from Susan Grant Lewin to the Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum, including Jaime Bennett’s work. Join the world renowned enamelist for an advanced workshop on Enamel layering techniques and sgraffito; a form of decoration made by scratching through a surface to reveal a lower layer of... View full event details here.

Test your knowledge, win prizes, and explore the role of storytelling in the design process in a delightful evening of short talks and trivial disputes. Cooper Hewitt curator Ellen Lupton will talk about her new book, Design Is Storytelling, a guide to narrative thinking for designers. Also on deck: Peter Mendelsund, a brilliant graphic designer... View full event details here.