Jonas Damon rounds up the 2014 schedule

Frog Design’s Executive Creative Director will make his debut this year.

Connecting with the City
Nov 8, 9:50am / 40 MINUTES

Across the globe, cities are the great places where connections between everyone and everything are made. Inspired by the streets of New York City, frog has been investigating a new type of urban infrastructure to help facilitate these connections. Beacon is a concept combining messaging, telephony, wayfinding, advertising, and wifi access into a network of interactive structures, deployed across cities’ street corners, accessible to all.

Speaker Bio: Jonas Damon

Jonas spends most of his time at frog, one of the world’s most iconic product strategy and design firms. As executive Creative Director, Jonas creates memorable user experiences in product design that seamlessly blend physical and digital technologies. He leads the Industrial Design practice across frog’s US studios, splitting his time primarily with teams in New York and San Francisco.

Jonas brings over fifteen years’ professional experience, spanning consumer electronics, transportation, furniture, retail, and packaging. Jonas’ clients have included AT&T, Bloomberg, Chrysler Fiat, Colgate-Palmolive, Comcast, Facebook, General Electric, Google, LG Electronics, Under Armour, PepsiCo, Samsung, Sharp, Tupperware, Umbra, Verizon, and Vitra. His collaboration with clients ranges from the design of specific products and product lines to shaping the design process as whole.

Jonas is a true citizen of the (design) world. He grew up in Germany before getting his degree from the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD). He began his career at Tom Dixon’s Eurolounge in London before becoming a design manager for the European retail group Habitat UK. At Habitat, he took part in rebuilding the in-house design team that revived Habitat’s reputation as the leading European retailer for home goods.

Outside of frog, Jonas is the founder Office for Design in New York City in 2001. There, he creates objects rooted in the exploration of new ways to engage old materials. He has crafted everything from lamps to kitchen ware, chairs, alarm clocks (he’s been called “Clock Man” in the past), toothbrushes, desks, tables and packaging. His works have been published and exhibited internationally. He also designs a successful line of consumer products for New York City-based Areaware.

His work is widely published and has been featured in museum exhibits. He has also spent time as a visiting critic and instructor at the École Nationale Supérieure des Arts Décoratifs (ENSAD) in Reims, the Royal College of Art (RCA) in London, UK and at New York’s School of Visual Arts.

You can check out some of Jonas’ work on his website: jonasdamon.com

*Image credit: CanUX & Elida Arrizza