Nearly 100 Hungarian and regional designers and manufacturers will present around 400 works at this year’s 360 Design Budapest exhibition, running 9–19 October in the Buda Castle District. Organized by the Hungarian Fashion & Design Agency (MDDÜ), the event highlights the cultural and economic significance of design across industries and everyday life.
The exhibition features creations from Hungarian and Central European design brands, industrial and visual artists, and for the first time in Hungary, a retrospective of Sándor Borz Kováts, one of the country’s most influential designers. Alongside these displays, visitors can explore prototypes, models, and audiovisual projects by students of the Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design. The show, curated by Judit Horváth of the Museum of Applied Arts, was created in cooperation with the Hungarian National Museum’s Public Collection Center.
As the central event of Budapest Design Week, the exhibition offers more than static displays. Visitors can join guided tours by musicians, actors, and content creators, take part in workshops, and attend performances and professional roundtable discussions. Admission is free but requires registration through the 360 Design Budapest website.
This year’s theme, Design Aligns – Creating Together, Living Connected, emphasizes the connective power of design across eras and industries, encouraging visitors to see beyond objects to the stories they embody. The venue, a baroque palace at 1 Táncsics Mihály Street, will host the exhibition for 11 days.
The MDDÜ has also launched open curator and architecture competitions for the first time. The winning concepts, developed by Barna Erdész and the Space Buffet collective (Ingrid and Albert Manhertz), reinterpret past inspirations through a contemporary lens. The exhibition will include products from ten Hungarian manufacturers as well as works by more than 70 Hungarian designers and over ten from across the region, including Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Slovenia, Ukraine, Romania, and Armenia.
The agency underlines that design is not only a cultural matter but also a driving economic force, generating more revenue in Europe than telecommunications or the automotive sector. In Hungary, the creative industry sustains manufacturing capacity and provides highly skilled jobs. According to MDDÜ director Zsófia Jakab, many Hungarian design and manufacturing developments have emerged directly from past editions of the exhibition.
Dedicated to nurturing new talent, 360 Design Budapest will showcase over 30 young Hungarian designers in 2025. The event also aims to raise the profile of creative industry trades, offering free professional guided tours for vocational and university students and educators.
Programme details and registration are available at the double Red Dot Award-winning 360 Design Budapest website: https://360dbp.com.
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