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Spher

Planetarium & Museum Bochum

20.-21. November 2026

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The True and the Beautiful

Few places bring science and art together as directly and on such equal footing as the modern planetarium.

This unique convergence serves as the starting point for SpherIcon, an event that focuses on the relationship between these two great spheres of human creativity. Held across the Kunstmuseum Bochum and the planetarium’s star theater, the event brings together scientists, artists, and philosophers to offer insights into this dynamic interplay from diverse perspectives.

Lectures, discussions, and immersive presentations illustrate how the „true and the beautiful“ manifest in images, data, and spaces. SpherIcon serves as a forum for exchange and collaboration—and as an invitation not merely to conceptualize knowledge, but to see and experience it.

    • 25 +

      speakers

    • 10 +

      grand hols

    • 55 +

      workshops

    • 99 +

      exhibitions

    Design Education

    Design thinking: cognitive modes and learning styles

    Design approaches, strategies, methodologies and tactics

    Problem solving: recognition procedures, hypothesis development

    The meaning of innovation and creativity, in theory and practice

    Designed Objects

    Fashion design and development

    Product design philosophy

    Industrial and Interior design

    Engineering and design

    Design Management

    People and artifacts: exploring uses and usability

    Participatory design systems

    Professional ethics

    Design knowledge management

    DESIGN IN SOCIETY

    Design in social policy, planning, and politics

    Health, safety, and public welfare in design practice

    Design as business

    Markets for design and designing for markets

    VISUAL DESIGN

    Communications design

    Visual arts

    Typography

    Graphic design

    ENVIRONMENTAL DESIGN

    Eco design: environmental and green design

    Theatre and set design

    Interaction design

    Landscape architecture

    DESIGN PRACTICES

    The business of design is in a state of flux. The roles, the tasks and the personae of designers are changing.

    No longer the technical expert, the heroic aesthete or the inspired individual of our earlier modern past, the contemporary designer draws upon dispersed sources of creativity and innovation. Collaboration today is a key. For design practitioners, a central paradox of our times is the increasing specialization, on the one hand, but on the other, the need for more broad-ranging and holistic integration of design tasks, working between and across design disciplines. Design is becoming an ever-more social process

    IMPERATIVE TO COLLABORATE

    The imperative to collaborate, moreover, extends well beyond the domain of professional interaction and working in design teams. It also extends to the relationship with the users, clients and consumers of design. Designers today need to build deeply collaborative relationships with their ‘public’. Participatory design and user-centered design are just two key phrases that capture the spirit of this imperative.

    INDEPENDENT BUSINESSES

    Our DesignDays 2021 conferences are designed for independent businesses, owners of small and medium enterprises and company directors.
    The Company, based in the USA, works towards developing a wide range of professional tools to suit its customer base.

    Design discourse

    Designers need to be able to ‘do’ a multimodal professional design discourse. They must speak and write their way through complex collaborations with co-designers and interactions with users. They need to be able to ‘do’ visualization as they explore design alternatives through mental images and picture their visions into reality. They should present spatial realities, prefiguring the three dimensional through the two dimensional and turning plans into tactile artifacts, manipulable objects, architectural spaces and navigable landscapes. The new, digital media provide newly flexible and accessible tools for multimodal and synaesthetic thinking.

    DESIGN MODALITIES

    Design’s modalities are also in a state of flux, its working tools of representation, communication, visualization and imagination. Digitization of text, sound, still and moving image is an important site of transition. This has spawned new practices of modeling and simulation, of prefiguring the real in the virtual. It has also introduced the virtual as a design end-in-itself.

    FEW WORDS

    Organization of a Design Days Conference series is a result of the continued policy and continuous learning process, connecting researchers and practitioners attempting to understand better the problems they are trying to address.

    SCHEDULE

    20th–21st of november 2026 | @Bochum Planetarium & Kunstmuseum Bochum
    We are excited to see you at the first edition of SpherIcon! This special event focusses on live performance in Planetariums and  Immersive Environment at the intersection of art and science.

    SPEAKERS

    List of Contributors to SpherIcon to be published here soon.

    What's new on our blog

    Check how the previous edition of Design Days Conference looked like

    Blog Page

    Receive Updates and Information

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    Contact

    SpherIcon will take place at the Bochum Planetarium and the Museum of Art in Bochum, Germany.

    VENUE:
    The Bochum Planetarium is one of the most visited planetariums in Europe. It is located near the Ruhrstadion on the northeastern edge of Bochum's city center in the Ruhr region. Built in 1964, it was the first large-scale planetarium in Germany to be constructed in the post-war era. The planetarium's program includes scientific lectures, presentations on astronomical and other topics, and shows for children. It also hosts popular artistic events, such as concerts and musical performances, beneath the starry dome. More than 2,400 events take place there annually. The 300,000-visitor mark has frequently been surpassed; in 2024, the Bochum Planetarium welcomed approximately 350,000 visitors.

    Address: Castroper Strasse 67, 44791 Bochum, Germany
    GPS coordinates: 51.48550672656047, 7.227806176043393

    NEARBY ACCOMODATION
    Are you looking for a place to stay?

    There are several hotels and accommodation within walking distance of the Planetarium.
    More places to stay can be found in the city center, which is one stop with the subway away from the Planetarium , and the area of the „Bermuda Triangle“ -a popular spot for night life in Bochum - which is two stops away.

    Food and Drink
    Best places to eat & drink can be reached on foot in a few minutes from the Planetarium and Museum of Art.

    Contacts
    We are happy to help you with any questions or recommendations any time.

    Info
    For further info and media related inquiries contact
    info@sphericon.one

    Sponsors

    Annual Design Days Conference is brought to you by:

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