On September 23^rd, DESTEX partners held its second official meeting virtually to monitor the project progress and discuss about the next steps on the project implementation.

The project main objective is to promote the uptake of creativity culture as a catalyst to unlock the innovation potential in the advanced textiles’ materials sector. DESTEX is developing a set of tools to bridge industrial and creative design to the manufacturing companies in the advanced textile materials’ sector.

In particular, the project is developing a virtual training program led by LCI, an intensive learning program for a summer course led DSKD by and a virtual hackathon platform led by POLIMI. During the last stage of the project, the team will also compile the best practices identified in a handbook.

LCI started discussing the different options for online platform to launch the virtual training program including the different open education resources and videos developed by the partners. The virtual program will follow the design double diamond structure (discover, define, develop and deliver) and each partner is completing a set of virtual lectures that will be launched in the next two months.

DSKD presented the status of the intensive learning program that will be tested next summer in Milan. This will a hands-on program that will bring into practice the concepts from the virtual training.

Lastly, POLIMI reviewed the status of the virtual hackathon platform development, which will be launched earlier in 2021 with a series of three demonstration hackathons of textile industrial challenges. The consortium is also selecting companies with specific challenges that will be addressed during each of the virtual hackathons by transnational teams of students.