Infomarkers Eindhoven Design District
Experience design year-round in Eindhoven
How can we make design in Eindhoven easier to experience?
Strolling through design on a regular weekday? In Eindhoven, you can do that all year long—if you know where to go. Until now, there hasn’t been a clear route or signage like during Dutch Design Week. Eindhoven Design District is changing this with a family of design-worthy information markers.
Eye-catching and recognizable—those were two key criteria designer Tijs Gilde (Studio Guilty) worked with. The design also needed to be versatile and suitable for marking buildings, areas, or objects, indicating routes, or highlighting temporary installations. And everything had to connect visually, forming one cohesive family. Using 3D-printed concrete and aluminum, Tijs collaborated with Eindhoven’s own concrete expert, Saint-Gobain Weber Beamix. As a result, the info markers are not just functional—they’re design pieces in their own right.
The initiators
Studio Guilty
Studio Guilty, led by Eindhoven-based designer Tijs Gilde, focuses on material and product design. Experimentation is at the core of Tijs’ practice, bridging traditional manufacturing and the design industry. His aim? To reinvent existing industrial materials and techniques, making them suitable for design applications. This approach creates new aesthetics for the furniture and interior design industries and opens up fresh markets for manufacturers.
Check studioguilty.com for more information.
Eindhoven Design District
Eindhoven Design District is an initiative by the Municipality of Eindhoven, Dutch Design Foundation (DDF) and Eindhoven365. Our mission is to make design in the city more visible and accessible, while fostering stronger connections between businesses and designers. Discover more on our "About EDD" page.
‘‘A design should intrigue and be visually interesting, but just as much functional and recognizable’’Tijs Gilde | Studio Guilty
The incentive
Eindhoven proudly calls itself the design capital of the Netherlands, but outside Dutch Design Week, design’s presence isn’t as visible as it could be. That’s unfortunate because the city overflows with creativity—you just need to know where and how to look.
Eindhoven Design District’s mission isn’t just to increase the visibility of design throughout the city (through efforts like this website) but also to make it an immersive experience. It’s about touching a design, walking around it, or seeing it in its intended environment—and for that, public spaces are essential.
Eindhoven’s design offerings are diverse: from architectural marvels like the Trudo Tower and creative hubs like Piet Hein Eek to social design project results and urban innovations like Clausplein Park or the new paving stones downtown. The challenge is making all these elements of the Design District accessible to the public. A unifying, recognizable feature was needed: the Eindhoven Design District infomarker.
Rather than a single, all-encompassing design, the solution would be a family of options adaptable to each location’s needs and project requirements. This vision led to an open call for designers. Tijs Gilde’s proposal perfectly aligned with Eindhoven Design District’s strategy and branding, and Studio Guilty took the concept forward.
The process
The idea
Look around the city—what do you see? Bricks, asphalt, and concrete, with occasional hints of wood and greenery. Concrete, in particular, dominates the urban landscape. Studio Guilty began the design process here, focusing on this material. What possibilities does concrete offer? In cities, concrete is usually cast on a large scale, such as in posts or bollards. Could this be approached differently? Tijs Gilde enjoys finding the balance between sculptural, aesthetic works and functional designs. For the Eindhoven Design District markers, he aimed for a design that would draw attention yet not overshadow its informational purpose.
‘‘By using 3D-printed concrete, Tijs bridges Eindhoven’s history of concrete manufacturing with its innovative future.’’Antoinette Klawer | Project manager Eindhoven Design District
The plan
Eindhoven is home to Saint-Gobain Weber Beamix, a factory specializing in 3D concrete printing. Tijs had collaborated with them before, so the connection was quickly made. This partnership was key for creating a family of unique, visually striking objects. Traditional casting wouldn’t work, as it produces identical copies, whereas 3D printing allows for more flexibility in small-scale production.
Eindhoven Design District’s branding (developed by George&Harrison) and their specific requirements—markers in various sizes, for temporary and permanent use—provided the final ingredients for the design.
The execution
Designing for public spaces is uniquely challenging. Anyone can stumble upon the objects, so they must meet rigorous functional and aesthetic criteria. The design journey began at Saint-Gobain Weber Beamix, where Tijs collaborated with concrete specialists to translate his sketches into 3D-printable models. From there, it was a process of constant testing. How does the material behave? Is the structure strong enough? How do the printed objects look in real life? To achieve the desired texture, the print team added a layer of sand to the print bed, creating a coarser structure. Normally, the side of the object against the print bed is smooth, but this didn’t align with the overall vision. Eindhoven Design District and the city government were closely involved in this iterative process.
George&Harrison handled the design of the markers, while Eindhoven365, the city marketing organization, wrote the text.
The first markers have been installed in Strijp, along the Strijp Design Route. Plans are in place to expand the markers to new locations in Strijp and throughout the city. For now, the current installations are undergoing real-world testing. What do you think? Let us know!
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