12 hot design dates you can't afford to miss

07. Pick Me Up

• 23 April - 4 May
• Embankment Galleries, 
South Wing, London, UK

The UK's original contemporary graphic arts festival is now in its sixth year. Subverting the norm of your traditional art fair, Pick Me Up showcases graphic art in all its forms.

A fun, quirky and informal festival with studio spaces where you can shop for affordable art, digital Q&As, competitions and workshops. Up-and-coming artists are celebrated, so get networking!

Here are the hottest illustrations from Pick Me Up 2014...

08. HOW Design Live

• 4-8 May
• Hyatt Regency Chicago, 
Chicago, USA

The 25th anniversary of HOW Design Live promises to be the biggest and best ever, with a bolder-than-ever speaker line-up including Jessica Walsh, Karim Rashid, Spin's Tony Brook and Mucca Design's Matteo Bologna. This is one of the biggest international design events, and this year will be merging five events into one experience.

09. F5

• 17-18 May
• Terminal 5, 610 W 56th St. 
New York, USA

F5 seeks to unite art, technology and design by bringing together the thinkers and doers that are breaking ground and shaping new standards in media and design.

The two-day festival gathers filmmakers, writers, digital artists, game designers, graphic designers, VFX experts and many more seeking to inspire and create. Speakers this year include Patrick Clair, Debbie Millman, Eddie Opara, Partik Moberg and Block & Tackle.

10. What Design Can Do

• 21-22 May
• Stadsschousburg, Amsterdam

What Design Can Do explores the impact that design can have across all creative disciplines, with 2015's speakers including the inimitable Stefan Sagmeister, johnson banks' Michael Johnson, Google Creative Lab's Steve Rura, and experimental artists Bompas & Parr.

11. TYPO Berlin

• 21-23 May
• Haus der Kulturen der Welt, John-foster-Dulles-Allee 10, Berlin, Germany

The global design conference with a typographic flavour returns to Berlin with talks and workshops covering "design, culture, society – with a little bit of kerning."

With this year's theme of 'character', talks will present strategies against a culture of superficiality, with a view to building personality within your work. The myriad guest speakers include Aaron James Draplin, Matthias Frey, Jon Gray, Josh Higgins and Gemma O'Brien.

Here's a little taster of day three of TYPO Berlin 2014...

12. OFFF Barcelona

• 28-30 May
• DHUB, Plaza de les Glories Catalanes 37, Barcelona, Spain

This year marks a milestone for OFFF Barcelona. It's the 15th anniversary of the epic three-day design conference, and plans are in place to make it a party to remember.

This year's featured artists include Laika, Michael Cina, Mirko Borsche, Stefan Sagmeister and Studio Blup. It promises to be an explosion of graphic design, web development, motion and sound design – and almost everything in between.

Here's a glimpse of the creative mayhem that happened last year, and check out the changing digital landscape captured in OFFF's 15-year archive of opening titles...

This events calendar first appeared inside Computer Arts 239, a stunning collector's item celebrating print and digital – on sale now.

What events are you going to this summer? Let us know in the Comments below...

Liked this? Try these...

• Get a free copy of The Self-Promo Handbook with Computer Arts 240
• 10 tips for breaking onto the speaker circuit
• Useful and inspiring flyer templates