Design Solutions 4 Crafts Development in Egypt: A Strategic Approach to anticipate challenges and to optimize choices

Design in Egypt must be shifted from imitating design in developed countries that focuses on design as a synonym for styling and producing luxury products, towards concentrating on the needs of the Egyptian society. In the context of craft development in Egypt, different activities of design must be redirected strategically toward meeting the needs of the local people both as consumers and as producers. In so doing, designers must work actively on improving craftsmen productivity in order to increase their income as well as to interpret people’s needs into appropriate and affordable products. Then at certain point these products must be connected efficiently with niche markets.
 
This paper argues that recent design thinking can support designers with new strategic insights and methods to anticipate challenges, to optimize the choices, and to synthesis the desirable solutions in the future.  This in turn will lead to empowering local people and integrating them in a sustainable economic situation. To ensure effective cooperation and participation at the national level, designer’s efforts must go hand in hand with other disciplines and must be sponsored by different stakeholders to promote development in specific craft sector. This paper is mainly concerned with answering the following questions: What kind of design solutions could be expected to empower local craftsmen? Who exactly can participate in producing this solution? How could designers support national policy towards sustaining crafts development efforts in Egypt?