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Lesley-Ann Noel is a lecturer in
Product Design and has done
work in product design, export
product development and
entrepreneurship training as a
consultant for organisations such
as the UWI Steel Pan Research
Laboratory, the Export Promotion
Council of Kenya, The Caribbean
Export Development Agency, the
Caribbean Development Bank and
the Uganda Women Entrepreneurs
Association Ltd.
Ms. Noel is the Coordinator of
the Visual Arts Unit and joined
the DCFA (then CAC) in 1999 as
a part-time lecturer in Design.
She became full-time faculty in
2008. She has exhibited work at
design exhibitions and design
trade shows in the United States,
Trinidad & Tobago, Jamaica, Brazil,
Germany and France. Her areas of
interest include ‘art and design in
primary education’, ‘sustainable
product development’ and ‘design
and product strategy for small and
micro-entrepreneurs’.
there may exist a romanticized notion of what we do in the Caribbean,
anticipating work with lots of images of palm trees. The fact that
governmental and regional agencies tend to favour international
design consultants over building local talent does not improve our
counterparts’ perception of us. I believe it is important for us to
build local demand, and to strengthen our expertise locally, perhaps
before penetrating the international market or at least at the same
time. It is greatly important for us to increase our consumption of
locally/regionally-designed products and design services in order to
make our industry better equipped to compete internationally. Some
designers or product makers may be able to leap frog the local market
and go straight to the international market, but I think most need to
develop a local or regional demand for their goods and services.
It may be possible to find nuances of Caribbean culture in Caribbean
design through themes, materials, colour schemes, the way we
deal with clients etc. However, with a more sophisticated and
therefore more demanding local audience, and with the impact of
globalization, some of these nuances may be less evident in our
products and services. This is not a negative thing it is merely the
reality of the situation. There may be a negative nuance of our
culture that impacts our design and creative industries, our own neo-
CARIBBEAN EXPORT DEVELOPMENT AGENCY - CREATE
01CREATIVEDESIGN -DESIGNINGTHEPRODUCTOFTHEFUTURE
LESLEY-ANN NOEL
COORDINATOR AND LECTURER,
VISUAL ARTS PROGRAMME,
UNIVERSITY OF THE WEST INDIES
CONTRIBUTOR
INDUSTRY INSIGHT –
CREATIVE DESIGN
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Images from Design
Caribbean 2011 held in the
Dominican Republic