The Events series is primarily concerned with the awards, competitions, and conferences that IDSA produced or sponsored. The materials in this series often demonstrate the planning that underpinned these events and illuminate the specific content presented at the events. Of particular interest in this series are the promotional materials and programs that explain IDSA’s national conference. Topics discussed at the conferences reveal the key issues and ideas in the industrial design field during a particular year. Also of interest are the materials that professional and student designers submitted for competitions and award consideration. These materials often include images of the entrant’s product or space. Submission materials may also include narratives that describe the philosophy behind certain design choices. In some instances, jury score cards and critical reviews are available. The jury material provides insight into which qualities were recognized in superior design.

The Events series is divided into seven subseries: Annual meeting, national conference, international conference; Industrial/International Design Excellence Awards (IDEA); Design of the Decade Awards; Catalyst; Partner, sponsored, or endorsed competitions; Conferences, symposiums, exhibits, and other events; and Miscellaneous.

The Annual meeting, national conference, and international conference subseries contains materials related to IDSA’s yearly membership gathering that grew in size and scope over the years. The materials tend to be promotional items and programs from the events. The bulk of the material is from 1997 through 2017, but there are scattered items from conferences in the late 1960s, early 1970s, and the 1980s. The subseries is arranged chronologically.

The Industrial/International Design Excellence Awards (IDEA) subseries primarily contains planning documents, submission materials, jury and scoring information, and lists and images of winners. A small amount of material is present from the 1980s, but the bulk of the material dates from 1990 through 2014, when the IDEA program entered its prime years. The subseries is arranged chronologically, then by item type. Submission materials make up the bulk of the subseries. Materials submitted by the eventual winners are best represented, but there are instances when all submissions received in a given year survived. There is a significant amount of digital submission material throughout the subseries, but the bulk of the digital submission files begin in 2005. Most of the digital files are images or videos of the submitted design. PDF files of application forms are also present in some cases. The applications typically include narratives that describe the design. Jury and scoring information is available in the subseries, though not for every year and not for every submission. The evaluations of winning entries are best represented. At the end of the subseries are awards ceremony programs, promotional placards, and sponsorship agreements that IDSA made with Businessweek. Digital submission files for an IDEA-branded awards ceremony for Brazillian designers, held in Brazil in 2009, are also included here.

The Design of the Decade Awards subseries contains submission materials for every design eligible for consideration in 1999. The submission materials often include an application and a series of images (print photographs, transparencies, and/or slides). All slides and transparencies in this subseries are stored separately in cold storage. In some instances, scoring information was filed with the submission. The subseries is arranged alphabetically by the name of the design product or space. At the end of the subseries is a blank award certificate and images of winning submissions.

The Catalyst subseries primarily contains planning documents and submission materials for IDSA’s Catalyst awards program, and it is arranged chronologically. Submission materials for the Catalyst awards include a narrative case study that explains how the design choices for a product or space increased the company’s financial earnings or helped create a positive change within an industry or society. The Catalyst awards ran through most of the first decade of the 2000s, and submissions and planning materials are well represented.

The Partner, sponsored, or endorsed competitions subseries primarily contains promotional materials and submissions from IDSA-affiliated competitions. Several student competitions are well represented in this subseries. These competitions include the Dyson/IDSA Eye for Why student competition, the National Library Service for the Blind/IDSA Talking Book Playback Machine student competition, and the Procter and Gamble/IDSA Student Design Collaborative. Submission materials (images, narratives) and scoring information (ratings sheets, comments) are available for these competitions. The subseries is arranged alphabetically by the name of the event, then chronologically for events that occurred annually.

The Conferences, symposiums, exhibits, and other events subseries contains promotional and content materials for an assortment of events for which IDSA acted as host or participant. The subseries is arranged alphabetically by the title of the event. Of particular interest are the papers submitted for the IDSA National Education Conference. The papers date from 1998 through 2007, and provide insight into the annual conference’s topics for the years available.

The Miscellaneous subseries contains event-related items that could not be identified with a particular event. This small subseries contains music marked for use at an unidentified event, competition entries for an unidentified event, and photographs from unidentified events.