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Short Bio
Başak Altan is a Design Strategist, Design Educator, Future Thinker & Connector. She helps her clients reimagine an inspiring future for their organizations through design. As a future thinker and connector, she provides expertise in discovering how the human story of her clients such as Microsoft and AWS’s innovations, connect to technology, environment and future business models through envisioning workshops. For over 20 years, she has been empowering communities, organizations, business leaders and learners through co-design mentorship & facilitation guiding their exploratory journeys to discover new and connected solutions that are sustainable with positive social impact on humanity. The teams she helped innovate new ideas and processes to transition to a circular economy have consistently received international awards, and recognition on sustainability and social impact achievement. She was elected to be the West District Chapter Representative for Industrial Designers Society of America after serving for two years as the Chair for San Francisco IDSA Chapter. In 2021 Başak was a recipient of a noteworthy distinction from IDSA to advance the profession of ID through information, community, education and advocacy. Başak is also the founder of the Bay Area Turkish Society.
Başak holds a Bachelor’s of Industrial Design from Syracuse University, and a Master of Business Administration from Presidio Graduate School. She was honored as a part of the Young Society Leaders in 2018 by American Turkish Society. Her work has been published and presented in TED, Architects Journal, Architecture Magazine, Architectural Record, Daily News, Metropolis, Van Alen Report, Surface Magazine, New York Times, Van Alen Institute in New York City, Royal Institute of British Architects in London, The French Institute of Architects in Paris, USAID Head Quarters in Washington, DC, ICFF in New York City.
Long Bio
Başak Altan is a Design Strategist, Design Educator, Future Thinker & Connector. She holds a Bachelor of Industrial Design from Syracuse University and a Master of Business Administration from Presidio Graduate School. As a future thinker and connector, she provides expertise in discovering how the human story of her clients’ innovations connect to technology, environment and future business models. For over 20 years she has been providing leadership on design and strategy services in the intersection of business, technology and education. She designs and facilitates Envisioning Workshops for clients such as Microsoft and AWS. The teams she helped innovate new ideas and processes to transition to a circular economy have consistently received international awards, and recognition on sustainability and social impact achievement.
Her early professional work spans from winning the Architecture of Humanity Award with the Tree of Life Transitional housing project to exhibit design, furniture, product and retail design. Her passion for sustainable design led her to move to the Bay Area in 2000, where she worked as the design coordinator for the Berkeley Eco House project. She designed and initiated the first community garden workshop in her hometown in Turkey in 2003; and during this time, she worked as a design researcher establishing Oakland’s first green building resource center under Mayor Jerry Brown.
After working as a product designer for Williams Sonoma and Red Envelope, she joined American Pacific Enterprises as Design Director to establish their hard goods department. In 2015, she founded the nonprofit Bay Area Turkish Society (formerly known as Berkeley Turkish School), where as President, she leads the efforts in creating a community program centered around the values of design thinking, leadership and sustainability.
In addition, from 2015 until 2020, she taught design research and sustainable design at the Industrial Design Department at California College of Arts in San Francisco. Her last studio won two international design awards for sustainability and social impact. She continues to mentor young designers on their investigative research and design career journey. For Başak, the most meaningful aspect of mentoring is influencing the next generation of designers to create experiences that make a positive impact in the world.
In 2018, she was recognized with the honor Young Society Leader by American Turkish Society. Her work has been published and presented in TED, Architects Journal, Architecture Magazine, Architectural Record, Daily News, Metropolis, Van Alen Report, Surface Magazine, New York Times, Van Alen Institute in New York City, Royal Institute of British Architects in London, The French Institute of Architects in Paris, USAID Head Quarters in Washington, DC, ICFF in New York City. She was elected to be the West District Chapter Representative for Industrial Designers Society of America.
EDUCATION & EARLY WORK
Başak received an honorary scholarship from Syracuse University, where she discovered her passion in design while pursuing her studies in Computer Science. She began her design career as an industrial designer after graduating with Cum Laude from the College of Visual Performing and Arts. Her thesis project,Tree of Life, a transitional refugee shelter system was awarded as a finalist at the Architecture for Humanity’s design competition. Her expertise of temporary structures, and her strong sense of form landed her first work as a designer for one of the largest exhibit firms, Exhibitgroup/Giltspur in Chicago.
In 2001 Gensler, hired her to design the modular seating system which made its debut at Neocon. When Williams Sonoma Inc. hired her as a product designer for Pottery Barn she designed over 100 successful collections that encompassed numerous mediums that varied from ceramics, glass, resin, wood, iron, and other metals. When she joined Red Envelope Inc., an online catalog retailer as a lead product designer to design high-end luxury products, the diverse categories including digital platforms that she oversaw surpassed the company’s target revenues.
In 2005 she accepted an offer to join American Pacific Enterprises Inc. as a design director to establish the hard goods department. She hired and lead creative talent, traveled to Europe and Asia to research trends, designed product lines, trained cross functional product management teams and lead product development.
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