In a series of three annual city-to-city poster shows at Bumbershoot, an arts and music festival held at the foot of the Space Needle every Labor Day Weekend, Seattle curator and designer Daniel R. Smith has set out to explore the poster as a form of dialogue between the city and its supposedly metropolitan polar opposites: Havana, Tehran, and now, Moscow.

The Commodore Hotel in Astoria, Oregon (population 10,000) is not exactly conveniently located, tucked away near the ocean's edge at the mouth of the Columbia River. But the mysterious tale of the hotel's past is enough to draw visitors for a night or two in the now-modern quarters of the historic getaway.

Nowhere do the virtual and built environments come together as they do in the gaming world. Mirror’s Edge, a first person action adventure game recently released by Swedish studio Digital Illusions Creative Entertainment (DICE), is an example of next generation ‘virtutecture’, where the boundaries between the real and the digital blur on a gaming console.

From tagging city walls to decorating urban boutiques, hotels & restaurants: Sweden's Dizel&Sate have moved up from the streets & across media.

Roman Kalarus is from the generation of Polish poster designers mentored by the fathers of the Polish Poster School and who has himself taught several of the younger designers currently renewing the tradition. He graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts in Cracow in 1976. He is currently a professor and head of a poster studio at the Academy of Fine Arts in Katowice. His work has been shown in major graphic design and poster shows in Poland and abroad.

2.5 metres of wire can go a surprisingly long way. For the recent Beefeater Design Challenge in Sweden ten young designers were asked to identify and solve a design problem associated with drinking in a bar.

IKEA and H&M are perhaps the most visible icons associated with Swedish design, known for its clean lines, functional form and accessibility. Much of this is the work of Swedish designers who graduated from the University College of Arts, Crafts and Design.

Furniture retailer Design Within Reach has announced the 50 finalists in its fifth annual DWR Uncorked competition. Entrants were invited to create an original miniature chair, no more than four inches tall or wide, using only the foil, label, cage and cork from no more than two champagne bottles.

There are no design critics because there are no students of design criticism. But that’s about to change. Three new master’s programmes will soon be training an army of critics and equipping them with the writing weaponry required for intelligent inquiry into all things design.

In the 20th century, Swedish design was dictated by functionality. But now a new generation of designers is turning traditional form and function on its head erasing the boundaries between art, design and handicraft.

Cardigans singer Nina Persson has been helping to turn Stockholm's most traditional department store into a hip, modern fashion house and art gallery - complete with severed eyes and distorted heads. Charlotte West checks out the new PUB.

Women’s influence on Swedish industrial design – both as designers and as consumers – is greater than ever. Design is becoming more universal and products are increasingly sensitive to the needs of both women and men.

The list of adjectives that has been used to describe Malcolm McLaren, the notorious manager of punk rock band the Sex Pistols, is long, and not entirely pretty. McLaren was one of the headliners at the sixth annual FutureDesignDays conference in Stockholm.