Update 14.05.2014: Unfortunately, conference tickets are sold out, but a few conference+workshop tickets are still available.
Some things just don't change: SmashingConf Freiburg is taking place again this year, on September 15th-16th 2014, in our lovely hometown Freiburg, Germany. Two days, one track, 18 brilliant speakers and 300 fantastic attendees, sharing practical insights into their craft. And the best bit: lots of networking with good ol’ German beers in beer gardens, at the very foot of the legendary Black Forest. Tickets are now on sale.
SmashingConf 2014: “This Is How We Did It”
The main focus of Smashing Conferences has always been hands-on insights and actionable takeaways — things that have actually worked in practice, and the design/development process behind them, including mistakes, failures, critical decisions and eventually successes.
We do not care about volatile trends, but we do care about interesting problems and smart solutions to them though. The goal is that everybody — speakers, attendees and people watching the videos later — will learn new techniques and approaches that can be applied in their next projects right away.
The conference in Freiburg isn’t going to be an exception: we’ve encouraged speakers to share real-life lessons from their projects, and explain in detail “how they built it”, with all the elegant and dirty decisions made along the way. And since everything is better with beers, this time we’d like to encourage attendees to share their experience publicly as well, at the Jam Session warm-up party on Sunday before the conference.
First Speakers
We’ve invited speakers who passionately care about their craft and aren’t afraid of pushing boundaries. We’re happy to welcome the first confirmed speakers:
- Marcin Wichary
UX Designer • Google, Medium.com - Sara Wachter-Boettcher
Content Strategist • A List Apart - Jason Grigsby
Mobile Strategist • Cloud Four - Matt Andrews
Front-End Developer • Financial Times - Phil Hawksworth
Front-End Developer • R/GA - Josh Emerson
Front-End Developer • Clearleft, Zoobox - Mathias Bynens
JavaScript Magician • Opera - Jasper Kaizer
Front-end Engineer • Rembrandt Museum - Peter Smart
UX Designer • British Airways - Patty Toland
Technical Strategist • Filament Group - Christopher Murphy
Writer, designer, educator • Web Standardista - The Mystery Speaker
(Somebody you probably know.)
Workshops
We are also happy to announce 4 full-day workshops that will take place on Wednesday, September 17th, after the two main conference days:
- "RWD Meets The Real World" with Jason Grigsby
Jason will get into the nitty gritty of how to strategically convert a "desktop" design to a responsible, responsive layout, - "Mobile Content Strategy" with Sara Wachter-Boettcher
Sara will be exploring how to master mobile content mayhem, - "Making It Work Offline" with Matthew Andrews
Matthew will be covering localStorage, ServiceWorker, Appcache and other offline options on the Web today, - "RWD: Clever Tips and Tricks" with Vitaly Friedman
Yours truly will be presenting smart techniques and strategies for responsible responsive Web design.
And as usual, if you book a Conference Ticket + Workshop ticket, you save €75 off the regular price. So what are you waiting for?
Attendees Jam Session
If you’d like to give an insightful 20-min talk at the event, please contact us at vitaly@smashingconf.com with a description of the talk and we’ll get back to you. Obviously, we won’t accept any promotional talks. The more practical your talk will be, the better.
Date, Location, Prices
The conference will take place on 15–16th of September 2014 in the Historic Merchant Hall in our lovely home town Freiburg, Germany. We have only 300 seats, so the number of tickets is very limited. Also, we've blocked every single hotel in town for you — you can select your hotel at the SmashingConf 2014 Location page ("Smashing Conference" is the magic word for hotel booking!).
AirBnB could be a good option as well, but be fast — there aren't many rooms available. Freiburg is known for being a vacation place, so perhaps you'd like to combine the conference with a relaxing family vacation in the skirts of the Black Forest? We've prepared some information about the location of Freiburg, so you don't get lost in the suburbs of the Southern Germany while travelling here. Now if that isn't an experience of a life-time, what is? (No, seriously, you will enjoy it!).
The price per ticket is €379 (incl. VAT) but we have 35 early-bird tickets had 35 early-bird tickets as well (sold out within 5 mins). A workshop ticket costs €349. Make sure to actually consider booking a workshop as well — if you buy both a conf ticket and a workshop, you save €75 off the price right away.
Sponsors, Dear Sponsors
We keep the ticket prices affordable for everyone, and we're happy to welcome sponsors to help us make the conference smashing in every possible way. If you're interested in sponsoring the event, please contact Cat (yes, it's actually Cat—not the Smashing Cat, though!) at cat [@] smashingconf [dot] com. We love our sponsors, and you make the event possible, and we'd be honoured to have you involved!
Questions?
We want Smashing Conference to be a valuable experience, but most importantly a friendly community event with lots of delightful surprises along the way. So if you are already expecting a few surprises here and there, you definitely should—we’ve got a few special mysteries coming up your way. Do you happen to like cats? ;-) Pssst, no spoilers!
Follow us at @smashingconf and get more details on the SmashingConf 2014 website. Also, more speakers will be announced soon, so get ready to be smashed with a few exciting surprises and announcements!
Questions? Shoot us an email anytime at hello@smashingconf.com — we'd love to assist you in every possible way and would be humbled and happy to welcome you in our lovely home town Freiburg this September!
Auf Wiedersehen!