St. Louis, a city defined by its most striking design element, is about to flaunt its design chops.

The local chapter of the AIGA, the professional association for design, is organizing the area's first Design Week, which kicks off Monday with a circus, musical performance and photography auction. The week's activities cut across a diverse range of industries and offer presentations from how design is good for business to interior design therapy for apartment dwellers.

"I'm hoping people will realize that St. Louis is a destination for creativity," said Traci Moore Clay, an organizer of the event. "We've been shaped for years by design, like the Arch and our urban neighborhoods. Now, it's our time to show off what we can do with design and why it's important."

Moore Clay hopes that within a couple of years, Design Week could join forces with the established Fashion Week celebrations in town. She said planning for the event began in January, and the organization has raised about $50,000 from private sponsors to stage the events.

The group deliberately cast a wide net for creators of design. Along with architects, the week's design umbrella includes: graphic, Web, industrial, environmental, landscape and interior designers.

"Design is in everyone's life," Moore Clay said. "From the car they drive to the furniture they purchase to the clothes they wear to the buildings that surround them. Design is the problem-solving in art."

Eric Thoelke, president of TOKY Branding and Design, said St. Louis has a diverse and influential design community that is exporting its ideas all over the country and world. But each sector tends to remain clustered within its own discipline. The Design Week events are a chance for others to see what is happening across industries, with the intent of cross pollinating ideas and innovation, he said.

"We want to create those opportunities for St. Louis designers to meet and create bigger ideas than if they were sitting in their silos," he said.

Part of that conversation about collaboration will include architects like David Polzin, with Cannon Design in downtown St. Louis. The firm is offering a program on sustainable architecture and is opening the doors of its headquarters based in a repurposed space on Clark Avenue.

"When spaces aren't properly conceived, there is a negative impact," he said. "When they are properly conceived, they improve the quality of life." Sustainability is an important part of the discussion across disciplines, he said.

Enrique Von Rohr, president of the local chapter of AIGA and lecturer at Washington University's Sam Fox School of Design and Visual Arts, says the national organization has spearheaded successful Design Week activities in several other cities, including New York and Kansas City. The local chapter of AIGA has about 400 members, about half of which are students.

"The reason we felt it was important to do this is because this is a large enough city and the value of design is at such a level that we wanted to raise the bar of understanding the value...to business, culture and society." Given the breadth of fields that design encompasses, it is difficult to quantify the economic value the design community adds to a region, Von Rohr said.

Part of the purpose of the week is to start a conversation about how much design is contributing to the economic force locally, he said.

"We are in the creative economy," Von Rohr said. "Can design be an economic engine for the region?"