The importance of design to the British economy has gained increasing recognition by government, manufacturers and retailers, and this has in no small way been the result of the work of Peta Levi. Levi, a journalist, became a campaigner for good design, encouraging British manufacturers to improve the quality of their designs and hence their sales. She was especially interested in helping young designers, setting up a variety of projects that have launched and sustained the careers of many over the past 25 years.

In 1983, as design correspondent for House & Garden, she persuaded the magazine, in conjunction with the furnishings exhibition Decorex, to back the Young Designer of the Year award, which she created. Shortlisted candidates were invited to send their prototypes to London for judging by a jury including Sir Roy Strong and the designers David Milinaric and David Mellor. Levi persuaded a furniture warehouse to lend its premises in Elephant and Castle and subsequently enticed representatives from leading manufacturers and retailers to come along to see the products.

At the time many businesses were sceptical about the need for design, and the lamentable lack of commercial knowledge of most emerging graduates did little to reassure them. Levi was struck by how badly prepared many were for the commercial world. She found that they neither knew how to analyse the market for their products nor how to cost them. They had little understanding of manufacturing processes and knew even less about selling their designs to manufacturers, or about patenting and licensing.

This was the start of what became her life’s mission: to help young graduates to set up their own businesses effectively. The Young Designer of the Year became the public show New Designers, and in 1988 it was transferred to the Business Design Centre in Islington, North London. Under Levi the show was selective, bringing together newly graduated designers from around Britain. It attracted (and still does) not only the public but also all the big creative and design agencies, retailers and manufacturers looking for new talent and new ideas. Her work had a snowball effect, legitimising British design and support for it both in Britain and internationally, with more than 60,000 new graduates shown at New Designers alone. Among those who opened the show was Diana, Princess of Wales, while Levi also had the unenviable task of informing Margaret Thatcher that she was disinvited to open the exhibition when she ceased to be Prime Minister.

Peta Levi was born into a comfortable Jewish family of three sisters and one brother in 1938. Her father, David, was a highly respected general surgeon with a strong ethic of helping others. Her mother, Vera, who claimed to be the first woman lobby journalist, was vivacious, charming and a consummate networker, talents that her daughter inherited. Peta Levi maintained that she had been expelled from her first primary school for “being a hooligan”, but went on to become head girl of Sarum Hall School, Hampstead, before attending Queen’s College in Harley Street, leaving at 17. Her mother introduced her to journalism, providing a web of contacts, but Levi quickly developed her own network as a social columnist for the London evening papers.

At 19 she met her husband-to-be, Michael Sayers, then an impoverished trainee solicitor. Once married they lived above her parents’ home, producing three children in four years. She wrote occasional articles, but became involved in her children’s education, particularly that of her younger daughter, who had physical and learning difficulties. When the Roman Catholic school that her daughter attended was threatened with closure in 1970, Levi used her formidable skills of persuasion to help to found the Cavendish School, Camden Town.

In 1969 she went back to journalism, specialising in design and new technology, writing for The Times, the Financial Times and House & Garden. But with the success of New Designers she concentrated increasingly on her new design ventures. From 1991-98 she curated exhibitions of design and contemporary craft at Bonhams, displaying the work of new designer-makers, a number of whom went on to become household names. Gradually passing on the role of co-ordinating New Designers, Levi maintained her interest, setting up One Year On for designer-craftsmen expanding their businesses.

Her support of designers was passionate yet non-judgmental and she was always available to give encouragement and advice. She was untiring in making connections for designers and ensuring that they received appropriate business training. In 1991 she created New Designers in Business and then in 1994 the Design Trust, which later became Design Nation, a source of training and support and additionally a web-based selective directory and catalogue of designers and products. When the Design Trust and Design Nation merged with the Creative Industries Unit of London Metropolitan University in 2006 Levi remained as their director.

In 2004 she created the successful Eureka, in which she united retailers such as John Lewis and Crabtree & Evelyn with designers to work on specific commercially viable projects. Yet like all Levi’s projects Eureka suffered from a lack of funding. Government did provide some resources for her projects, funding an administrator who worked from Levi’s home, and participation in overseas exhibitions. Many recognised Levi’s enormous input, but nevertheless she was constantly fundraising. Her projects were run from her home and from her husband Michael’s wallet. He took an active role in supporting her various philanthropic endeavours, backing her financially and emotionally. Without his encouragement her achievements over the 49 years of their marriage would have been less formidable.

When she became ill with Parkinson’s disease and subsequently with breast cancer, she continued her crusade. Even when she then had a brain tumour diagnosed, she would appear at events in her wheelchair to encourage new designers and to persuade manufacturers and retailers. She was appointed MBE in 1993 for her services to industrial design, she was an honorary Fellow of the Royal Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufacturers & Commerce and of the Royal College of Art and was given an honorary doctorate by London Metropolitan University in 2006. Yet the recognition that she appreciated most was from the thousands of designers and craftspeople whom she had encouraged.

She is survived by her husband, a son and two daughters.

Peta Levi, MBE, design campaigner and journalist, was born on December 6, 1938. She died on April 24, 2008, aged 69