Working across both academia and industry, we collaborate with a range of stakeholders to support individuals, teams, and organisations working toward long-term positive impact.
Modes of collaboration
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Research
We collaborate on research projects that explore how design can shape more sustainable, resilient, and equitable futures. Whether large or small in scale, our projects are typically interdisciplinary and co-developed with academic, industrial, and public sector partners. We offer expertise in design processes, sustainability, and strategic foresight - and often act as design translators to help make complex ideas actionable. If you’re exploring the future of your field, asking unfamiliar questions, or need support to navigate innovation through a design lens, we’d love to talk.
Consultancy
Our lab offers consultancy and strategic support across a range of areas - from product and service development to systems innovation and long-term thinking. We deliver custom workshops, foresight sessions, talks, and collaborative projects with organisations of all sizes. Whether you’re tackling a major challenge or still figuring out which questions to ask, we can help guide thinking and build momentum. We bring a practical, people-centred approach that makes complex ideas understandable and future ambitions more actionable.
Taught collaborations
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PhD students
We welcome PhD researchers from across disciplines who are passionate about using design to create better futures. Some bring deep design expertise, while others apply methods from engineering, policy, social science, or arts and humanities in a design-led way. We support students based in the Dyson School and beyond, and are happy to act as second supervisors for Imperial candidates exploring design and innovation for systemic change. If you’re interested in doctoral research aligned with our lab, we’d love to hear from you.
Teaching
We teach across all programmes at the Dyson School of Design Engineering, with a focus on innovation, design processes, sustainability, and futures thinking. We also run bespoke training sessions, industrial seminars, and guest lectures for external partners. Our team regularly delivers workshops and talks for corporate training and public engagement - and we’re passionate about outreach, including working with schools and community organisations to share design’s potential for shaping the future.
Our expertise
We bring together design, engineering, and foresight to support future-focused innovation. We specialise in design-led research that harnesses data informed decision making, stakeholder engagement, reflective evaluation and emerging technologies and practices.
We have deep expertise in:
- Strategic design processes – helping organisations design not just products, but better ways of thinking and working
- Circular economy innovation – from sustainable material strategies to new business models and system-level interventions
- Foresight and futures methods – including scenario planning, speculative design, and futures literacy in complex contexts
- Process mapping and decision analysis – uncovering the key touchpoints where design choices are shaped, delayed, or lost
- Cross-sector collaboration – working effectively with clients, communities, and stakeholders to build meaningful outcomes
What makes our work distinctive is its blend of critical reflection and applied pragmatism. Whether we’re informing innovation programmes, building toolkits, running scenario workshops, or designing speculative prototypes - we aim to make designing better futures actionable, impactful, and grounded in real-world context.