Designing Cities for All

 “Design is everywhere, and everything is designed. Thus, the job title of ‘designer’ encompasses hundreds of industries, job titles, and career paths. What is design and what does it comprehend? In what way does design influence our daily life? How do we design and what skills are needed? And what does it take to be the actual person doing the design?”

As part of the Pakhuis de Zwijger’s new two-year activity program ‘Designing Cities For All’, I was on the panel to discuss how we can design and foster inclusive cities. I had the pleasure of sharing learnings from my #Archtivism thesis project, from practice and inspiring projects. 

Meet the panel

The evening was moderated by Jörgen Tjon A Fong and on the panel with me we had: futures researcher and designer Rudy van Belkom, researcher and technologist Nishant Shah and human-centered design thought-leader Dr Melis Senova. I really enjoyed the fact that each panelist brought a different perspective to the discussion. It also simply felt great to have a live roundtable discussion in the studio for a change in these times of covid!

More on Designing Cities for All

Designing Cities for All is a two-year program by Pakhuis de Zwijger starting in 2021 supported by Stimuleringsfonds Creatieve Industrie. The program focuses on the role that designers play in designing and shaping cities for and by everyone. The program puts forward the notion of ‘Cities of Belonging’, which are described as “cities in which everyone feels and is allowed to feel at home.” The focus is put not only on spatial design but also on the digital domain and our public systems, services, and products.