I’m Director of the new Institute for Sustainable Worlds and Professor of Design & Imagination at Norwich University of the Arts, in the UK, and I also run the Imaginaries Lab, a research-through-design studio in Utrecht, Netherlands. My work centres on tools and methods for collaborative (re-)imagining: helping people, together, create and explore possible futures, imagine new ways to live, and understand ourselves and the world around us better, in an age of crises in climate, health, and social inequalities.
I have a PhD in Design from Brunel University, London, a Master’s in Technology Policy from the University of Cambridge, and a BSc in Industrial Design Engineering, also from Brunel. I am a fellow of the Alliantie EWUU’s Centre for Unusual Collaborations based at Utrecht University, and an elected member of the international advisory council of the Design Research Society, one of the leading international organisations for design research, where I was an executive board member (2022–4). I grew up in Dawlish, Devon, UK, and now live in Utrecht, Netherlands.
Career
Before joining Norwich in 2025, I was Associate Professor of Imagination and Climate Futures at Eindhoven University of Technology (TU/e), where I was a finalist for Best Teacher at TU/e, nominated by my master’s students, in 2023. Prior to TU/e I was Assistant Professor and Chair of Design Studies at Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA, United States (2016–20) where I contributed to the Transition Design subject area, and was also a Faculty Affiliate of the Scott Institute for Energy Innovation, a member of the Center for the Arts in Society, and collaborated with the Frank-Ratchye STUDIO for Creative Inquiry, Carnegie Mellon School of Architecture, the Human-Computer Interaction Institute, and Metro21. Between 2013–16, I worked at the Royal College of Art, London, first as a senior associate at the Helen Hamlyn Centre for Design’s Work & City and Age & Ability Labs, and then as a research tutor in Innovation Design Engineering and for other doctoral programmes, supervising and advising PhD researchers. Before the RCA, I was a research fellow in Experiential Engineering at WMG, University of Warwick (2011–12) and a research assistant in Environmentally Sensitive Design at Brunel University (2010–12).
Earlier in my career, I worked in industry on a range of product design projects, including R&D for the late Sir Clive Sinclair (on mobility products and some unusual folding bikes).
Research projects
I’ve been an investigator or researcher on a range of projects bringing together design and technology with societal, community, and environmental challenges, including: IMAGINE: Contested Futures of Sustainability (2022–24), led by Oslo Metropolitan University and funded by the Research Council of Norway; Playing With The Trouble (2022–25), funded by the Centre for Unusual Collaborations; Game Your Way Through: Games as a method for transformative collaborations (2021) and [Un]box: Unpacking, cocreating, and materialising collaborative research processes for shared learning, purpose and impact (2023–24), both Spark grants from the Centre for Unusual Collaborations; Spooky Technology (2020–21), funded by the Frank-Ratchye Fund for Art at the Frontier and Carnegie Mellon College of Fine Arts; Sleep Ecologies (2019), funded by Philips; Legible Policy (2015–16), with Laboratorio para la Ciudad Mexico City, Superflux and the Future Cities Catapult; SusLabNWE (2013–15), a European Union sustainability and energy research ‘living lab’ collaboration led by TU Delft; Media, Community & the Creative Citizen (2013–15), a Research Councils UK Connected Communities project; Creating Sustainable Innovation through Design for Behaviour Change (2014), funded by the UK Arts & Humanities Research Council; and Empower (2010–12), an energy research collaboration between Brunel University, University of Warwick, startup CarbonCulture and the Department of Energy & Climate Change, funded by the UK Technology Strategy Board. In 2015 I was project manager for the RCA’s role in GATEway, a driverless vehicle research programme.
I have successfully supervised / advised ten PhDs to completion as supervisor, advisor, or committee member, and have been an external examiner for PhDs at Monash University, KTH (Stockholm), University of Technology Sydney, Loughborough University, NTNU (Trondheim), RMIT Europe, and Lancaster University.
Publications
I created the Design with Intent toolkit (Equifine, 2010)—which has been widely adopted by educators, researchers, designers and businesses worldwide—and New Metaphors: A Creative Toolkit for Generating Ideas and Reframing Problems (Imaginaries Lab, 2019), which has been applied in contexts as diverse as robotics, corporate culture, and the circular economy. I was an editor of Spooky Technology (Imaginaries Lab, 2021), Living Labs: Design and Assessment of Sustainable Living (Springer, 2016); and led the editorial team for Creative Citizens’ Variety Pack: Inspiring Digital Ideas from Community Projects (RCA, 2014); was a co-author of Drawing Energy: Exploring Perceptions of the Invisible (RCA, 2015); and author of Rebel Without Applause (Bookmarque, 2003), a history of the Reliant Motor Company. I regularly publish in international academic journals and at conferences, in design, HCI, and related fields, and have been a member of programme and review committees for events including DRS, CHI, DIS, C&C, and EPIC.
Professional activities
I was chair of the programme committee for DRS 2022 in Bilbao and online, one of the largest international academic design research conferences, am a regular reviewer for leading academic journals, and have been a reviewer for funding bodies including the UK Engineering & Physical Sciences Research Council, EU Horizon 2020 Future & Emerging Technologies Programme, RCUK Sustainable Society Network+, and Fond National de la Recherche (Luxembourg), and for PhD programmes at Universitat Oberta de Catalunya and Oslo Met.
I try to maintain an active engagement with professional interaction design and social sector practice through delivering keynotes and workshops at practice-focused events around the world, including The Conference Malmö, IxDA Interaction, UX London, UX Lisbon, and Interaction Latin America, and through the Imaginaries Lab‘s work with organisations including the UK’s National Lottery Community Fund, American Eagle Outfitters, CMU’s Tepper School of Business, and Demos Helsinki’s Untitled Alliance. I was a jury member for the IxDA Interaction Awards 2019 and was co-chair of the student design competition for ACM DIS 2020.
Publications ⧉ | ORCID 0000-0002-8653-7057 ⧉ | Google Scholar ⧉
▶ CV on request
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