Design Researchers in Residence: Artificial

Artificial is a culmination of projects by our 2024/25 cohort of Design Researchers in Residence, exploring the perceived boundaries between what is ‘natural’ and what is ‘artificial’ or made by humans.

From London’s thriving parakeet population to the design of the humble Henry Hoover, the display interrogates the artificial relationships woven into everyday life and explores the ways in which design can help us imagine a future rooted in care, collaboration and coexistence.

The 2024/25 Design Researchers in Residence are Christie Swallow, Hani Salih, Laura Lebeau and Neba Sere.

The Design Researchers in Residence programme supports emerging designers at the start of their careers to spend a year developing a new research project in response to a theme. It builds upon the Design Museum’s flagship designers’ residence which has supported emerging designers since 2007. Former residents include Asif Khan, Adam Nathaniel Furman, Jade Folawiyo and Lawrence Lek. Previous themes for the programme were ‘Restore’ and ‘Islands’. Design Researchers in Residence is part of the museum’s Future Observatory, a national design research programme based at and coordinated by the Design Museum and generously supported by the UKRI Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC).

Future Observatory and the Design Museum are excited to announce a new display by this year's cohort of Design Researchers in Residence, who spent a year at the museum developing innovative projects that respond to the climate emergency.

The history of design is often read through the lens of Anthropocentrism, where products and services are conceived and manufactured to support human flourishing without concern for other species. Yet today we know well that this approach is part of a broader set of planetary crises which find their root in the artificial separation of the 'human' from the 'natural'.

This year’s cohort of design researchers are using their skills to that end: developing research that re-contextualises contemporary issues through collaborative interdisciplinary and interspecies relationships. Studying archives, analysing political systems, waste streams, and co-creating within local communities and ecologies - each project looks to disrupt passive assumptions and imagine futures that de-centralise human needs and re-establish reciprocal narratives.

The 2024/25 Design Researchers in Residence are Christie Swallow, Hani Salih, Laura Lebeau, and Neba Sere, their projects will challenge the distinctions between the natural and the artificial by exploring topics that touch on our daily lives. Christie’s research delves into the urban myths surrounding parakeets, seeking to redefine our perceptions of ‘native’ species. Hani’s work focuses on mapping man-made frameworks for decision-making, to uncover the outdated logic that persists in national planning. Laura will examine the convenience of synthetic materials, prototyping harmless appliances from natural materials and Neba will explore the artificialisation of plants by tracing the routes of colonised ecologies, to reclaim lost knowledge.

This residency gives the researchers space for the hugely necessary practices of mutual learning and knowledge sharing by deepening material literacy and collaboration. Researching from the perspective of plants and parakeets, uncovering the impact of decision-making and mass- production, each project looks to question the artificial relationships that govern and underpin our existence.

Design Researchers in Residence is Future Observatory’s programme for design research into the climate crisis hosted at the Design Museum. The residency supports thinkers at the start of their careers to develop new research on environmental concerns and centred around a particular theme.

The residency has two main aims: to provide design researchers in the early stages of their careers time and space away from their regular environment to develop and produce new work, and to offer museum visitors an opportunity to engage with live design research projects.

Each year the residency accommodates four researchers, working in different design disciplines, to further develop their individual responses to the theme and brief. The programme culminates with a publication and final showcase at the Design Museum, due to open in June 2024. Each resident is provided with a commissioning budget, which goes directly towards producing the work in the display as well as a bursary to support the development of their career and to fund their practice.

The Design Researchers in Residence programme builds upon the Design Museum’s Designers in Residence programme, which ran from 2007–2020. The revised residency programme, now in its third year, continues to provide emerging designers and researchers with time and space away from their regular environment to develop impactful new projects that contribute to design research into the climate crisis taking place across the country.

This programme is generously supported by the UKRI Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC).

Background image: Artificial display photography by Rob Harris for the Design Museum.