The Design Research Lab is a laboratory for experimental design and research reflecting on the digital society. Through playful interventions, critical making and collaborative reasoning we investigate possible futures. As a platform and network, we are deeply involved with the requirements and policies needed for an inclusive and sustainable development of the digital society from a design perspective.
We are an interdisciplinary team of designers, researchers, tech-enthusiasts and critical thinkers from Berlin University of the Arts, German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence (DFKI), Weizenbaum Institute for the Networked Society, as well as Einsteincenter Digital Future (ECDF).
The project explores the potential of online services and social media in participatory processes of urban planning. It aimes at increasing the democratic and social participation of immigrants on the one hand, as well as initiating institutional change that will make these processes more inclusive. It develops, tests and evaluates participatry tools in social living labs in the Berlin district of Mitte and in the city of Wiesbaden, in order to involve diverse groups more strongly in urban development processes.