Strategic Design Workshops

With expertise in design, foresight, and people-centered research, we have been in a unique position to advise companies and organisations in the early stages of their project. Though much of our work in this area remains subject to client confidentiality, we are able to discuss the following case studies, demonstrating some of our methods and tools.

In each of these workshops, we capitalised on our work in the emerging practice of 'design futurescaping', deploying tools from design and foresight to help organisations bring value to their projects.

Client: Unwired Ventures and Nokia

Partnering with Unwired Ventures, we developed a strategy to explore how children imagine the future of work. We led a session with a group of 12-year-olds at a school in south London, using roleplay to explore the sorts of work they might want to do, the places they would like to work, the technologies they imagined using, and the people they might be working with. The results of this research were captured in a film, a series of workshops, and a report for the stakeholders involved.

Students from a school in Teddington create their 'Futurescapes of Work'

Lucy wants to work as a 'Business Manager' while being able to stay 'out of office' whenever she pleased.

Sarah wants two jobs: As a designer and a writer.

Alex wants to be a hedgefund manager by day, and a musician by night.

Jon wants to be a cameraman. He says "I'd like to be out a lot, as that would make me loyal to the company."

Client: Mobile Life, Sweden

Superflux was invited by Stockholm's Mobile Life Centre to help develop strategies to communicate their work in pervasive gaming, mobile broadcasting, RFID, and application-building. Over two days of sessions, the groups worked on ways to communicate their ideas – creating stop-motion animations, roleplaying game trailers, interactive posters, and short documentaries.

This team of researchers create a stop motion animation around their RFID game.

This team make a short film about their new photosharing app.
Client: Microsoft Research, Cambridge

Working with the Socio-Digital Systems group at Microsoft Research, we oversaw the development of value propositions derived from their research and invention. From these propositions, we workshopped communication strategies that could more effectively reflect the specific impacts of their work – provoking, inspiring, engaging, and holding the attention of their parent company.

Everyone set about making storyboards

Short films were presented at the end of the workshop, presenting sketches for new applications, products and softwares.

Client: Brigade Group

Invited by Manasi Prasad to lead a futurescaping workshop for the Board Members of the Brigade Group, we worked to frame the vision and direction for their ambitious new project: the New Music Experience Centre in Bangalore, India.