Regina Sipos, Victoria Wenzelmann, Tobias Löhe

In times of crisis, whether ecological, political, or social, design can serve as a catalyst for transformation. This workshop explores how practitioner-led transition design can contribute to systemic change, particularly in contexts where marginalized communities play a crucial role in innovation. Bridging design research and grassroots innovation, the session invites participants to engage in a hands-on exercise that moves from problem mapping to rapid prototyping of transition strategies. Inspired by relational and co-created design methods, we will explore how designers, activists, and community members can collaboratively envision alternative and desirable futures.

About 

Dr. Regina Sipos is a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Technical University of Munich. She wrote her PhD thesis focusing on intrinsic and collaborative technology design and innovation in grassroots communities in the Global South. She is also the Founder and Director of the Social-Digital Innovation Initiative, facilitating the cross-pollination of open-source technology and social innovation. She designed and managed the United Nations’ first global co-creation and incubation platform for social entrepreneurs working with open-source technologies. She is Chair of Design and Transdisciplinarity, Technical University of Munich.

Victoria Wenzelmann is a researcher, facilitator, and community builder specializing in makerspaces, distributed manufacturing, and co-creative innovation.
She has extensive experience in community-driven design and innovation, having co-founded the Global Innovation Gathering (GIG), a network connecting grassroots innovators worldwide. Her work includes projects like Tolocar, a mobile makerspace initiative in Ukraine, and broader explorations of makerspaces in disaster recovery and resilience-building. She works at the New Production Institute, Helmut Schmidt University Hamburg, Germany.

Tobias Löhe is a designer and engineer by trade. His work is concerned with translating systemic perspectives into actionable design interventions toward more regenerative futures. He utilises design as a tool for sense-making and collaboration and will be exploring the nature of more-than human perspectives in design, as a PhD candidate at TUM.