NEWS From 8 to 10 October, Umeå Institute of Design hosted the 2025 CIRRUS Network Meeting, welcoming educators, coordinators, workshop leaders and administrators from Nordic-Baltic art and design institutions. The theme, MAKING…, invited participants to reflect on the generative, hands-on nature of design as a way of understanding, shaping and transforming the world.
The CIRRUS Network Meeting saw participants explore the 4D labs at UID under the stewardship of research engineer David Risberg.
ImageJens PerssonThe meeting opened with a keynote by Professor Cindy Kohtala, Programme Director of the MFA in Interaction Design at UID. Her research bridges Design Research and Science & Technology Studies, focusing on how grassroots initiatives such as makerspaces, citizen science and urban activism enable hands-on sustainability and local knowledge sharing. She presented various ways that we can think about 'making' in design, drawing on examples from design practice and sustainability research. Her talk set the tone for a programme centred on collaborative, design-led practices and the transformative potential of making.
Over the course of two days, attendees engaged in guided tours, workshops and discussions that explored making from multiple perspectives: as a tool for change, a material practice, and a critical question of purpose and agency. The programme included a visit to Bildmuseet, one of northern Europe's leading venues for international contemporary art, and a tour of UID and the Arts Campus.
Attendees got busy in the UID workshops, fashioning their very own kåsa, a traditional Nordic hand-carved wooden cup.
ImageJens PerssonThursday’s afternoon workshops offered a range of approaches to the theme. Participants explored hybrid processes in 'Analogue Making and Digitised Workflow', where they crafted their own kåsa, a traditional Nordic hand-carved wooden cup. In 'Making Things from the Future', attendees stepped into a speculative bazaar set in the future, creating imaginative artefacts that reflected visions of climate futures, technological utopias and social transformations. Other sessions discussed global perspectives in 'Making Internationalisation Happen!', examined collaborative research methods in 'Collaborative Sense-Making: Sitting on the Same Side', and focused on colour theory and design judgement in the age of AI.
On Friday, the network held its formal meeting and board election, followed by a keynote delivered by the UID teaching team. The presentation explored different aspects of making collaborations, offering multiple examples of projects carried out with external partners across the school's educational programmes. These included industry collaborations, public sector engagements and community-based initiatives, highlighting the diverse ways in which making is embedded in UID’s pedagogical approach.
Visitors engaged with the UID research environment, here represented by Heather Wiltse, associate professor in design.
ImageJens PerssonIn the afternoon and evening, participants had the opportunity to take part in cultural activities including guided tours of Umeå’s Gendered Landscape, the Museum of Women’s History and the Guitars Museum, as well as a slojd workshop at Västerbotten Museum.
The event reflected UID’s ongoing commitment to hands-on, inclusive and forward-thinking design education. It provided a platform for critical reflection, creative exchange and collective imagining, emphasising how the practice of making continues to shape the future of design.