Industrial Design and Interior Architecture

Research is developed through design's innovative and exploratory ability to create and form new possibilities for a complex future.

Urban Materiality - Towards New Collaborations in Textile and Architectural Design (Fridh, The Swedish Research Council) at Form/Design Center in Malmö 2019.


Research in design and interior architecture has developed from a relatively narrow understanding of the field to being conceived as an essential part of our material culture, where societal and ecological aspects interact.

In our research at Konstfack, we use methods that are both theoretical and practice-based, for example, phenomenological and posthumanist approaches, co-design, modelling and prototyping. The research is often inter- or transdisciplinary, and through sketches, drawings, scale models and prototypes, complex situations and contexts are formed, tested and analysed.

Many of our contemporary challenges are complex and dynamic. There are often controversies between the wishes of different stakeholders, which requires an ability to radically reconsider frames and working methods. The realization of proposals and projects affects people and other life forms and enables engagement and joint exploration of new ways of being in and understanding the world.

New insights can be articulated through a reflective practice that requires positioning and taking a stand. Probing is seen as a way of thinking, and knowledge manifests itself in activities and concrete materializations. This makes knowledge available for both development and critical review together with others.

Two ongoing research projects focus on developing a tool for perceived light quality, Perceptual Metrics for Lighting Design, and on temporary interior landscapes, Interiors Matter: A Live Interior.