SOCIAL DESIGN LAB

See a place through the people who live it

“How do you gain a genuine understanding of what is happening in a neighbourhood, school or organisation?” Not simply by asking people questions, but by seeing, listening and making together.

With the Redrum Social Design Lab, we temporarily create a local editorial team and makers’ lab. Residents, young people or employees use photography, film, interviews, podcasts, illustration, design and storytelling to explore their own environment.

The content they create simultaneously becomes research material, participation and communication. Stories, images, observations and ideas come together on a digital platform. Redrum analyses the patterns behind them and translates these into concrete insights, opportunities and design questions.

The result is not a conventional report, but a living picture of a place. Together with clear direction for what could happen next.

A Social Design Lab can include

  • local qualitative research;

  • workshops and creative research assignments;

  • interviews and stories from participants;

  • photography, film, audio and illustration;

  • a public project website;

  • a Social Design Scan;

  • future scenarios and prototypes;

  • concrete recommendations for next steps

Why Redrum

As the creators of Skill School and Stadslab, Redrum knows what happens beneath the surface in communities, how people think and participate, and how education, youth work, healthcare, government and business need to work together.

We have also seen too many valuable research reports disappear into a drawer. That is why the Social Design Lab combines research with action. Our designers, filmmakers and storytellers work directly with the people involved, turning insights into something tangible and beautifully made. The result is not just a deeper understanding of a place, but films, stories, visualisations, prototypes or platforms that people can actually use, share and build on.

Not another report about a place, but research that already starts to change it.

For

Municipalities, provincial and regional authorities, housing associations, educational institutions, area developers and social-impact organisations.

Applicable to

Neighbourhoods, communities, schools, campuses, organisations and other communities.