where climate action meets the future of design

Month: June 2026

Bojana Nikitovic

Posted on by 9ve8c

Bojana Nikitović’s work in costume design spans theatre, opera, ballet, and film.

She graduated as Valedictorian from the Faculty of Applied Arts in Belgrade in 1989 and began her career in theatre, designing costumes for more than 100 productions, including productions of Shakespeare, Dostoevsky, Dickens, and Molière. Her contribution to the performing arts has been recognised with numerous awards, including an EMMY NOMINATION for Outstanding Fantasy/Sci-Fi Costumes for her work in Dune Prophecy, a winner of the Costume Designers Guild Awards for Excellence in Sci-Fi/Fantasy Television for her work in Dune Prophecy, four Sterija Awards, two Ardalion Awards, and the Grand International Award for Spectacle Design at the YUSTAT Biennial.

Since 2001, she has worked internationally, collaborating with Academy Award-winning costume designer Milena Canonero on films such as The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou, Marie Antoinette, and The Wolfman. Her film credits include Coriolanus, A Good Day to Die Hard, Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance, and numerous other international productions.

Richard van der Laken

Posted on by 9ve8c

Laken practice advocates for designers’ responsibility to engage with societal issues and contribute to systemic change.

Richard van der Laken is a designer and creative director, and co-founder of the international platform What Design Can Do (WDCD). Through WDCD, he has led numerous campaigns, conferences, and design challenges that bring together multidisciplinary communities to rethink the role of creativity in urgent global challenges such as climate change, inequality, migration, and the transition to circular systems.

Recently, he founded Laecken, a contemporary fashion label that explores men’s self-expression through clothing, accessories, and textiles. Rooted in global craft traditions from regions such as Mexico, Japan, Ghana and India, the brand draws on geometric simplicity and the traditional menswear.

Henriëtte Waal

Posted on by 9ve8c

Artist and designer known for her interdisciplinary work in artistic research, environmental design, and community engagement.

She is the artistic leader of Veenweide Atelier and the co-founder of Atelier LUMA, LUMA Arles’ biodesign lab dedicated to bioregional practices and material engineering. Henriëtte has led fieldwork in Mediterranean wetlands, collaborating with remote wetland communities from Southern Europe, Africa, and West Asia. Her work spans co-fabrication systems for beverages, footwear, colors, crafts, and spaces, as part of an ongoing search for new ecosocial balance. Her projects have been exhibited internationally.

In her recent book Water Works (Waal & Driessen, 2025), she outlines ecosocial design as a method, in which the relationship between humans, ecology, and systems is central. The book positions water infrastructures as socio-ecological systems that require new forms of ecological imagination, storytelling, and alliances between human and non-human actors. 

Ivan Kucina

Posted on by 9ve8c

Kucina’s research explores urban transformation through informality, participatory design, and community-led development.

Professor at the Dessau International Architecture Graduate School (DIA), Anhalt University of Applied Sciences, where he leads the Master Thesis Studio and elective courses. Previously, he taught at the Faculty of Architecture, University of Belgrade (1996–2014), and has held visiting professorships at institutions including Parsons School of Design in New York, Polis University in Tirana, KTH Stockholm, and the German University of Technology in Oman.

Alongside his academic work, Kucina has maintained an architectural practice spanning urban design, architecture, exhibitions, and furniture design. He co-founded the Belgrade International Architecture Week (2006) and founded the School of Urban Practices (2012).