mcbw design sum­mit 2025

mcbw sum­mit 2025 is a gen­uine high­light of munich cre­ative busi­ness week (mcbw). It brings togeth­er design­ers, doers, and thinkers from all over the world to dis­cuss the one key ques­tion: How to design a vibrant com­mu­ni­ty? How can com­mu­ni­ties grow and stay vibrant – and how can design sup­port the process, on both a small and large scale?

Twen­ty-five speak­ers from more than 10 coun­tries and a sold-out loca­tion with close to 300 par­tic­i­pants made it clear: The top­ic mat­ters to all of us because the long­ing for social sol­i­dar­i­ty and sus­tain­able design has nev­er been greater. This is why mcbw design sum­mit 2025 in Munich – referred to as the pow­er­house of the cul­tur­al and cre­ative sec­tors by Dr. Chris­t­ian Scharpf, the city’s Head of the Depart­ment of Labor and Eco­nom­ic Devel­op­ment – is the ide­al event to address these challenges.

Design not only cre­ates prod­ucts, but it also shapes our society

Be it dig­i­tal appli­ca­tions, pub­lic spaces, archi­tec­ture, or work­spaces, design affects the way we live, com­mu­ni­cate, and engage. Design is a part of social sys­tems – with sig­nif­i­cant impli­ca­tions, inten­tion­al or not. This point is what the con­fer­ence address­es: Design is meant to be inten­tion­al and guid­ed by respon­si­bil­i­ty, not left to chance.

BEDA is the Bureau of Euro­pean Design Asso­ci­a­tions. This year, col­leagues from Den­mark, Ice­land, Spain, and Turkey par­tic­i­pat­ed and con­tributed top­ics that mat­ter to all of us: How can cities be rebuilt after a flood or an earth­quake? How can we pro­tect vil­lages against vol­canic activ­i­ty? First and fore­most, how can design­ers assist com­mu­ni­ties in this work in the best way pos­si­ble? Furkan Demir­ci of the Türkiye Design Coun­cil helped rebuild the city of Antakya after the 2003 earth­quake left it in ruins. He remind­ed us of the role design­ers were asked to assume: “As design­ers, you should lis­ten more than talk. Because build­ing trust is key to being able to build com­mu­ni­ties.” The BEDA pan­el also illus­trat­ed very impres­sive­ly how vibrant com­mu­ni­ties are cre­at­ed around the world through a vari­ety of projects.

Design for vibrant com­mu­ni­ties has many faces

Pri­or to mcbw design sum­mit 2025, we asked our com­mu­ni­ty to pro­pose projects aimed at mak­ing the com­mu­ni­ty vibrant. We received many respons­es: more than 80 entries, six of which were pre­sent­ed on stage. Dur­ing the ses­sion it became clear just how diver­si­fied a vibrant com­mu­ni­ty can be – from archi­tec­ture against the over­heat­ing of city cen­ters, and projects designed to fight people’s social iso­la­tion after the pan­dem­ic to an icon­ic One World Flag as a sign of a glob­al sense of belong­ing. The chal­lenges of the present are as numer­ous as the solu­tions presented.

Shap­ing Togeth­er­ness: design pro­motes cooperation

Carsten Waldeck, founder of SHIFT, used his mod­u­lar Shift­phone to illus­trate how design can assume respon­si­bil­i­ty for the envi­ron­ment, the econ­o­my, and social issues. Waldeck’s approach is to pre­vent elec­tron­ic waste by devel­op­ing prod­ucts that are easy to repair and have a long life­cy­cle. The con­cept is based on a sus­tain­able busi­ness mod­el and a mind­set that pri­or­i­tizes appre­ci­a­tion for things and peo­ple. This mind­set char­ac­ter­izes the entire com­pa­ny, from resource man­age­ment to human relations.

Ezio Manzi­ni, pres­i­dent of the DESIS net­work and a vision­ary in the field of social design, brought a cen­tral mes­sage to the table: Com­mu­ni­ties can­not be shaped direct­ly, but the pre­req­ui­sites to shape it can. His con­sid­er­a­tions are root­ed in the idea that iso­la­tion as a social chal­lenge is not mere­ly a psy­cho­log­i­cal prob­lem but a result of the way we orga­nize our soci­ety. Manzi­ni empha­sized that because tra­di­tion­al com­mu­ni­ties such as vil­lages or neigh­bor­hoods are declin­ing, as a soci­ety we must find new paths for peo­ple to recon­nect. Design can cre­ate spaces that fos­ter trust and thus allow peo­ple to feel safe and con­fi­dent to open up. In Manzini’s opin­ion, design is not an end in itself but rather a tool for soci­etal change that must, how­ev­er, always respect people’s free­dom. He believes that through their work design­ers encour­age debate but at the same time must be effi­cient, remain objec­tive in their actions, and reflect crit­i­cal­ly on them at all times. Good to know: In the run-up to mcbw, Manzi­ni spoke about Small, open, local and con­nect­ed in a pod­cast. Click here to lis­ten to what he had to say!

Inspir­ing Empa­thy: design points out the human factor

Kim Dabbs, glob­al vice pres­i­dent ESG and social inno­va­tion at Steel­case, dis­cussed the rel­e­vance of empa­thy at the work­place. She point­ed out that if peo­ple lack a sense of belong­ing in their work envi­ron­ments, they will find it dif­fi­cult to reach their full poten­tial. This is why, in Dabbs’ opin­ion, inclu­sive design is not mere­ly “nice to have” but essen­tial for inno­va­tion and col­lab­o­ra­tion. Design, she said, has the pow­er to trans­form work cul­tures to increase a sense of belong­ing, open­ness, and engagement..

Alona Kharchenko, co-founder and CTO of Devan­thro, is com­mit­ted to fight­ing the nurs­ing short­age. She set out to rethink care with the use of tech­nol­o­gy but with­out los­ing focus on peo­ple. Kharchenko’s team devel­ops care robots that pro­vide sup­port and show empa­thy. The team’s goal is to achieve a lev­el of care in which close­ness, dig­ni­ty, and com­pas­sion remain tan­gi­ble despite tech­ni­cal assis­tance. Rather than being replace­ments, tech­no­log­i­cal advance­ments are tools for strength­en­ing human rela­tion­ships in the care sector.

Open­ing Minds: design awak­ens curiosity

Design­er Ana Relvão used every­day prod­ucts such as kitchen sys­tems (for J*Gast) or a cof­fee machine (for Ligre) to demon­strate how far being curios can take you in design. For her, inno­va­tion does not begin with high tech but with open ques­tions and the courage to think about things dif­fer­ent­ly. She remind­ed us that even small things bear great poten­tial if we are will­ing to chal­lenge estab­lished rou­tines and take new per­spec­tives. A pod­cast episode by Ana Relvão is avail­able here.

Accord­ing to Tim Brown, design and curios­i­ty are close­ly relat­ed. A trail­blaz­er in the field of design think­ing and long-time CEO of IDEO, he urged the audi­ence to use design in a more delib­er­ate and respon­si­ble man­ner. He envi­sions design as enable­ment – not only of prod­ucts, but also of soci­etal trans­for­ma­tion. Using the Min­istry of Pos­si­bil­i­ties (Design Palm­wood) in Dubai as an exam­ple, Brown demon­strat­ed how a play­ful mind­set cou­pled with trust and curios­i­ty can help shape new paths for entire soci­eties. He clar­i­fies that good design begins with ask­ing the right ques­tions and a will­ing­ness to involve peo­ple active­ly. For Brown, a play­ful approach to chal­lenges offers end­less opportunities.

Last­ing impact of mcbw sum­mit 2025

Design nev­er hap­pens in a vac­u­um; it inevitably influ­ences social sys­tems. For this rea­son, we have to chal­lenge design con­tin­u­ous­ly, from ini­tial ideas to far beyond the use stage. If you design, you are respon­si­ble for what you cre­ate and for its effects. This respon­si­bil­i­ty has many sides to it and some­times is invis­i­ble and often not plan­able. Yet it begins with a sim­ple prin­ci­ple: being mind­ful of the respon­si­bil­i­ty inher­ent in one’s actions and direct­ing them toward the com­mon good. Thus, design is much more than a cre­ative process because it is a social man­date. Design will remain viable only if it embraces its role with­in a dynam­ic, inter­con­nect­ed soci­ety. Every act of design is an invi­ta­tion to make the world a bet­ter place – let’s get to it!

A big thank you to our guests who made mcbw sum­mit 2025 tru­ly unique!

Furkan Demir­ci, Kike Cor­rech­er, Hal­la Hel­gadót­tir, Christi­na Melander, Chu-Yi Vuong, Oliv­er Ris­tau, Regi­na Han­ke, Igor Brn­cic, Thorsten Haber­mann, Thomas Man­dl, Nila Reza­ei, Christo­pher Krain­er, Ezio Manzi­ni, Carsten Waldeck, Kim Dabbs, Alona Kharchenko, Ana Relvão, Tim Brown and our team of mod­er­a­tors, Leon­hard Nima, Anna Wörn­er, and Francesca Terzi.