Prof. Dr. Florian Conradi

About

Florian Conradi is a designer and researcher combining critical theory and design practice as an approach for the explorative method of ‘Critical Design’ situated within design research. Drawing on methods of performative design and artistic research, he applies the means and principles of ad-hoc transformations and free/open technologies to explore the ‘politics of design’.

Since 2022 he co-heads the interdisciplinary research group ‘Design, Diversity and New Commons’ at the Berlin University of the Arts (UdK) / Weizenbaum Institute, and since March 2025 he is a visiting professor for ‘Design Research’ and ‘Critical Design’ at the Institute of Theater Studies at the Freie Universität Berlin and the Einstein Center Digital Future.
 
He has taught critical approaches to design at amongst other places the UdK Berlin, as a visiting professor in the international MA program in Integrated Design at the Anhalt University of Applied Sciences in Dessau (2018/19, 2024/25), and as a visiting professor for ‘Open Science/Critical Design’ at the Institute of History and Philosophy of Science, Technology and Literature at the Technische Universität Berlin (TU) and the ECDF (2019-2024). Since 2022 he is a board member of the Berlin Open Lab (UdK Berlin/TU Berlin) and since 2024 he is a Principal Investigator at research project ‘Object, Space, Agency’ at the Cluster of Excellence ‘Matters of Activity’ (Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin).
 
Florian Conradi studied design and art at the Sandberg Institute (Gerrit Rietveld Academie) in Amsterdam (MFA), the Bezalel Academy of Art and Design in Jerusalem, the Köln International School of Design (MA), and wrote his Ph.D. (Dr. phil.) in the field of Design Research at the UdK Berlin. Since 2008 he has been initiating sociopolitical design projects with institutions in the field of critical media and political advocacy, carrying out field research in Europe, the Middle East, East and West Africa. As a research associate, he has worked for the Design Research Lab at the UdK Berlin, German Research Centre for Artificial Intelligence, and from 2018-2022 he co-headed the research group ‘Critical Maker Culture’ at the UdK Berlin/Weizenbaum Institute.
 
Since 2019 he collaborates with Michelle Christensen to explore the potential of research practiced within open lab settings. As a mode of exploration, they initiated the project ‘Critical Inquiry + Design’ – a transdisciplinary and trans-university terrain that attempts to blur the boundaries of theory and practice, academia and activism, and science and civil society. In this context, students and researchers from different disciplines, institutions and geographies collaborate on project-base, to debate, prototype and formulate commons-based critical perspectives and practices. Based at the Berlin Open Lab, the research, teaching and experimental design practice carried out in the project focuses on feminist/queer, beyond western-centric and postanthropocentric approaches to design.

Research Group: Design, Diversität and New Commons