SERVICE

FUTURES

LAB

A design lab established in 2018 at London College of Communication, University of the Arts London. We address issues of:

Public Design
Social Justice
Climate Emergency
Public Health

What’s new?

Centre for SocioDigital Futures Collaboration

(Repost of Paul Clarke’s blog post from https://sociodigitalfutures.blogs.bristol.ac.uk/2026/01/21/design-futures-and-collaborating-with-london-college-of-communication-watch-our-new-film/) In 2025, the Centre for Sociodigital Futures (CenSoF) at Bristol University collaborated with MA Service Design at London College of Communication (LCC), setting briefs for students on the Design Futures unit. The outcomes were presented in an exhibition in London, June 2025, which showcased a diverse range of speculative prototypes that explored emerging sociodigital challenges through the lens of critical service design. We have also produced a short film about the…

Co-Creating Futures: Service Design in Rural Governance in Pujiang County, Chengdu

Spotlight on Ziwei (Zoey)Lin’s PhD in Progress Project Description This project focuses on the application of service design in rural governance and revitalisation in China, with Pujiang County in Chengdu as the primary field site. Integrating co-design, participatory design, design for policy, and speculative design methods, the project explores how design can empower grassroots governance…

Design in Local Government Playbook

Dr Lara Salinas has been awarded an AHRC Innovation Scholar grant to advance design excellence in the public sector. Lara will be seconded to London Borough of Camden’s Strategy and Change team, from where she’ll collaborate with the national Local Government Service Design Network to co-create a Design in Local Government Playbook. Research question Playbook…

Societal Readiness Framework

Purpose SoRA is a framework to support reflexive assessment and improvement of Societal Readiness. SoRA has been created in collaboration with experts, innovators and policy makers. The assessment consists of four dimensions that relate to carbon reduction, social justice, social good and alignment with preferable future systems. SoRA facilitates alignment with carbon reduction targets, better…

Design Pedagogy for Changemaking

Design Pedagogy for Changemaking What do we mean by changemaking? How can design research and design practice catalyse changemaking? And how to teach or train for changemaking via design or using design and creative methods? In this lecture Dr Silvia Grimaldi and Dr Malé Luján Escalante, respond to these key questions using examples to their…

Transition Living Lab UAL: LCC Design School

Image: Student work This is an international collaboration of UAL: LCC and UAL: LCF and two Indonesian Universities. In this challenge MA students responded to a brief to co-create an intervention (workshop, activity, session, etc.) that will be part of the Transition Living Lab, a training program for displaced people interested in becoming change-makers and…

Making Connections

Making Connections is a 9-month research project exploring how staff voice can be more effectively embedded into decision-making and governance at the University of the Arts London (UAL). Conducted between January and September 2025, the project was commissioned by UAL’s Social Purpose Lab in collaboration with the People & Culture Group, and delivered by the…

UAL Knowledge Exchange Awards

Two projects involving Service Futures Lab members won the Knowledge Exchange Awards at University of the Arts London in September 2024 We won: People’s Prize in the Equity and Diversity category for Transition Living Lab Team: Malé Lujan Escalante, Silvia Grimaldi And: Special Commendation in the R&D Innovation category for the Equality, Diversity and Inclusion:…

Design|Policy Research Network

Image: cover of the final report, photo courtesy of Lucy Kimbell The collaborative, cross-disciplinary research network organised workshops and engagement sessions to consolidate and better articulate the emerging relations between research and practice in design and public policy processes. Research contributions include a novel, evidence-based and contextual understanding of the potential for design in relation…

UAL Climate Systems Mapping

Image: Alice Blencowe, UAL Climate Systems mapping project, Collaborative Mapping Session, 2024 This pilot research project is motivated by the commitment to net-zero emissions in UAL’s Climate Action Plan and UAL’s Strategy 2022-32 and, beyond science-based targets, UAL’s commitment to social purpose and justice. UAL – like all HEIs and organisations – will be challenged…

Pluriversal Ways of Knowing Sharing Circle

Refugee Transition Network (RTN) – AHRC International Networking Project and The Service Futures Lab, partnered to create a participatory experience that brought together the Lab’s stakeholders, UAL scholars and researchers, NGO’s organisations working in social purpose, refugee partners and participants from the RTN network, PGT students and MA Service Design Alumni, around ideas, music, rituals, magic,…

Climate Emergency Visual Action Plan

Purpose Climate Emergency Action Plans are highly complex, involving multiple actors from across sectors. The most immediate challenge, to enable collaboration both inside the local government and with external organisations, is to communicate the multiple lines of actions and operational objectives. This information is held in different parts of the organisations, and in documents with…

Service Design Training

Links: Report Tool Pack Manifesto University of the Arts London Academic Development, Services Delivery and Course Support approached the Service Futures Lab to upskill the teams in service design methods as well as deliver mindset change that would affect the teams’ ways of working, with the aim to make the way IT services are developed…

Design Methods for Social Justice

The third event in this year’s Service Futures Lab Public Event series is a roundtable discussion chaired by Dr. Silvia Grimaldi, focussing on how we design for social justice. Speakers from industry and academia will present short case studies of their work and explain how they adjusted their design approaches, practices and methods to focus on…

Good Help for Families in Camden After Covid

Camden Family Changemakers was a co-design project carried out in 2021 between Camden Council’s family services team, parents and family members residing in Camden, London College of Communication (LCC) MA Service Design and MA Data Visualisation students, two MA Service Design alumni, five academic staff members, the Service Futures Lab at LCC and the UAL’s Public…

UAL Climate Studio

UAL Climate Studio is a 6-months collaboration between three UAL colleges to develop an urban network of citizens, organisations and government to support collaborative place-based climate action.

PNK Garden

PNK Garden is a local gardening project in South London, on a land that had previously been disused for over 30 years. PNK Garden is fully independent, self-managed, self-funded, shared and free to access.

CoDesign4Transitions

CoDesign4Transitions is a four-year doctoral network (2024-28) that brings together eight universities in seven countries (Belgium, Denmark, Hungary, Italy, Poland, Spain, UK) who will recruit and supervise a cohort of 13 transdisciplinary Doctoral Candidates (DCs).

Paint & Plant

A series of community events to support cross-pollination between UAL student communities and local communities.

EDI in the Foundation Industries

“Equality, Diversity & Inclusion (EDI): Future-Proofing Your Workforce” was funded by UKRI through the Transforming the Foundation Industries Network + project (TFIN+). The purpose of the project is to model an approach to EDI learning and development that enables each Foundation Industry (FI) partner to benefit from a uniquely bespoke development package that responds to…

EDI and Inclusive Design

This is a framework for people in any role within a design-driven organisation or within product and digital teams, focussing on both Inclusive Design and on Equity, Diversity and Inclusion. Designed by Dr Silvia Grimaldi with Veron Lai, Meghana Shailendra and Yini Zheng, together with a group of co-designers, this framework is meant to be…

Co-design your place Erasmus+

The programme prepares young people (<30) to be changemakers, designers and leaders in regenerated areas. During 18 months of intensive, educational and practical workshops, we designed and implement two services supporting the urban renewal by social inclusion, created a publication and a handbook, and hosted a conference and workshops. Project Handbook: Grimaldi, S. et al.…