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I feel hopeful about the impact of design on the world,” says fashion designer Foday Dumbuya, “It has the power to drive change by addressing social issues, promoting sustainability, and enhancing quality of life.”
In September this year, the UK hosts the World Design Congress (WDC), where the best minds from business, education and research get together to discuss how design can do just this.
Dumbuya, cofounder of the menswear label Labrum and designer of the black Arsenal strip, is one of five world-class creatives acting as ambassadors for British design at this biannual international event. While previous congresses have had such intriguing themes as “From Spoon to City” and “Towards an Aesthetic of the Invisible Design of Tradition”, for 2025 the UK’s Design Council has gone for the stark but urgent “Design for Planet”.
Dumbuya with his fellow ambassadors – award-winning furniture designer Tom Dixon, architect Lesley Lokko who curated the Venice Architecture Biennale in 2023, Suhair Khan, who is a tech entrepreneur and expert on AI, and designer and artist Es Devlin – have put together a list of the designers they think are trailblazers in changing the way our furniture, clothes and buildings can be made.
“The idea of good design has shifted from a focus on functionality and aesthetics to encompass experience, sustainability, and inclusivity,” says Dumbuya. “It prioritises environmental responsibility, embraces technology, fosters collaboration and promotes circularity, reflecting a broader understanding of design’s impact on society and individuals.”
This idea is at the heart of a list the ambassadors have created of new trailblazing designers. These creatives are not just using innovative materials or new methods of production, but rethinking the systems and wisdom about the products we use and how we make them.
Arthur Mamou-Mani
Parametric architect
Life as an architect was the obvious choice for Arthur Mamou-Mani. What else was a young Parisian raised by ecologist parents and who has an equal love for maths, science and art to do? So after training at London’s Architectural Association, he established his design studio in Hackney.
From that point on, everything about Mamou-Mani’s work ceases to be obvious. His firm has become famous for building fantasy: the world’s largest 3D-printed sand pavilion; a temporary temple for the Burning Man festival in Nevada; a test site for airships in France; a viewing platform constructed from reclaimed ironwood and rattan in Bali. All from design with circularity at its heart.
Mamou-Mani creates biological shape – spirals, waves, repetitive patterns – from 3D-printed and recycled materials using parametric design. The computer-based process uses algorithms derived from the properties of a material to produce buildings and interiors that are a little bit Le Corbusier, a little bit Escher.
“It’s not our vision imposed on a material,” he explains, with the example of using a single tree cut to create complex wood waves designed with algorithms using information about wood’s malleability. “You need science to measure your impact and architects can be reluctant with science because they worry it prevents creativity.”
Mamou-Mani believes science can prevent waste. He talks with delight about an airship hangar his studio is creating in Nouvelle Aquitaine, France, using biomimicry to make the best design for the site. “We put in ripples on the exterior which means we use 50% less steel,” he beams. “That’s a massive carbon saving. And the building is meaningful: if we replace airplanes with helium balloons it could have a massive impact.”
He believes that UK has a lot to bring to the world of circular design. “I come from France and we have a tendency to turn to the government when there is a problem. I love the entrepreneurial spirit of the UK – the idea that an individual or a company can have impact can be fantastic.”
Fernando Laposse
Regenerative furniture designer
When Fernando Laposse arrived in London from Mexico to study product design in 2007, it was the dawn of the “smart” era – smartphones, smartwatches. “My university, in a spot-on way, tried to prepare us for that. For me, that was soul crushing – I think my heritage was always on my mind, and Mexico has a tradition of craft and agriculture more than industry, so I’ve worked on how I can merge these two worlds for my own sanity.”
On a residency at a cultural institute in Oaxaca, Laposse was galvanised by meeting activists fighting for a ban on genetically modified corn in Mexico. “I decided I wanted to do something to help indigenous farmers make a living out of ancient grain.”
His plan has taken shape in Tonahuixtla, an area he’d known since childhood, where Laposse has worked with the local Mixtec tribe, first to grow agave to reverse soil erosion, then to cultivate corn. The fibres and husks of these plants are the materials for his furniture designs. Laposse also teaches locals the techniques to turn crops into materials, increasing their role in production. “I’ve known these communities since I was a child, I have a sense of duty to do them. And they’ve given me a career so this helps everyone.”
Luckily, the Totomoxtle furniture range is not only clever but beautiful, from the exquisite marquetry formed from corn husks to the cute faux-fur affect of the knotted agave fibres. It looks pop and luxe, but as Laposse points out: “My materials talk to you about Mexico and biodiversity.”
As the world starts to experience the fallout of human impact on the environment, Laposse thinks Latin America could come to the fore. “Radical ideas are going to come from this part of the world – we still have a traditional understanding of the interconnections between humans and nature which are long gone from Europe. We are in position where we can change course and maybe create new systems. This is what I try to do with my design.”
Kusheda Mensah
Sustainable furniture designer
One of Kusheda Mensah’s first formative design memories was her local library in Peckham. Created by architect Will Alsop as part of the 1990s regeneration initiative for the area, it was the first library to win the Stirling Prize. It’s colourful and inclusive a community meeting place and it’s easy to imagine Mensah’s own furniture would work well in this prestigious building. The British-Ghanaian designer’s brand Modular by Mensah specialises in padded seating and curved and comfortable tables designed to interlock, bringing people physically together, and all made from recycled foam and textiles.
“The fabrics I choose are not only sustainable but a source of inspiration,” Mensah says. “They allow me to creatively explore ways to give new life to what would otherwise be discarded. I want to ensure my design ideas don’t come at the cost of tomorrow.”
Mensah has also made a valuable contribution to the industry by talking openly about the challenges she’s faced in an industry which is often all about image. Mensah was working in retail when she took a gamble and applied to present at the Milan Furniture Fair, she used a bank loan to start up her business and then had to juggle work and parenting two young children.
“Cost of living is a real crisis, and, unless you have financial backing, it’s hard to manifest your designs. A challenge I face is finding financial support from councils or institutions for my passion for social design – specifically creating interactive spaces that are engaging but built with a deep commitment to sustainability.”
Currently Mensah is working on her next collection – to be sold with Swedish furniture brand Hem – but she’s delighted that her work has been highlighted by the WDC ambassadors.
“It’s a privilege. I hope my efforts might inspire others.”
Natsai Audrey Chieza
Biomaterial designer
Bacteria have not traditionally been a big source of inspiration for product design, but Natsai Audrey Chieza is not one to follow tradition. Born in Zimbabwe, she moved to london at 17 and studied architecture before switching to biochemical engineering. She shifted focus to microbiology and synthetic biology and hasn’t looked back.
She pioneered the use of bacteria to dye fabric at her company Faber Futures, creating a chemical-free process which cuts down on pollution and water waste. Last year she started a biodesign brand called Normal Phenomena of Life which uses algae, bacteria and fungi as key components of everything from lamps to clothes.
“We develop biosolutions for industries such as fashion, textiles, and design, harnessing nature’s capabilities – refined over billions of years of evolution – to create regenerative, high-performance materials.”
Chieza says one of the fascinating consequences of her work is the relationship she’s developed with other non-human organisms and a sense of respect for how our fate intertwines with theirs.
“I think people still only understand the value of this work being able to scale the technology so that you can replace previous technologies and become a billionaire,” she has said. “That didn’t interest me, because what I experienced was transcending that logic of capitalism to be changed by the bacteria itself. Having its lifecycle drive all of my design decisions.”
She thinks that science today reveals how codependence, rather than dominance, works. “The Cartesian notion of ‘survival of the fittest’ – the motif of the capitalist age – is not universal. Nature provides excellent counterexamples: from mycelial networks that share nutrients across forests to coral and algae co-evolving to sustain entire marine ecosystems. If we are serious about working with living systems, we must build business models that mirror nature – where value is generated, shared, and stewarded symbiotically.”
Priya Ahluwalia
Fashion designer with a global vision
In fashion, Priya Ahluwalia is already a big deal. Her eponymous London-based clothes label, launched in 2018, has won her a cupboard full of trophies. Upcycled and repurposed fabrics have featured in her collections since research trips as a student took her to Lagos in Nigeria and Panipat in India, and she saw first-hand the mountains of discarded clothes in these cities, sent for recycling from the west. (The images can be seen in a photography book she released called Sweet Lassi.)
As her label’s popularity has steadily grown – she now produces menswear and womenswear – Priya has looked beyond vintage fabrics to logistics and social enterprises in the global south to keep moving forward with ethical business practice.
“We’ve had impact on the issue – with commercial partners who want to work with us and understand the way me and my team operate to customers having different ideas about how they want to spend their money,” she says.
Her clothes designs are also growing ever more influential. Priya’s British, Nigerian and Indian heritage influences each collection from reworked saris and Cleopatra-style wigs to confident, sexy dresses. There’s a sense of gestalt between the fashion influences, manufacturing conventions, the meeting of west and global south that makes Ahluwalia designs feel synonymous with the way her business works.
“There was not much representation of ideas that weren’t western,” she says, “but the market for fashion is global. There was space to represent something from a different point of view. Why not have something in your wardrobe that’s inspired by Nigerian pottery as well as by Renaissance Italian art?”
Priya plans to add homeware to the Ahluwalia brand soon and says she can see how the aesthetic and ethos of her brand could work in many different areas.
“We care about representative and inclusive design and we aim to do things that are better for people and the planet.”
Sebastian Cox
Crafts maker and woodman
Furniture maker Sebastian Cox has been a success ever since the collection he created for his masters in 2010 sold out. An early advocate for regenerative design – working with nature to improve the environment – he has stayed true to this desire since university. He lives in Kent where he has a furniture workshop and also manages two woodland areas. “I think it’s easy to excuse yourself when you’re a craft maker,” he explains. “You think you have low impact but as soon as you sell to market, you contribute to a material culture.”
Cox subjects all of his products to an environmental lifecycle assessment to monitor carbon footprint, while simultaneously working on his woodmanship – cultivation of woodland using human interaction to have positive impact on the natural environment. Coppicing – cutting trees back to encourage new growth – is an example.
“We think of ourselves as a green and pleasant land, but the UK is only 13% forest, whereas in Europe the average is 38%. We also had an empire, so after we cut down our own wild wood, we then went and cut down everyone else’s. Most antique furniture is made of someone else’s wood, which is a tragedy.”
Cox feels this circular and systemic approach to design is the obvious – if not the only – way forward for the industry. “I look at the past where you sketched a chair and then produced thousands of them and became a celebrity. We have to be a more useful profession with more impact.”
The DWC ambassadors full list of trailblazers
Jayden Ali, architect
Co-curator of the 2023 British Pavilion at the Venice Biennale, Ali runs a London-based architecture and design studio focused on decarbonisation and decolonisation.
Victor Xavier and Søren Hallberg Søndergaard of Assimply Studio
This Brazil-based creative agency makes household products with reused terrazzo.
Michael Bennett, architect and furniture designer
An American football star turned designer, Michael Bennett makes sustainable furniture that draws on his African and southern American roots and is inspired by the African diaspora.
Nzinga Biegueng-Mboup, architect
Based in Dakar, this architect uses bioclimatic design and local materials to preserve Senegalese tradition.
Shajay Bhooshan, architect
Shajay Bhooshan specialises in programming and computational design and works at Zaha Hadid Architects.
Phoebe English, fashion designer
Phoebe English creates sustainable, handcrafted designs emphasising zero-waste and circular practices.
Arthur Huang, structural engineer
This structural engineer started his company Miniwiz in Taiwan in 2005, using waste and upcycling to make building materials.
Insiya Jafferjee, product designer
As founder of Shellworks, Insiya Jafferjee’s focus is creating new generation of materials, that perform like plastic, but are petroleum and microplastic free.
Kieron Lewis, graphic designer and writer
As well as working as designer on books about race, Londoner Kieron Lewis has become a valuable public speaker about diversity and inclusion.
Emmanuel Lawal, designer
With a career that started in music and broadcasting, Emmanuel Lawal has now founded a design studio that focuses on global communication projects.
Sara Martinsen, designer
Danish artist and designer Sara Martinsen uses unusual natural materials such as gelatin to create beautiful furniture.
Charlotte McCurdy, interdisciplinary designer
Designer Charlotte McCurdy is an academic looking at future materials such as using algae to supersede plastics
Marjan van Aubel, solar designer
This Dutch designer creates products such as chargers and solar panels that use light as a power source but also as decoration
Dr Sophia Wang, artist and researcher
Sophie Wang is the co-founder of MycoWorks, a biotechnology company, and an experimental dance company. She also makes art about the climate crisis.
