Projects per year
Organisation profile
Organisation profile
The Centre for Design History applies a cross-disciplinary perspective to understand how design in all its forms has shaped things, spaces and actions across time. Our approach extends to other arts and humanities, the social sciences, engineering, health, and community engagement.
We aim to develop wide social and economic impact via our links with the cultural sector, particularly museums and art galleries, government and voluntary sectors and, crucially, creative businesses. Our research makes an important contribution to cultural life and wellbeing.
The centre contributes to an expanded field of design history that embraces the conjunction of professional and non-professional practices; digital and analogue artefacts; the de-centring of design practice away from singular object to complex ecologies, objects and systems, and the embedding of design thinking into management and organisational processes.
While traditionally, design history has been applied to museology, business history and within academia, opportunities have emerged for new applications and forms of impact for the discipline. The current reflexive use of design as a value in policy and planning opens up new fields of investigation both in contemporary design history and re-investigating the past, and offers exciting opportunities to pioneer new research routes and produce new, impactful and high-quality research outcomes.
We also have the following Emeritus Professors: Jonathan Woodham and Lou Taylor
Anyone interested in working with us should contact [email protected]
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Collaborations and top research areas from the last five years
Profiles
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Tom Ainsworth
- School of Arch, Tech and Eng - Subject Lead Architecture and Design, Principal Lecturer
- Centre for Arts and Wellbeing
- Experimental Design Practices Research Excellence Group
- Radical Methodologies (RaM) Research Excellence Group
- Centre for Design History
Person: Academic
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Designing Spaces, Making Sustainable Homes: The Design Industry, the Data Gap, and Design Innovation
Rajguru, M. (PI), Ainsworth, T. (CoI) & Sarker, D. (CoI)
Arts and Humanities Research Council
1/10/24 → 30/09/26
Project: Research Councils / Government Depts.
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Crafting a Sustainable Future: Empowering Indian Crafts in the Creative Industries
Rodriguez Echavarria, K. (PI), Wintle, C. (CoI), Weyrich, T. (CoI), Patel, C. (CoI) & Vadodaria, K. (CoI)
Arts and Humanities Research Council
1/10/24 → 30/09/26
Project: Research Councils / Government Depts.
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T. S. Eliot and Beethoven: Aesthetics, Music and Politics 1870-1945
Virkar, A. (PI)
1/09/24 → 31/08/25
Project: Research Councils / Government Depts.
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East Asian Design History Reader: Modernities and Formation of the Inter-East Asian Design, 1900-1945
Lee, Y. (Editor), Kikuchi, Y. (Editor), Wang, W. (Editor) & Kang, I. (Editor), 2026, (Accepted/In press) Brill.Research output: Book/Report › Book - edited › peer-review
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A Potted History of the Nudist Movement
Pollen, A., 24 Feb 2025Research output: Non-textual output › Digital or Visual Products
Open Access -
Cold War Photographic Diplomacy: Darren Newbury in Conversation with Kylie Thomas
Thomas, K. & Newbury, D., 19 Feb 2025, In: Journal of War and Culture Studies. 18, 2, p. 203-217 15 p.Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
Open AccessFile
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Talk about Showing Resistance and Art on the Streets
Atkinson, H. (Presenter)
13 Nov 2025Activity: External talk or presentation › Invited talk
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ICDHS 14 "Cultures of Design," the 14th edition of the International Conference on Design History and Design Studies, at IIT Delhi on 10-12 October 2025
Atkinson, H. (Member of programme committee)
10 Oct 2025 → 12 Oct 2025Activity: Events › Conference
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The role of bureaucracies in histories of design activism
Atkinson, H. (Presenter)
10 Oct 2025 → 12 Oct 2025Activity: External talk or presentation › Oral presentation