We are a community of 26
members from more than 15 countries
You want to be part of the community?
Join as a member
Each year, the Distributed Design Platform holds an open call for new member organizations to join its core community. The selection is made through a collaborative process. Becoming a member offers unique opportunities for collaboration, knowledge exchange, and participation in key initiatives.
If you’d like to learn more, feel free to reach out to us at [email protected]!
Be part of the Ecosystem
Through carefully curated activities and customized training opportunities, we can offer you a partnership that aligns with your needs, enabling you to integrate Distributed Design values into your organization and become a strategic partner!
Contact [email protected] for strategic partnerships
Our existing members
Global Innovation Gathering (DE) is a vibrant, diverse community of innovation hubs, makerspaces, hackerspaces and other grassroots innovation community spaces alongside individual innovators, makers, technologists and changemakers. GIG is pursuing a new vision for global cooperation based on equality, openness and sharing. We aim to enable more diversity in the production of technology and global innovation processes and support open and sustainable solutions developed by grassroots innovators.With solid roots in the global south, we share, collaborate and work together. GIG provides a platform for meaningful exchange by fostering knowledge exchange and collaboration between its members. GIG contributes to creating and using open, inclusive and sustainable technologies and meaningful connections between innovators, positively impacting the policies and frameworks for grassroots innovation. We support research in innovation and development, digital rights and technology ecosystem questions carried out by local experts and international teams.
GIG works to connect innovators and makers from around the world. It aims to bring different design perspectives to the heart of Europe and facilitate real-time collaboration between global south and global north partners.
Our main activity is organizing the Global Innovation Gathering annual event in Berlin. Members of the network, as well as partners in Europe, are invited to attend, meet and organize workshops together on topics of education, critical making and inclusivity.
Pakhuis de Zwijger (NL) is a platform for urban development and the creative industry, located in a redeveloped warehouse in the city centre of Amsterdam. What started out as a ‘clubhouse for creatives’ seventeen years ago has now grown into a platform that organises cross-disciplinary discussions, workshops, festivals and more on a daily basis. Urging temporary urban issues with relevant stakeholders. Pakhuis de Zwijger informs, inspires, connects people, effectuates, monitors and reflects.
Pakhuis de Zwijger is a public meeting space and a center for dialogue. Our main activities include organising programmes and public events about urgent and complex social issues. Based on that, Pakhuis de Zwijger provides a stage for Distributed Design talents and creatives to showcase their work in the format of a public event. To select the designers, we post an Open Call in early September each year and do the interviews with talents during October. We record and livestream our events to make them (inter)nationally accessible. Additionally, their projects are digitally showcased on Pakhuis de Zwijger’s website. Finally, strong networking opportunities are provided to creative talents through the events.
Polifactory (IT) is the makerspace-fablab of Politecnico di Milano, serving as a multidisciplinary research lab aimed at exploring the relationship between design and evolving models of production, distribution, and use within product-service systems, particularly in the context of digital transformation and the shift towards a circular economy. Polifactory conducts competitive research, consultancy, and public engagement initiatives in collaboration with companies and institutions involved in design-driven innovation, user-driven innovation, as well as open and circular innovation. Through its Talents in Residence program, Polifactory supports the pre-incubation of ideas developed by young talents from Politecnico di Milano.
Polifactory offers a residency program on the themes of Distributed Design dedicated to young designers studying at the School of Design of the Polytechnic of Milan, one of the largest and most prestigious Design Schools in the world with over 4000 students attending. Every year Polifactory explores a project theme that represents an innovation challenge for Distributed Design. Through the launch of an Open Call, teams of young designers are selected to develop their projects within the Fab Lab, operating as Makers in Residence and having access to the makerspace and its equipment and counting on the collaboration with the laboratory staff who supports in the design and prototyping phases.
Happylab (AT) is Austria’s first Fab Lab, established in 2010. The term Fab Lab refers to an open high-tech workshop equipped with computer-controlled machines that people can use to manufacture a wide variety of products on their own. It is far more than just a room with machines that can be used by the interested public. A key aspect is providing low-threshold access in order to appeal even to those not yet equipped with the relevant prior knowledge. The Happylab is an interdisciplinary entry point for all who have creative and/or technological project ideas.
Happylab is offering a residency program for emerging creatives in Distributed Design, with full access to makerspace facilities, co-working spaces, and training to advance their projects and careers. This initiative supports local product manufacturing, promoting environmental sustainability. Participants are chosen via an Open Call, with selection criteria focusing on diversity, gender equality, and sustainability. The program also aims to internationalize creative talent, encouraging international applications. Throughout the residency, participants can showcase their work at the final exhibition on side and a online exhibitions, to enhance their visibility.
Based in e-Estonia, the Fab City Foundation (EE) supports the Fab City Global Initiative through the development of projects for social innovation, research, and learning programs on urban innovation. The Foundation facilitates the Network of cities, hosts an annual Summit in collaboration with a local host, and leads strategic action research on innovative city models like the Fab City Full Stack and PITO to DIDO model.
As a founding member of the Distributed Design Platform, Fab City Foundation is dedicated to promoting Distributed Design practices through events, activities, and outreach across the Fab City Global Community. We facilitate enriching collaborations, engage various stakeholders, and spark inspiration through events, meetups, and projects. Our blog posts showcase the impact of our activities and we share high-quality resources to open-source knowledge gained from our initiatives. We continually foster global collaboration and knowledge exchange to support inclusivity, diversity, and sustainability, aiming to strengthen the field of Distributed Design and foster innovation through our Global Network.
re:publica is one of the largest and most exciting conferences centered on digital culture, which explores how technology impacts society, politics, and everyday life. Originating in 2007, it has grown into one of Europe’s largest events of its kind, attracting a diverse audience of activists, scientists, hackers, entrepreneurs, NGOs, journalists, social media and marketing experts, and many others. The festival features a wide range of activities, including lectures, workshops, a pop-up makerspace and panel discussions that cover topics like internet policy, digital rights, and future technologies. Held annually in Berlin, re:publica fosters a collaborative environment that fosters innovation and creates synergies between net politics, online marketing, network technology, digital society, and (pop) culture.
In cooperation with the Global Innovation Gathering (GIG), re:publica hosts a pop-up Makerspace during the festival over three days. Here, makers from around the world come together to meet, hold, and participate in making-related workshops and meet-ups, and connect with an audience new to the Maker movement. At the Makerspace, there are also various open-source hardware exhibitions and co-created art pieces displayed each year. Our creative talents contribute to the program by either holding a workshop or creating off-stage pieces to exhibit on-site.
Maker (DK) is a non-profit association working to empower the next wave of creators and physical entrepreneurs, those who will serve as the driving force behind a more circular future. We do this by providing access to a space where anyone can build, share and learn, nurturing a culture of innovation-by-collaboration within our community. We are diverse, professional, approachable and cross-disciplinary at the core and we embody this through our urban presence: our open lab for sustainable product development in Copenhagen.
Maker develops, facilitates and hosts residencies within the Distributed Design Platform project. As part of our residencies in Maker V-10 the creative talents get full access to all of our facilities, get an appointed mentor from our national and EU based community, take part in masterclasses, technical training sessions and finally take part in an exhibition promoting and showcasing the talents’ work.
Espacio Open (ES), a private non profit cultural association, is a creative and social projects accelerator based in Bilbao. Its objectives are to influence the local social and economic scene in the city by boosting emerging cultural trends through the design and implementation of innovation-based projects, mixing art, design, technology and social issues, with both local and global perspective. The organisation manages 1.000 square meters of installations and 15 workers. The project moved in 2011 to the Bilbao Old Cookie Factory, in the Zorrozaurre island. As a Fab Lab/ Makerspace, Espacio Open organizes the Maker Faire Bilbao since 2013, one of Europe’s oldest maker movement gatherings, launches annual calls for artistic residencies and is a partner in several European projects linked to urban innovation, among other activities.
Through Fab Lab Bilbao, Espacio Open offers a work space and professional support for the development of creative projects, through annual calls for artistic residencies. In addition, Espacio Open annually organizes the creative technologies festival Maker Faire Bilbao including professional workshops focused on creative talents. These activities are aimed at supporting professionals from different disciplines so that they can introduce open technologies into their creative processes and show their projects to broader audiences.
Ars Longa (FR) is a structure of production, diffusion, mediation of experimenal’s forms at crossroads of Art, Research and Society, both in public and private spaces. It favours innovative approaches and focuses on the educational or civic appropriation of projects. City is our playground. We explore and study the movements that make and transform the metabolism of the city. Regulators, operators or citizens, we accompany with them experiments that allow us to think by doing. To manufacture in town, to manufacture the city.
Ars Longa offers a support programme for young emerging designers by providing (1) access to our workshop, (2) an ecosystem of makers / workshops and (3) professionals in several areas of the transition economy.
Working closely with the renowned Parisian design and craft school BOULLE and the MORNING OS incubator, where the workshop is located, we are offering designers a three-stage process: an open call with 4 selection criteria: Creativity, Heritage, Inclusion, Wise Techno. The programme also aims to internationalise creative talent by encouraging international applications.
Exhibitions will be held at Morning OS or as part of collaborative projects.
Danish Design Center (DDC) (DK), as Denmark’s national design center, it is DDC’s mission to promote the use of design in business and industry, to help professionalise the design industry and to document, promote and brand Danish design in Denmark and abroad. In other words, the DDC aims to ensure the best possible meeting between the supply and demand sides in the design field. The DDC’s key approach in this encounter is systematic experimentation with design-based value creation in companies.
Knowledge Center of Vestmannaeyjar (IS) in Iceland fosters innovation and economic diversity by actively supporting entrepreneurs and businesses. It operates Fab Lab Vestmannaeyjar, a digital workshop open to various groups. As a founding partner of 14 other Fab Labs in Iceland, it offers guidance for establishing similar spaces and hosts workshops. Through programs, it aids innovation from conception to startup. Associated with projects like Distributed Design and the Vestmannaeyjar Coastal Community, it connects various sectors for ocean awareness and economic development. Additionally, it conducts educational programs for students and offers Fab Academy courses.
In an endeavor led by the Knowledge Center Vestmannaeyjar Iceland, Fab Lab Vestmannaeyjar emerges as a pivotal hub for innovation and creativity. Presently, the program is actively providing personalized support to budding creatives & entrepreneurs, offering them year-long access to cutting-edge tools, knowledge, and expertise in digital fabrication and project strategy. A part of the initiative is an intensive maker-to-market bootcamp. This event is empowering participants with crucial skills in business development and project management, shaping their journey from creative ideation to market success. Through tailored guidance and in-kind support, the center is fostering community building, internationalization, and revenue diversification, propelling emerging talents towards entrepreneurial success.
Lisbon Polytechnic (PT) is a high-level institute of higher education which includes eight separate schools or institutes with expertise in the areas of Arts (Dance, Music, Theatre and Film), Communication, Business Administration (Accounting and Administration), Education, Engineering and Health Technologies. Overall, it offers 34 undergraduate, 42 masters and 22 postgraduates in daytime and after work, and has 13,500 students attending its courses and more than 1,300 teachers, of which close to 360 are PhDs and 118 are experts, also providing around 400 employees, staff in technical and administrative areas.
Metalab (UA) is a City development laboratory that supports a socially equal, spatially comfortable, culturally rich, environmentally responsible, economically balanced city (environment). Our vision is to establish a makerspace in Ivano-Frankivsk, Ukraine, serving as a platform that fosters innovation in humanitarian aid, med tech, climate change response and economic development. With a unique technical prototyping platform, we aim to provide a space that is inclusive and empowering, fostering learning, creativity, and entrepreneurship for all. By creating a center for peer learning and knowledge sharing, we aim to facilitate collaboration and cultivate a supportive community. A place where the value of science, technology, and design can be added to Ukrainian products. By nurturing innovations and inventions, we aspire to contribute to the growth and success of Ukrainians.
At POLE we experiment with sustainable solutions that can be implemented in the reconstruction of Ukraine, but also that can answer today’s needs and distribute the results. METALAB established a sustainable materials laboratory with a sample library. We will continue the laboratory tests and research with recyclable construction materials that can fully or partially aid Ukraine’s post-war reconstruction. We are planning an event for the community to mark the opening of the new POLE space in mid-July this year. It will be a networking event with a public program for the network of our partners and the local community.
Museum of Architecture and Design (SI) is one of the oldest museums for architecture and design in Europe. MAO collects, stores, studies and presents material from these creative areas at temporary and permanent exhibitions, opening itself as a space for everyone who wishes to research, study, and learn more about how we inhabit our living space, how we organize it, change it, design it, mark it, and make it our own. MAO is also the organiser of the oldest Biennial of Design (BIO), the oldest European design biennial, as well as the founder and coordinating entity of Future Architecture Platform.
As part of the Distributed Design Platform, MAO and Center for Creativity offer support to local producers and makers, encourage collaborations and promote their practices in an international community of creatives working in similar, interdisciplinary fields. Our past and future activities in the DDP scheme focus on facilitating opportunities that deal with questions of locality, community and heritage on the one hand, as well as disseminating these ideas in an international context on the other.
Opendot (IT) OpenDot is a research and open innovation hub, a space dedicated to rapid prototyping and digital manufacturing, open and accessible to all. OpenDot, founded in Milan in 2014 by the design studio Dotdotdot, OpenDot generates changes that find in open source and technological know-how opportunities for growth in educational, design and production level.
OpenDot develops projects and research paths, training programmes and co-design processes involving all the stakeholders to create innovative solutions aimed at generating a positive social impact for people and the planet.
Opendot collaborates with Politecnico of Milan, DOMUS Academy, NABA (New Academy for Fine Arts) among other Universities. For 7 years it has been organizing the 6-months-lasting training Fab Academy, devoted to digital Fabrication and coordinated by MIT Media Lab.
Residency program within the Distributed Design Platform project for designers, artists, creatives, makers and engineers (why not) from diverse backgrounds.
Three theme challenges (to choose along the three options):
- Repurposing and upcycling: from Fashion to … and vice versa
- Transformational design for adaptive fashion.
- Dress the change: fashion as a means for climate activism.
We will offer access to the full facility, mentorship and training.
P2P Lab (EL) works for the development and maintenance of a global knowledge commons, encompassing a global community of researchers, makers, artists, designers and others, that advocates and monitors models of peer production, peer governance and peer property in every field of human activity. Its wider network includes institutions and organisations from academia and civil society, active grassroots social movements and institutions working for the transition to a P2P-driven, commons future.
Our core activities involve organising events on sociopolitical issues from a commons perspective, providing a platform for creative talents to showcase projects and exchange ideas. To ensure diversity and inclusivity in our activities, we issue an Open Call, through which we select participants for our local activities, typically held in the summer/autumn, contingent upon the availability of participants. Emphasising documentation, we share insights and promote projects through channels like the DD website, the DD book, and the mobility scheme. We ultimately aim to build a global network of makerspaces, exchanging best practices to address global climate change challenges autonomously.
SPLOT Institute (PL) inspires cross-disciplinary creative collaboration to address pressing social, environmental and economical challenges. We deliver schemes for young creators from diverse backgrounds using our own methodology, successfully applied in international projects such as SPLOT UA Residency (organized in collaboration with the US Department of State and the US Embassy Warsaw), Direction Earth/Space Creative Campus (for the European Space Agency) and ART+DESIGN+SCIENCE schemes (supported by the Polish Ministry of Culture and National Heritage).
As part of the Distributed Design Platform, we have launched SPLOT Open – an initiative that focuses on building an inclusive, open and interdisciplinary community where we strive to democratize access to knowledge and creation. As part of the scheme, we facilitate a space for meetings, interactions and exchange of ideas that have openness in their DNA. To make sure that we are open indeed, we welcome a wide array of initiatives. Our definition of openness includes components ranging from open licensing, co-creation and circulation of knowledge sharing or open data to community governance, circularity and decentralized decision-making.
FabLab Budapest (HU) is a ten years old open innovation centre, one of the first FabLab in Central-East Europe and until now the only member of the FabLab network in Hungary. We are located in the downtown of Budapest offering our services, access to our workshop, tools and knowledge for students, entrepreneurs and companies. We believe in bottom-up innovation and help others to create their first prototype. Our goal is the democratisation of digital manufacturing technologies to provide access to personal and collaborative invention and innovation using digital technologies. We have a strong cooperation with the Moholy-Nagy University of Art and Design. In this cooperation we try to foster students of traditional craftsmanship to enter into the 21th Century with digital manufacturing technologies and start their own design brand. We provide a comprehensive education program on design thinking, digital manufacturing and DIY biology.
