Designing Peace

Project, Jordan River Peace Park

• Designed by Ecopeace Middle East
• Peace Park Multi-Layer Model: Courtesy of EcoPeace Middle East & Yale Urban Design Workshop / Yale School of Architecture

Jordan, Israel The Jordan River Peace Park is a proposed 2,000-acre park that spans a culturally, historically, and ecologically significant area of land in the river valley shared by Jordan and Israel. With the aim of encouraging cross- border cooperation in an effort to protect an ailing common resource—the polluted Jordan River and its surroundings—design concepts were developed jointly between a peacebuilding organization, university design teams, and local communities. These site-specific concepts incorporate historic structures, ancient ruins, and rehabilitated landscape elements that offer sanctuary to migrating birds, protect threatened habitats, and strengthen the region's economy by attracting new visitors.

Project, Black Lives Matter Harlem Street Mural

New York, New York, USA Sparked by the Washington, DC, mayor’s decision to mark a street with "BLACK LIVES MATTER" during the summer of 2020 racial justice protests, dozens of murals were created in small towns and large cities across the US. The Black Lives Matter Harlem street mural was one of eight painted in New York City. Artists designed and painted the northbound mural and, in as much a historic event as a work of art itself, more than 300 community members completed the southbound side over two days. The murals have provided a platform to reframe the conversation about public space, identifying the need for safe spaces for people of color to gather, create, and heal.

Project, Black Lives Matter Street Mural Census

• Designed by Kim Albrecht
• Visualization: Courtesy of Harvard Kennedy School's Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, with metaLAB (at) Harvard & FU Berlin

Australia, Canada, United Kingdom, United States Soon after witnessing the rapid spread of Black Lives Matter murals across the United States—with an aim to create a public archive of this historical movement—an open civic data advocate posted an online spreadsheet for people to document the murals. The database is open to crowdsourced submissions and currently contains more than 200 works from big urban to small rural communities. The archive tracks key information for each artwork, including dates and locations of installation, links to photos and media stories, the mural’s message, and the artists and organizers involved. The data visualization illustrates the ways this powerful declaration spread virally and how events intersect.

Project, Christmas Operations

• Designed by MullenLowe SSP3

Colombia In an effort to bring an end to the decades-long conflict in Colombia, the Ministry of Defense partnered with a Bogotá-based ad agency to create a series of campaigns to persuade FARC (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia) rebels to leave behind their weapons and come home. The successive campaigns built on lessons learned about effective tactics from returning guerrillas. The first campaign focused on the spirit of Christmas and its significance as a holiday spent with family; another brought lights to the jungle’s rivers, sending floating orbs filled with homecoming messages; another featured stories from mothers of soldiers. These humanizing campaigns helped shift public perception of returning guerillas. Campaigns: Operation Christmas, Rivers of Light, Operation Bethlehem, Mother's Voice.

Project, Art the Arms Fair

• Designed by Art the Arms Fair Collective
• Pattern Tank photograph: Courtesy of Tristan Oliver Striking Suit with Police Baton Chart: Courtesy of War Boutique X Maharishi

London, United Kingdom Every two years London is host to one of the largest arms fairs, where delegations from around the world trade and purchase weaponry. Running parallel, the Art the Arms Fair exposes and expands discourse on the international arms trade’s role in contemporary society. Through visual art exhibitions, lectures, and workshops, along with poetry, comedy, and music events, artists and the wider public voice opposition while envisioning alternatives to the war industry. Free to all, the diverse set of art offerings present a more accessible format for people who are not comfortable engaging in confrontational protests.

Project, Safe Passage Bags Workshop

• Designed by Lesvos Solidarity

Lesbos (Lesvos in Greek), Greece Fleeing conflicts and persecution, record numbers of refugees have arrived on the shores of Greece’s island of Lesbos. In solidarity, local residents transformed a former summer camp into a community-run refugee camp, setting up the Safe Passage Bags workshop. Employing refugees, as well as local residents, the workshop was set up as a place where they could work and create something together while learning a new skill. Sending an important message to the world—the right to safe passage—bags of all sizes are made from recycled life jackets and dinghies no longer needed after the treacherous sea journey.

Project, HarassMap

• Designed by Rebecca Chiao

Canada, Egypt, Mexico, South Africa, Switzerland, Turkey After experiencing daily sexual harassment on Egypt’s streets, four women designed an online crowd- mapped anonymous reporting system, HarassMap. Anyone can share an incident—via text message, online, email, and social media—noting the location, date and time, giving either a personal or witness account, and telling whether an intervention occurred. The posts are then geotagged and aggregated to reveal harassment hotspots on a digital map. The anonymity of the reporting platform has eased the burden of a topic that can be taboo, and the posts provide clear evidence to instigate social and policy changes that can lead to more secure and safe public spaces for all.

Project, Peace Pavilion

• Designed by Collaborative Architecture

New Delhi, India Mumbai-based architects challenged a national war museum competition with a design proposal for a "peace museum," aiming to shape a new narrative and alter India’s discourse on war and nationalism. The ideals of peace and nonviolence are integral to the museum’s content and programming. The ambitious design aims to explore the narrative of nonviolence in the country’s history while creating more democratic places for its future. The welcoming Peace Pavilion structure is centered in a public plaza and, like a tree canopy, it is designed to provide shelter from the elements and daily chaos found in urban India.

Project, Designing for Dignity

• Designed by Manuela Aguirre
• Safety Blanket and Sketchbook: Courtesy of Manuela Aguirre and Jan Kristian Strømsnes

Oslo, Norway Responding to a notable increase in sexual assault in Oslo, a product and service design student team worked with stakeholders—doctors, nurses, social workers, and police—to redesign the entire prevention and response system to be less clinical, but more dignified and comforting to sexual assault survivors. Design workshops led to three coordinated design responses: a soothing safety blanket for survivors; a customized patient education system to guide survivors through medical, social, and legal systems; and guidelines for creating restorative, reassuring interiors for a patient care clinic through lighting, color, and signage.

Project, Recoding Post-War Syria

• Designed by Reparametrize Studio

Damascus, Syria Recoding Post-War Syria is a research and open- data platform that offers a new process for rethinking and revitalizing cities in the wake of conflict. After witnessing firsthand the destructive legacy of war in their own cities of Damascus, Syria, and Beirut, Lebanon, two architects propose a new methodology that fuses state-of-the-art technology and community participation to plan, design, and rebuild damaged post-conflict cities. Challenging typical rebuilding approaches that demolish entire neighborhoods, the studio aims to recycle the rubble and use existing functional buildings. Advanced 3D scanning and digital modeling of the destruction provides an accurate reconstruction plan.

Project, Ideas Box

• Designed by Philippe Starck
• Courtesy of Bibliothèques Sans Frontières

Australia, Bangladesh, Burundi, Colombia, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ethiopia, France, Germany, Ghana, Greece, Iraq, Italy, Jordan, Lebanon, Malaysia, Rwanda, Senegal, Tanzania, Turkey, United States 2014–present Ideas Box is a portable library and pop-up multimedia center that can be easily shipped, is energy independent, and can be set up in 20 minutes. It was designed to be deployed to areas of hardship— refugee camps, isolated communities, underserved urban spaces, and remote Indigenous peoples’ land around the world. Each box’s contents are tailored to the community’s needs. Ideas Box has been distributed across six continents, offering free access to information, culture, and educational resources, which are key tools in promoting healing and building more tolerant communities.

Project, Stone Garden

• Designed by Lina Ghotmeh-Architecture
• Model and Façade Process Samples: Courtesy of Lina Ghotmeh—Architecture Model photos and videos: Ali Cherri, Nadim Asfar, Gregory Buchakjian, Gilbert Hage, Ieva Saudargaite, and Ghassan Salhab

Beirut, Lebanon Stone Garden is a 13-story tower imbued with hopeful futures for inhabitants of a post-war city. Conceived by a Beirut architect as an inhabited sculpture, it transforms tumultuous events into creative potential. Framing the sea, each opening is filled with verdant gardens that invite nature into the dwelling while providing natural adaption to the changing Mediterranean climate. Standing as a landmark to Beirut’s experience, the architect describes it as "living archeology" that materializes what the city has endured in built form and signals a new belonging for the construction workers who fled neighboring wars, their handwork visible in the tower’s straited façade.

Project, Korea Remade

• Designed by Harvard Graduate School of Design
• Rescaling the Middle Ground models: Courtesy of Ann Salerno DMZ Tourism Guide: Courtesy of Jiawen Chen

Korean Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) Korea Remade explores alternative futures for a reunified Korean Peninsula through landscape design by providing social, economic, and cultural opportunities for Korean citizens. The landscape design studio focused on one of the most heavily fortified territories in the world, the demilitarized zone (DMZ) that separates North and South Korea, considering human re-habitation, natural restoration, and existing infrastructure. This includes scattered observatories, abandoned military bases, minefields, subterranean tunnels, as well as existing forests, estuaries, and wetlands. Proposals erase and redraw borders while addressing population displacement, live landmines, soil contamination, and the importance of scenic vistas through complex landscape reorganization and ecologies.

Project, Casa Azul

• Designed by Special Envoy for the Venezuelan Situation, International Organization for Migration - Panama

Venezuelan migration routes in South America, Central America, and the Caribbean Casa Azul, Spanish for "Blue House," is an architectural and research initiative that explores how design can improve the delivery of humanitarian aid to vulnerable migrants. The project focused on much-traveled paths from Venezuela along South and Central American and Caribbean migration routes. Casa Azul is grounded in a flexible space concept, which allows for the adaptation of existing structures or new buildings that can quickly and easily transform into the distinctive, bright blue casas. These hubs offer not only necessities but also space for embracing a shared humanity though opportunities for social, economic, and cultural interactions with local communities.

Project , Startblok Elzenhagen

• Designed by MUST
• Startblok Elzenhagen Installation - Building a Future Together: Courtesy of MUST Urbanism and Creative Industries Fund NL

Amsterdam, Netherlands Startblok Elzenhagen is the second of three affordable housing developments designed to create community between young refugees and Dutch youth, ages 18–28. They live together while working and attending school, helping each other as they start life in Amsterdam. The designers, MUST Urbanism, approached the physical and social design of the housing as a city—a system of connections and interactions between people of different backgrounds—providing a variety of shared public spaces. Hallways in the buildings act like small neighborhood streets where numerous chance encounters can occur, with common areas for amenities and social activities. Large balconies on each floor expand the hallway’s utility.

Project, Rare Earthenware

• Designed by Unknown Fields
• Vases: Courtesy of Unknown Fields

Baotou, Inner Mongolia, China Rare Earthenware makes visible a critical but often unseen aspect of the global supply system, the rare earth elements used to make electronics and renewable energy technologies. More than 95 percent of the world’s rare earths come from China and the majority are from Baotou, one of the most polluted regions on the planet. As with conflict minerals, rare earth extraction can lead to or aggravate existing conflicts and the mining and processing of these materials can be highly toxic. And yet, rare earth elements continue to be used widely in the technology that supports daily life.

Project, RefAID

• Designed by Shelley Taylor

Current: Albania, Austria, Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Haiti, Hungary, Ireland, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Montenegro, Morocco, Netherlands, North Macedonia, Norway, Moldova, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, Ukraine, United Kingdom, United States; Planned: Algeria, Bangladesh, Belize, Benin, Bolivia, Brazil, Burkina Faso, Cape Verde, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cote d’Ivoire, Ecuador, El Salvador, Gambia, Ghana, Guatemala, Guinea, Guinea- Bissau, Honduras, Jordan, Kenya, Lebanon, Liberia, Libya, Mali, Mauritania, Mexico, Nepal, Niger, Nigeria, Panama, Peru, Rwanda, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Togo, Tunisia RefAid is a mobile application designed with the understanding that people fleeing conflict often travel with few possessions except a phone. The app shows refugees, and those who help them, where services are nearby, geolocating them on a map. Available in a growing number of languages, the interface uses simple, color-coded icons to indicate necessities such as food, shelter, toilets/showers, and legal help. The app has transformed the speed with which organizations can update their services and communicate with people on the move in realtime by aggregating information into a single platform, pushing the entire sector to be more digital.

Project, Positive Peace Index

• Designed by The Institute for Economics and Peace

163 Index countries Challenging the vast amount of research devoted to conflict, an Australian think tank instead explores the drivers of peace with an aim to shift "the world’s focus to peace as a positive, achievable, and tangible measure of human well-being and progress." The organization has designed a set of tools to measure peace around the world, including a Positive Peace Index, which provides a yearly snapshot of the level of positive peace—the attitudes, institutions, and social structures that create and sustain peaceful societies—around the globe. The index identifies factors that help to make societies resilient to economic, political, and environmental turmoil and more adaptable to a changing world.

Project, Papers, Please

• Designed by Lucas Pope

Global Building empathy is the goal of the game Papers, Please. Rather than playing as an elite international spy, gamers take on the persona of a low-level border agent for the fictional communist state of Arstotzka. Tasked with deciding who can enter the country or be turned away and/or arrested, players are dropped into a complex scenario of borders, power dynamics, administrative operations, and moral dilemmas. By shifting the perspective around these politicized issues, the game sheds light on immigration questions and builds empathy for those affected, a central aim in conflict resolution and peace education.

Project, Maps (Bullet Rug Series), 2013-present

• Designed by DETEXT
• Rug #40 (40 cal, USA): Courtesy of Juan Yarur Torres Collection, Fundación AMA Bullet Casing Markings: Courtesy of DETEXT

Colombia, Guatemala, Lebanon, Mexico, Spain, United States (countries where bullet casings have been collected) In the Maps series, Raúl Martínez gathers discarded bullet casings, weaving them by hand into shimmering rugs to tell hidden stories. Each casing is marked with a manufacturer’s code and country of origin and can thus be used to track international arms trafficking routes, backdoor diplomacy, and secret military interventions, exposing the complex economics that underpin gun violence. The first rug in the series, made of 9mm casings gathered in Guatemala, is stamped with marks from the United States, Russia, and Israel—the three main suppliers of weapons during the country’s civil war.

Project, Blue: The Architecture of UN Peace Missions, 2007-ongoing

• Designed by Malkit Shoshan

Mali, Liberia (field research) United Nations (UN) peacekeeping missions unfold across hundreds of conflict-affected regions around the world. For added security, the bases for these missions are engineered as self-sustaining islands, walled off from their surroundings. The BLUE research and design project reenvisions UN camps not as temporary and closed forts but catalysts for local development. The proposed redesigned bases would provide better access to basics like water and medical treatment, exchanges of knowledge and resources by creating dedicated facilities for local civilians, and a lasting legacy. The structures would be designed and built using local techniques so that the base could be integrated into the city after the mission leaves.

Project, Teeter-Totter Wall

• Designed by Ronald Rael
• Teeter-Totter: Courtesy of Ronald Rael and Virginia San Fratello

Anapra, Chihuahua, Mexico and Sunland Park, New Mexico, USA Two communities in Mexico and the United States, long separated by a border wall, came together to play on three oversized teeter-totters that spanned the US-Mexico border. The wall itself acted as a fulcrum for the teeter-totter installation. Echoing US-Mexico relations, movements and actions taken on one side of the border directly impacted the other, as children and adults alike enjoyed the see-saws. The installation temporarily transformed this small section of the border into a space of hope and elation, exposing the borderlands as a place where women and children live with dignity in spite of the xenophobia and violence perpetuated by the wall and its construction.

Project, The Chronic

• Designed by Chimurenga

Distribution: Brazil, Egypt, Finland, France, Germany, Kenya, Lesotho, Namibia, Netherlands, Nigeria, Rwanda, Senegal, South Africa, Sweden, Tanzania, Uganda, United Kingdom, United States, Zimbabwe The Chronic is a newspaper written by and for Africans. It was born out of an urgent need to write differently about Africa by exploring the complexities, innovations, thinking, and dreams found in its everyday life. Published by Chimurenga, a global platform for writing, art, and politics, The Chronic poses a series of provocations, with each edition based on a distinct theme. Interviews, essays, and exposés are intertwined with critical cartographies, photography, original comics, and illustrated stories, histories, and geographies. The newspaper’s accessible hand-drawn design offers evidence of the people telling and visualizing stories, and honors the reader’s curiosity and imagination.

Project, Conflict Kitchen

• Designed by Jon Rubin
• Food Wrappers: Courtesy of Jon Rubin and Dawn Weleski

Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA Conflict Kitchen, a takeout restaurant in Pittsburgh, served food from countries in conflict with the United States. From Afghanistan to Cuba, the Haudenosaunee Confederacy (an alliance of six Indigenous nations—the Mohawk, Oneida, Onondaga, Cayuga, Seneca, and Tuscarora), Iran, North Korea, Palestine, and Venezuela, the restaurant’s rotating identities included not only changes in menu, but events and performances, which offered further engagement with the cultures and issues at stake in those regions. Using food to bring people together, the kitchen encouraged learning and exchange, and ultimately confronted the limited and often biased understanding among people for the "other’s" culture.

Project, Island Tracker

• Designed by Center for Strategic and International Studies

East and South China Seas Island Tracker is an innovative, public-facing online tool, part of the Center’s Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative that uses easily attained commercial satellite imagery to record activity in the South China Seas—one of the world’s most disputed waterways. The Tracker documents artificial island building and construction projects, such as new airstrips and ports, in the almost 70 disputed reefs and islands to which China, Malaysia, the Philippines, Taiwan, and Vietnam lay claim. By increasing transparency in these remote locations, the tracker helps to prevent miscalculations and discourages assertive behavior, instead generating opportunities for collective actions that support regional stability.

Project, Social Emergency Response Centers

• Designed by Design Studio for Social Intervention
• SERC Prototype Sketch and How to Stop a Social Emergency Installation: Courtesy of Design Studio for Social Intervention

Canada, Serbia, United States (Arkansas, Connecticut, District of Columbia, Georgia, Illinois, Massachusetts, Mississippi, New Jersey, New Mexico, Oregon) 2016–present Social Emergency Response Centers (SERC) are pop- up workshops designed to help communities when they need them. Rather than responding to natural disasters like hurricanes, the centers were created to respond to social emergencies such as social injustices, oil spills, gentrification, and more. The team reimagines clear emergency procedures, like the "stop, drop, and roll" fire drill, asking participants to "STOP, look around, gather your people; DROP fear, anxiety, assumptions; let's ROLL, roll out new ideas, roll together...Co-led by activitsts and artists, SERCs aim to bring communities together to envision and build a stronger, more just democracy.

Project, Body Mapping

• Uvira Body Map: Courtesy of Jocelyn Kelly, Program on Gender, Rights and Resilience, Harvard Humanitarian Initiative

Democratic Republic of the Congo Body Mapping is a tool to help former child combatants—boys and girls that have been used and subjected to abuse and violence during a conflict— begin to heal and re-enter their communities. Together, the children with their family and community members illustrate various physical, psychological, and social effects of child soldiering on a life-sized outline of a human body. The body maps are filled with images and text about each participant’s experiences before, during, and after conflict. To spark conversations and contribute to the healing process, ten maps were made in seven communities within the Democratic Republic of the Congo, resulting in concrete recommendations.

Project , The Murder of Halit Yozgat

• Designed by Forensic Architecture

Original Incident: Kassel, Germany On 6 April 2006, 21-year-old Halit Yozgat was murdered in his family-run internet cafe in Kassel, Germany. His was the ninth of ten racist murders committed in Germany between 2000 and 2007 by a neo-Nazi group known as the National Socialist Underground (NSU). At the time of the killing Andreas Temme, an agent of the German domestic intelligence service (Verfassungsschutz), was present in the cafe. Temme claimed not to have witnessed the murder. Within the 77 square meters of the internet cafe, and the 9 minutes 26 seconds during which the incident unfolded, different actors—members of migrant communities, a state employee, and the murderers— were positioned in relation to each other in a manner yet to be made clear, but one whose implications bear great political significance. This unit of space and time stands as a microcosm of the social and political controversy known as the "NSU Complex." Commissioned by Unraveling the NSU Complex, a Germany-wide alliance of antiracist activists, Forensic Architecture’s investigation became possible when hundreds of documents from the Hessen police investigation of the murder—reports, witness depositions, photographs, and computer and phone logs—were leaked at the end of 2015.

Project, My Ancestors' Garden

• Designed by Hood Design Studio
• Water Feature Pavers: Courtesy of the International African American Museum

Charleston, South Carolina, USA My Ancestors’ Garden memorializes the port of entry for nearly half of all enslaved Africans brought to North America, where thousands of people were warehoused, sold, and many died. The landscape design for the International African American Museum exposes what had been erased—the former Gadsden’s Wharf location had never been marked—and now reveals truths that have been long obscured. The landscape design marks the watery terrain with the full-size outlines of bodies drawn in an abolitionists’ diagram of a packed slave ship and takes cues from "hush harbor" landscapes where enslaved Africans could meet freely and share stories and traditions from their homeland.

Project, The Adventures of Daly Graphic Novels

• Designed by Lab 619
• The Adventures of Daly Graphic Novel examples: Courtesy of Search for Common Ground

Tunisia The Adventures of Daly graphic novel campaign used comic books to counter extremist recruitment that targeted especially vulnerable Tunisian youth. Each comic, centered on a different character’s experience, was developed collaboratively with local teens who reviewed the graphics, stories, and dialogue; the comic then served as a launching point for discussions about creating alternative narratives to violence. The fictionalized accounts in the novels offered stories grounded in real experiences, resulting in authentic narratives that did not revolve around extremism but could address sensitive topics and real issues facing young people in Tunisia.

Project, Extinction Symbol

• Designed by ESP
• Extinction Symbol Protest Sign: Courtesy of Ward Ogden and Extinction Rebellion NYC

Global The Extinction Symbol was created to raise awareness of the need for transformative change in the face of an accelerating species extinction caused by humans. An unprecedented one million out of eight million plant and animal species are under threat. Designed to be easily drawn, recognized, reproduced, and understood, a circle signifies the planet and an hourglass sends an urgent warning that "time is running out" for many species. Used around the world, the symbol has become the visual identity for the growing Extinction Rebellion movement and the world’s "ecological symbol of peaceful resistance."

Project, Hate Speech Lexicons

• Designed by PeaceTech Lab

Cameroon, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ethiopia, Iraq, Kenya, Libya, Mombasa, Nigeria, South Africa, South Sudan, Sudan, Yemen An investigation by Iraqi journalists, who noticed the dangers of inflammatory language used in media coverage, led to the development of the Hate Speech Lexicons. These carefully researched guides include words, phrases, and examples of how and why certain words can cause strong and even violent reactions. With the rise of social media, PeaceTech Lab pioneered a process for identifying and contextualizing hate speech using machine learning, workshops, and interviews with local communities. The resulting lexicons, freely available online, offer alternative words and phrases that can be used to stop the spread of inflammatory language. A future lexicon focused on the United States is planned, once funded.

Project, World Peace Symbol

• Designed by Amijai Benderski
• Flag: Courtesy of Amijai Benderski

Montevideo, Uruguay An emerging graphic designer in Uruguay sought to create a universal symbol for peace that could be used freely by people around the world. Existing signs and symbols are linked with problematic meanings, a barrier to unconditional use by all. The V hand gesture signaled victory and resistance, the dove was also a religious symbol, and the 1960s counterculture peace sign was originally designed for a nuclear disarmament campaign. The World Peace Symbol fuses the iconic peace sign within a globe—a representation of our interconnected planet—with lines that connect and radiate from this symbolic ideal of freedom and goodwill.

Project, Paper Monuments

• Designed by Colloqate Design
• Public Proposals: Courtesy of the Ethel and Herman L. Midlo Center for New Orleans Studies at the University of New Orleans

New Orleans, Louisiana, USA Paper Monuments is a public art and history project created after the removal of US Civil War Confederate statues in New Orleans. Designed to elevate untold stories of the city and its inhabitants, particularly communities of color, the project began with an open call to residents to write and sketch monuments they wanted to see in their city. More than 1,200 public proposals were submitted, from people aged 3 to 78, which included a range of suggestions highlighting the city’s culture, displacements, and long-needed historical correctives, as well as expressions of deep love of the place and its people.

Project, Universal Declaration of Human Rights Posters

• Designed by Students and faculty, Designmatters, ArtCenter College of Design

Displays: France, United States The Universal Declaration of Human Rights was and is a groundbreaking document that proclaims all persons across the world are entitled to certain absolute rights and freedoms. A partnership between the United Nations and ArtCenter College of Design led to the creation of a series of posters illustrating the document’s ideals. Students across the school, from illustration and fine arts to graphic and product design, selected various articles to visualize, resulting in a powerful set of designs that remind us that the declaration’s global agreement is as relevant today as when it was first created in 1948.

Project, CONIFA

• Designed by Confederation of Independent Football Associations (CONIFA)
• CONIFA Team Badges: Courtesy of CONIFA Teams

Teams by region: Africa: Barawa, Barotseland, Biafra, Chagos Islands, Kabylia, Matabeleland, Somaliland, Western Sahara, Yoruba, Zanzibar; Asia: Arameans Suryoye, East Turkistan, Karen, Kurdistan, Lezghian, Panjab, Rohingya, Ryūkyū, Tamil Eelam, Tibet, United Koreans in Japan, Western Papua; Europe: Abkhazia, Artsakh, Chameria, Cornwall, County of Nice, Délvidék, Elba Island, Ellan Vannin, Felvidék, Franconia, Greenland, Jersey, Lazistan, Monaco, Northern Cyprus, Occitania, Padania, Raetia, Romani People, Sápmi, Sardinia, Sicily, Skåneland, South Ossetia, Székely Land, Two Sicilies, Western Armenia, Yorkshire; North America: Asociación Nationale de Balompié Mexicano, Cascadia, Kuskatan, Québec; Oceania: Australian First Nations Mariya, Hawai’i, Kiribati, Tuvalu; South America: Mapuche, Rapa Nui (dynamic list continues to evolve and includes current and former teams by the league’s regions) CONIFA is the second-largest football or soccer organization in the world. With more than 60 teams and some 675 million people represented, CONIFA is composed of minority groups, stateless peoples, and organizations that are not affiliated with the Fédération Internationale de Football Association (known globally as FIFA). Dedicated to inclusion and welfare through sport, CONIFA is politically neutral, but its games and tournaments provide opportunities for teams to elevate their cause on an international stage. With an aim to build bridges all over the world through friendship, culture, and sport, each player essentially acts as an ambassador for their people.

Project, Stalled!

• Designed by Joel Sanders Architecture (JSA)
• Cooper Hewitt Case Study Model: Courtesy of JSA/MIX Design

United States Public restrooms have been at the center of societal shifts for decades—the latest debate concerns transgender individuals using facilities that align with their gender identity. In response, Stalled!, an ongoing design and research initiative, considers the cultural, political, and historical aspects of restroom designs. By placing restrooms within broader discussions about who public spaces are designed for, working with experts from the humanities, law, medicine, and public health, the Stalled team is reimagining the relationship between people and the built environment. Their work focuses on designing safe, inclusive gathering places for people of different ages, genders, races, cultures, religions, and abilities.

Project, Astropolitics: Depletion of Terrestrial Resources and the Cosmic Future of Capitalism

• Designed by Bureau d'Etudes

Earth and Moon Bureau d’Études creates critical cartography—maps that examine contemporary political, social, and economic systems. The Astropolitics map exposes a potential conflict over Moon resource extraction, locating satellite systems, environmental and social crises linked to mining, and lunar bases and machines required for extraction. By making these systems visible, the map helps us consider our future. Like the 1967 Outer Space Treaty, which established use of space for peaceful purposes and the common interest of all, it calls on us again to reimagine the Earth, Moon, and other celestial bodies as interconnected places, not simply an endless cosmos ripe for exploitation.

Project, Regreening Africa

• Designed by World Agroforestry

Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Mali, Niger, Rwanda, Senegal, Somalia More than 80 percent of people living in sub-Saharan Africa are dependent on land, yet almost half of the land is degraded, making the soil vulnerable to droughts, storms, and nutrient deficiencies. This massive loss of productive land increases competition for dwindling resources, which can lead to migration and conflict. The Regreening Africa initiative was developed to meet this urgent challenge. Its mobile app tracks and disseminates local and scientific knowledge. Farmers can record and share their own proven regreening approaches and applied restoration efforts. Collected data is analyzed to adjust and optimize the sustainable practices underway.

Project, New World Summit - Rojava

• Designed by Democratic Self-Administration of Rojava (West Kurdistan)
• Installation: Courtesy of Sammlung Migros Museum für Gegenwartskunst, Zurich

Dêrik, Canton Cizîrê, Rojava New World Summit – Rojava consists of the design and construction of a new public parliament for the stateless government of Rojava in northern Syria—an alliance of Kurdish revolutionaries, Assyrians, and Arabs—and served as the location for an international summit that aimed to confront common crises through power and resource sharing with a diversity of peoples. Described by one of its revolutionary leaders as the "People’s Parliament of Rojava," the circular, open public forum embodies this new democracy’s foundational value of collective self-representation, not a separate space for elite representatives but one for all to gather, to imagine new worlds and bring them to life.

Print, Xylophone Wall/Muro de Xilófono, from the project Borderwall as Architecture

• Designed by Studio Rael San Fratello
• ink jet archival print on paper
• Museum purchase through the Smithsonian Latino Initiatives Pool, administered by the National Museum of the American Latino

Print, Horse Racing Wall/Muro de Carreras de Caballos, from the project Borderwall as Architecture

• Designed by Studio Rael San Fratello
• ink jet archival print on paper
• Museum purchase through the Smithsonian Latino Initiatives Pool, administered by the National Museum of the American Latino

Print, Wildlife Wall/Muro de Fauna, from the project Borderwall as Architecture

• Designed by Studio Rael San Fratello
• ink jet archival print on paper
• Museum purchase through the Smithsonian Latino Initiatives Pool, administered by the National Museum of the American Latino

Print, Cactus Wall/Muro de Pitayo Dulce, from the project Borderwall as Architecture

• Designed by Studio Rael San Fratello
• ink jet archival print on paper
• Museum purchase through the Smithsonian Latino Initiatives Pool, administered by the National Museum of the American Latino

Print, Teeter-Totter Wall/Muro de Subibaja, from the project Borderwall as Architecture

• Designed by Studio Rael San Fratello
• ink jet archival print on paper
• Museum purchase through the Smithsonian Latino Initiatives Pool, administered by the National Museum of the American Latino

Print, Greenhouse Wall/Muro de Invernadero, from the project Borderwall as Architecture

• Designed by Studio Rael San Fratello
• ink jet archival print on paper
• Museum purchase through the Smithsonian Latino Initiatives Pool, administered by the National Museum of the American Latino

Vase, Rare Earthenware Vase (Smartphone), 2014–2015

• Designed by Unknown Fields
• black stoneware, radioactive mine tailings
• Museum purchase from General Acquisitions Endowment Fund

Vase , Rare Earthenware Vase (Laptop), 2014–2015

• Designed by Unknown Fields
• black stoneware, radioactive mine tailings
• Museum purchase from General Acquisitions Endowment Fund

Vase, Rare Earthenware Vase (Electric Car Battery Cell), 2014–2015

• Designed by Unknown Fields
• black stoneware, radioactive mine tailings
• Museum purchase from General Acquisitions Endowment Fund