SDSI Open #3, the annual hybrid conference of the Erasmus Mundus Master’s in Service Design Strategies and Innovations (SDSI), brought together designers, public servants, students, and educators in Kuldīga (Latvia), and online under the theme: “Futures in Place: Designing with Systems, Communities, and Care”.  Hosted at Adatu Fabrika, the event explored how design can shape futures that are grounded, just, and regenerative.

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Keynote speakers challenged participants not only to design for the future but to design from it:

• Jānis Ķinasts (Latvia’s State Chancellery Innovation Lab) shared how his six-person civic design team cultivates “relational environments” for public innovation.
• Alessandra Molderings-Enriconi (denkwerk) highlighted design’s complicity in systemic crises and urged shifting from disruption to regeneration and long-term care.
• Alicia Shao (Köln International School of Design) took the audience to Mars to imagine futures unconstrained by today’s assumptions, calling futures thinking “a flashlight into the dark.”
• Zeynep Falay von Flittner (Falay Transition Design) shared her think tank’s Futures Prototyping approach, making regenerative futures tangible through immersive storytelling and citizen participation.

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The event also featured Kuldīga 2050 Summer School’s winning concept - a vision of the town as a slow-living hub where time becomes a community currency - and a heartfelt reflection from the SDSI cohort 2024-2026, celebrating the power of play, community, and place in service design learning.

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Read the full conference recap on LinkedIn here.
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Watch the full video recording of the conference on Youtube here.