Gert Jan Veldwisch (r.) at 4TU.Design United exhibition during DDW 2024. Photo Maud Staassen 4TU.Design United, the design collaborative venture uniting WUR with the design faculties at Delft, Eindhoven and Twente, recently got a new scientific director from Wageningen, Gert-Jan Veldwisch. He is hoping for more ‘design self-awareness’ at Wageningen.
Veldwisch, an assistant professor in Water, Society & Technology, was previously responsible for coordinating Wageningen’s contribution to 4TU.Design United for the Dutch Design Week. ‘In that context, I constantly saw and heard how skilled WUR is in design thinking. But it is as if we don’t really realize that at WUR itself. The role of design here is largely implicit, whereas there are so many great examples at Wageningen of design in research or education. Take the WUR Student Challenges, where design thinking is the main didactic principle.’
Call for Dutch Design Week
Veldwisch wants WUR to become more aware of this and to shine at the upcoming Dutch Design Week — from 18 to 26 October in Eindhoven — with appealing design-driven projects developed by staff or students. The call for the Design Week is open until 13 June. For further details, see the 4TU site. Last year, for example Arend van der Kam’s (Landscape Architecture) master project was featured in 4TU.Design United’s exhibition in the Klokgebouw, which, as more or less the heart of Dutch Design Week, is visited by tens of thousands of people.
