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Institute of Design (ID)

@iitdesign

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Design systems, lead change, shape the future at the only design school in the US devoted exclusively to graduate study.

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📍Say hello to our host for the month: IIT Institute of Design

IIT Institute of Design (ID) is the largest graduate design school in the US, focusing on research and strategy. Tackling issues like digital learning and patient-centric healthcare, ID offers MDes, MDes/MBA, PhD, and part-time MDM programs. Discover more at www.id.iit.edu.  Parking & Transportation:

🚗 Parking

Street: Metered and open street parking is available along Federal Street and surrounding campus roads.

🚇 CTA Transit

‘L’ Lines: Take the Green Line to the 35th-Bronzeville-IIT station right on campus, or the Red Line to the Sox-35th station one block west.

Bus: The #29 (State) and #35 (31st/35th) routes stop directly adjacent to campus. Event Details:  📅 Date: Friday, July 31st ⏰ Time: 8:30 – 10:00 AM 🏢 Location: IIT Institute of Design | 3137 S Federal St, Chicago, IL 60616 🎟️ Registration opens Friday, July 25th! by @iitdesign

To all the recent grads out there: my wish for you isn't that you find a “great job.”

My wish is that you find expansion.

Those words capped off my Alumni Commencement Speech at the @iitdesign at @illinoistech in May 2026. They sum up my philosophy on work.

✨ I hope you find the courage to say “No” to the roles that make you feel small, even when the world tells you to be grateful for the paycheck.

✨ I hope you trust that your “superpowers” are not just lines on a resume, but gifts meant to change the teams you join.

✨ And most of all, I hope you realize that the most important “design project” you will ever work on is the life you are building.

When I started out in my career, I made some bold, unconventional moves. People very vocally told me I was doing it wrong—that I was throwing away the “great jobs” being presented to me.

But I knew differently.

How? My body was telling me. It’s my compass.

➤ Feelings of expansion nudge me to explore a new path or opportunity.
➤ Feelings of constriction tell me when to retreat.

Here’s the truth: “great jobs”—they are NOT all equal.

➤ You can have a “great job” that sucks the soul out of you. Or one that fills your cup with curiosity, creativity, and excitement.

➤ You can have a “great job” where you feel taken advantage of. Or one where you genuinely enjoy the people you collaborate with daily.

➤ You can chase external tokens of validation (titles, promotions, paychecks, cars). Or you can measure your success by the impacts you have on others.

It’s easy to get swept up in the "shoulds" and lose yourself in the “great job” that doesn’t turn out to be so great.

Be vigilant as you assess each opportunity. Be intentional with your life’s design. Pay attention to when you feel expanded and when you feel constricted.

👉 I share more of my personal story—and the bold, unconventional moves I made in my early career—in this write-up from ID IIT (LINKTREE IN BIO).

For now, I want to leave you with a reflection…

Which way is your compass pointing right now? Are you choosing expansion, or are you playing it safe and settling for constriction? by @iitdesign

What happens to a teacher's knowledge after they're gone?

Charles Owen spent four decades at ID developing rigorous systems thinking methods—frameworks that transformed how designers approach complexity. When he passed in 2019, his work moved into archives, accessible only to those who knew what to look for.

Until now.

Anurag Duddu (MDes 2025) @anuragduddu has now created AskChuck, an AI tool that makes Owen's methodology conversational. It transforms 20 academic papers, 176 pages of frameworks, and 70+ diagrams into a queryable system that returns exact citations.

Learn how Anurag took a rigorous approach to using AI, and created AskChuck to serve future generations.

Link to "Our Work" in our bio to learn more about this project.

#AI #DesignEducation #SystemsDesign #CharlesOwen #DesignLeadership #Innovation by @iitdesign

Don't miss conversations like this.

“Organizations need designers now more than ever.” Luca Gonnelli @l_isforluca , at our 8th annual Lucas J. Daniel Lecture in Sustainable Systems.

As execution is increasingly automated, more and more designers are moving from making pixels to architecting systems. Designers’ roles are evolving, as always.

Events like this happen regularly at ID. Conversations that challenge, inspire, and prepare you for the work ahead.

Don't miss the next one. Sign up for our email list to stay connected to the ideas, speakers, and moments that matter. Link in bio

Thanks to Zach Pino, Tomoko Ichikawa, Luca Gonnelli @l_isforluca , @illotv , @algo.tv , David Stone @simplydg , and @aigachicago for making this event possible.

#DesignLeadership #DataViz #DesignEducation #AI #SystemsDesign by @iitdesign

In 1997, the @chicagotribune profiled a photographer searching for "America the Beautiful." Twenty-nine years later, as the US turns 250, his photographs ask the same question in a different light.

David Plowden spent 75 years photographing a vanishing United States—grain elevators, freight trains, dying Main Streets. He died May 4, 2026, at 93. That same day, his exhibition "David Plowden's Iowa" opened @siouxcityart.

"The fact that the demise of the steam locomotive and the beginning of my career occurred simultaneously was a coincidence that determined the course of my life," Plowden wrote.

In 1978, he joined ID as faculty, continuing a tradition—dating to László Moholy-Nagy's founding—that treated the camera as an instrument of seeing, not just recording. His work endures in the students he taught and in the permanent collections of the @artinstitutechi, the @librarycongress, the @smithsonian , and Yale's @beineckelibrary

What will America look like in another 250 years—and who will look closely enough to notice?

To read more about David, follow the News & Stories link in our bio.

#Photography #AmericanLandscape #USA250 by @iitdesign

From craft to systems. From execution to strategy. From design to AI.

ID alum Tanvi Waghray @tanviiiiiiiiiii (MDes 2025) is now an Experience Designer at @grainger, designing AI-powered tools that support thousands of call center team members every day. Her work sits at the intersection of AI, interaction design, and workflow strategy—figuring out how humans and intelligent systems can work together with clarity and confidence.

"I realized I wanted to go deeper, not just execute on design, but understand the strategic systems underneath it," Tanvi said about why she came to ID.

This is what ID prepares you for: not just solving today's problems, but designing for tomorrow's challenges.

Read Tanvi's full story about how ID prepared her to design for AI by clicking our "News & Stories" link in our bio.

#DesignCareer #AI #ExperienceDesign #IDAlumni #HumanCenteredDesign #SystemsThinking #DesignLeadership. by @iitdesign

The American Hospital Association (@ahahospitals) recognized @uchicago Medicine's Hospital-at-Home program as a national model.

ID’s Equitable Healthcare Lab, led by Kim Erwin, partnered with UChicago Medicine to reimagine hospital-quality care in the home. Engaging 85+ patients, providers, and community members, they built equity into the system from the start.

The result: a comprehensive service blueprint, patient education materials, and an Equity Roadmap—all grounded in what patients and families actually need.

When equity is in the infrastructure, we can transform healthcare.

To read more, click on the "News & Stories" link in our bio.

#Healthcare #Equity #HealthcareInnovation #UChicagoMedicine #HealthEquity by @iitdesign

20+ Papers. 10+ Disciplines. One School.

From @harvard_business_review to the @designresearchsoc, clinical journals, and beyond—ID faculty and students demonstrated design as a rigorous mode of inquiry for addressing complex problems across healthcare, food systems, behavioral policy, and more.

This is what happens when we move beyond disciplines and into real-world impact.

Read the full story of how ID researchers are advancing systemic change through the "News & Stories" link in our bio.

#DesignResearch #SystemsDesign #Healthcare #Policy #DesignLeadership by @iitdesign

Autonomous robots are already on our sidewalks. So how do we design trust between humans and machines?

Shreya Mathur @small_sage (MDes 2026) built a framework to answer that question—and @core77 just recognized it.

Her project, "Crossing Paths: When Human-Centered Frameworks Are No Longer Enough," goes beyond imagining the future. It intervenes in it. Using behavioral systems design, social research, and data analysis, Mathur created actionable principles that product teams can apply today.

Discover how the ID community @illinoistech designs for the futures that are already arriving.
Find the full article with the "News & Stories" link in our bio.

#DesignAwards #SpeculativeDesign #Core77 #DesignResearch #DesignLeadership #SystemsDesign #GraduateDesign by @iitdesign

This Chicago Design Week, the Institute of Design reflects on a milestone: 77 years since our affiliation with the Illinois Institute of Technology @illinoistech.

Our story begins with the Bauhaus—a movement that united art, craft, and technology and believed that design was for everyone. After Nazi authorities closed the Bauhaus in 1933, László Moholy-Nagy brought those ideals to Chicago, founding The New Bauhaus in 1937.

ID's affiliation with Illinois Tech in 1949 represented a commitment to scale and sustain that vision.

77 years later, that vision still drives us. In every Foundation student who enters without a design background. In every graduate who goes on to reshape industries, lead organizations, and design more equitable futures. In every problem we frame, every question we ask, every system we reimagine—it all traces back to that original idea that artists, technologists, and systems thinkers can—and should—work together to build harmonious futures.

From our Foundation program (rooted in Moholy's "preliminary course") to our graduate students who go on to lead organizations and reshape industries, ID continues the Bauhaus legacy: democratizing design, welcoming diverse perspectives, and proving that design belongs everywhere.

As Chicago Design Week celebrates our city's creative spirit, we're honored to be part of the story—and committed to evolving it.

#ChicagoDesignWeek #DesignLeadership #Bauhaus #DesignEducation #Innovation #ThrowbackThursday by @iitdesign

She had just three months and $200 to figure out her life. 23 years later, she is:

• President of Sylver Consulting @sylverconsulting, a global innovation research and strategy firm she built from the ground up;
• A trusted advisor to @fortune500 companies;
• Author of Leading Through Free Fall, according to @forbes : "a blueprint for leaders seeking to turn chaos into competitive advantage”

ID alum Brianna Sylver (MDes 2003) @briannasylver_ didn't become who she is today despite the uncertainty she faced after graduation. She became who she is because of what ID taught her.

Here, you master a design approach: through methods, mindset, and making. More importantly, you learn leadership: how to navigate uncertainty, build organizations, and shape futures.

Learn more about Brianna's path—and discover what's possible after graduate school in design. Follow the "News & Stories" link in our bio.

#DesignLeadership #Careers #HumanCenteredDesign #HCD #Education #Innovation by @iitdesign

@firstflight23 , and I attended @iitdesign to discuss “Designing through complexity for enterprise leaders” using a simple human centered quadrant of understand/make and abstract/concrete as a sandbox to understand “what is” with “what could be.” Thank you to @bynumtony and @alexschulko for being our guides. by @iitdesign