Design as Thinking: Not Here, Not Now
Dunne and Raby are well-known figures in the field of critical design. They both teach design and societal issues at The New School in New York and also serve as visiting professors at the China Academy of Art in Hangzhou. They have been working at the intersection of design, philosophy, and fiction for years. In a 2023 interview with ndion, they emphasised that they are no longer solely interested in speculative design, but in speculative thinking. They argue that design should not be bound by realistic expectations, but should help to make new realms of possibility visible. Their 2013 publication „Speculative Everything“ had already laid the groundwork for this approach, demonstrating that reality becomes more malleable the more we speculate. Ideas released through speculative design, they wrote, increase the chances of reaching a desirable future
With „Not Here, Not Now“, they continue this trajectory — this time with new depth. The book reads like a travelogue through imaginary worlds, where design is viewed as a means of thinking. This richly illustrated book not only documents imaginary archives, libraries, glossaries, taxonomies, lists, stories and essays, but also brings them into dialogue with one another.
The tone is serious, yet not without hope. The opening chapter soberly considers political, economic, and ecological disruptions, making clear that this is not about escapism. Instead, it is about taking the imaginary seriously as a resource, particularly in times of crisis.
„Writing about design at a time when in the West, we are experiencing a major reconfiguring of geopolitical power relations and a shift toward inward-looking nationalism; accelerating marketization of seemingly every aspect of life, including education; increasing environmental instability and uncertainty; the realization that our techno-utopia might in fact be a dystopia; and the appearance of significant cracks in a political and economic system that while generating vast wealth, has completely failed to ensure its fair distribution, it is hard to be optimistic. But we will try.“
Not Here, Not Now
Speculative Thought, Impossibility, and the Design Imagination
The MIT Press, Eds. Anthony Dunne, Fiona Raby
Hardcover | $39.95 | 2025 | 296 pages | ISBN: 978-0-262-04966-5