The Center for Design’s annual Design Research Week will return this spring, from March 16-22, 2026.

Design Research Week is a weeklong event that showcases design-led research projects and initiatives. Keynotes, panels, workshops, exhibitions and more connect Northeastern’s research community with external stakeholders, partners and guests across the design ecosystem in the Boston area and beyond.

For this edition, the program will be organized around an overarching theme: Performing Futures. In addition, each day will have an engaging schedule to fit these themes: Health + Wellness, CAMD Day, Media + Play, Tech + Performance and Art + Process.

To close out the week, the Center for Design will partner with Scout, a student-led design organization, for its annual conference, Interventions: Entangle. The partnership will encompass the launch of a two-day designathon and sponsorship of the conference.

View the full program here.

Design Research Week 2026 would not be possible without the valuable partnerships of the Center for the Arts, the Center for Transformative Media, the CoDesign Collaborative, the Communication Studies Department, the Department of Art + Design, the Department of Music, the Department of Theatre, Gallery 360, the School of Architecture, the School of Journalism, Scout and more.