Convenor
Convenor's affiliation
Cristina Ledro
University of Padova
Co-convenors
Siriat Sae Lim, Clara Filosa, Anna Nosella
Abstract
In an era of accelerating technological disruption, the intersection of creativity and resilience has become a defining capability for sustainable innovation. Eco-design (or design for environment) represents a crucial bridge between these imperatives, driving both environmental stewardship and adaptive renewal. This track explores how creative and inclusive design approaches, data-driven, supported by digital technologies such as digital twins, artificial intelligence, and data analytics, enable resilient pathways toward sustainability across product, organizational, and ecosystem levels.
We invite scholars and practitioners to share theoretical, methodological, and empirical insights into how eco-design practices enable sustainable transitions in volatile, uncertain, and digitally mediated contexts. Contributions may address:
• creative processes that foster resilience within eco-design,
• digital tools that integrate lifecycle intelligence, and/or
• frameworks that connect design thinking with responsible and regenerative innovation.
By emphasizing the synergy between creative capability and technological disruption, this track seeks to highlight eco-design as a platform for reimagining circularity, adaptability, and sustainability across industries and societies.
Description
Eco-design, also known as design for environment, integrates sustainability considerations throughout the entire product life cycle, embedding environmental intelligence at the earliest design stages (Vernier, 2024). By doing so, it provides a methodological and ethical foundation for circular and regenerative innovation (Mendoza et al., 2017). However, the pursuit of eco-design in an era of disruption demands not only technical optimization but also creative exploration and systemic resilience. Creativity drives adaptive problem-solving and fosters new aesthetic and systemic visions for sustainability. When design thinking integrates responsibility, participation, and digital fluency, it empowers teams to develop innovations that are not only sustainable but also resilient to disruption (Baldassarre et al., 2024). External pressures, such as evolving legislation, consumer expectations, and socio-environmental volatility, converge with internal drivers like digital transformation and the search for competitive advantage. Firms must balance these dynamics while facing challenges such as cost constraints, supply chain complexity, and cultural inertia.
Recent advances in digital technologies — especially artificial intelligence, digital twins, and generative design tools — are reshaping eco-design as a creative experimentation space. These technologies enable rapid simulation, real-time feedback, and multi-scenario analysis, empowering designers to explore resilient solutions that integrate environmental, social, and economic perspectives. Digital twin–driven design, for instance, merges cyber-physical data and lifecycle analytics to guide smarter and more adaptable decisions throughout the product-service system (Tao et al., 2018).
This track therefore positions eco-design as both a creative laboratory and a resilience-building mechanism, an integrative platform where digital intelligence, human imagination, and ethical responsibility converge. It seeks to explore how such integration enables organizations to navigate turbulence, regenerate value, and create sustainable futures.
We welcome conceptual, methodological, and applied contributions, including but not limited to:
• Case studies of eco-design practices that demonstrate creative resilience in the face of technological disruption
• Frameworks integrating eco-design principles with Design-Driven Innovation (DDI) and resilience-oriented design thinking
• Innovative applications of AI, digital twins, and data analytics in sustainable and adaptive product development
• Generative design and creativity-support systems for sustainability and circularity
• Inclusive co-design methodologies for resilient and equitable innovation
• Business models and ecosystems enabled by digitalized eco-design
• Ethical, societal, and governance considerations in technology-assisted sustainable design
• Impact of eco-design practices on circularity and organizational adaptability
• Strategies for strengthening resilience through digital, creative, and sustainable design integration
By aligning eco-design with the 2026 conference theme, this track underscores how creativity and resilience can together redefine sustainability in an age of technological disruption. It invites scholars, practitioners, and policy makers to envision eco-design not merely as a technical practice but as a transformative mindset, one that reimagines how innovation, technology, and ethics can co-evolve toward a sustainable and resilient future.