Ellie Horwood
Design for
Health and Wellbeing, Speculative futures, Stronger Civil Society
Year
2019-2020
With an undergraduate in human geography and a professional background in marketing, Ellie is an inter-disciplinarian passionate about issues of social and environmental change. Ellie is interested in human-centered and participatory design approaches as well as the use of creative methodologies in provoking thought and behavioural change.
Ellie believes in an ontological approach to design (advocated by Arturo Escobar and others); where design is always a conversation about possibility and the structures of possibility. And where, the big question of design is encountered in recognising that in designing tools, products and services, we are also – designing ways of being.
Passionate about the potential of design to effect positive change, Ellie seeks to remember that design is not apolitical, nor is it always unproblematic. Through Ellie’s eyes, design extends far beyond the remit of professional designers. Design is everywhere and for everyone.
Insight
What is your favourite part of the D4C programme?
Mind-opening conversation and discussion, which prompts you to see the world differently through your own eyes but also through the eyes of others. Design For Change forces you to ask, honestly, of yourself: “What are the changes I want to see in this world and what am I going to do about it?”.
One book or reading recommendation?
Ann Heylighen & Andy Dong (2019) “To empathise or not to empathise?: Empathy and its limits in design”. Design Studies, 65: 107-124. A thought-provoking quick read which critically examines how empathy has too often been problematically positioned as a design ideology.
Where are you working?
Ellie is working as Digital Marketing Manager at the Charities Aid Foundation (CAF). CAF is committed to supporting the power of giving and assists donors, philanthropists, companies and charities to amplify their on the ground impact and to grow engagement with communities and beneficiaries across the UK. Ellie is excited to bring her marketing skillset to CAF, a charitable organisation, which she sees as a ‘big change facilitator’ in civil society.
