WDC-Campus

Exhibition: dreams, ideas & prototypes

The extensive exhibition dreams, ideas & prototypes covers over 1,200qm at the Museum Angewandte Kunst and its outdoor areas, showcasing more than 100 works by emerging talents in design and architecture, as well as researchers from other fields. A special focus is placed on interdisciplinary collaboration across diverse academic sectors.

The exhibition was curated by designers Julia Klass and Corinna Gratzl from the WDC Campus team. The core concept behind their curation is to frame the exhibition as an interactive, social experience and a circular project. This means minimising the use of new materials and returning as many elements as possible into material cycles after the event. The exhibition's layout is based on a modular scaffolding system designed for reuse and adaptability. Furthermore, the WDC Campus team is collaborating with initiatives like "Material für Alle" to repurpose existing materials and extend their lifespan. In this way, the concept of the circular economy is not just discussed but directly put into practice through exhibition design.

The exhibition is divided into 5 areas, each addressing questions of great social importance:

Connection & Community
How can decision-making be made transparent and participation attractive? Democracy in everyday life opens up opportunities to shape the future together.

Health & Care
What does a good life look like when health is self-determined and care is approached from a social perspective?

Sustainability & Environment
How do we shape a future that preserves resources and approaches responsibility with a long-term vision?

Spaces & Inclusion
How do we want to build, live, and connect with one another? What kinds of spaces enable interaction, inclusion, and a sense of neighbourhood?

Movement & Mobility
How will we move in the future to ensure more people stay connected? Mobility is social infrastructure.

What will be on display?

Projects by students, universities, and international institutions form the core of the exhibition. It features numerous premieres: works specially developed for the WDC Campus by participating partner universities, supplemented by outstanding projects from national and international educational institutions. In addition, award-winning works from Germany’s most prestigious design accolades will be presented under one roof for the very first time.

The exhibition is rounded off by themed areas where the work of students enters into a dialogue with projects by established designers. Contributors include Ineke Hans, Tobias Trübenbacher, Andreas Mühlenbehrend, Nico Munkler, Sebastian Oschatz, Peter Eckart, and Kai Vöckler. Their projects tackle topics such as Artificial Intelligence, multimodal mobility, medical technology, and bio-based building materials. This demonstrates how ideas born during university studies can be developed further, transferred into practice, and turned into tangible solutions for social and economic challenges.