Advancing Africa Through
Design and Technology

The Africa Center for Design Research (ACDR) is a research-driven creative institution exploring the intersection of design, technology, culture, and human experience. We exist to challenge conventional thinking, expand the possibilities of creative practice, and empower a new generation of designers, researchers, and innovators to address the questions shaping our world. We believe design is more than the creation of visual artefacts. It is a way of investigating problems, questioning established systems, preserving cultural knowledge, and imagining better futures. Through computational design, African visual culture, animation and interactive storytelling, and inclusive technology, ACDR brings creative inquiry and technical experimentation together to explore what design can become.

Our work is grounded in the conviction that Africa must be an active contributor to the knowledge, technologies, and creative systems shaping the future—not simply a consumer of ideas developed elsewhere. We seek to create space for African perspectives, emerging technologies, interdisciplinary collaboration, and original research to inform new approaches to design and innovation. At ACDR, curiosity becomes investigation, research becomes experimentation, and ideas become opportunities for meaningful change. By connecting creative practice with critical thinking and technological capability, we aim to advance knowledge, nurture talent, and contribute to a more inclusive and culturally grounded creative future.