Prof. Dr. Gesche Joost

Gesche Joost has headed the Interactive Textiles research department since 2016 and has been Professor of Design Research at the Berlin University of the Arts since 2011, where she heads the Design Research Lab (www.drlab.de). Since 2017 she has been a member of the board of the Einstein Center Digital Future Berlin and of the Steering Committee of the Weizenbaum Institute for Networked Society, where she conducts research on digital sovereignty and manufacturer culture.

She is chairwoman of the German Society for Design Theory and Research and a member of the board of the Studienstiftung des Deutschen Volkes. From 2014 to 2018, she was the Federal Government's Internet Ambassador to the European Commission. She is a member of the Synod of the Evangelical Church in Germany (EKD) and the Goethe-Institut. In 2016, she founded Calliope gGmbH, which offers digital learning to children from the third grade onwards.