Lab4Living: design for life and for living

In 2019, the interdisciplinary research centre, Lab4Living was awarded over £4 million by Research England in recognition of its excellence in design-led research. This award has enabled us to produce world-leading research around the themes of the 100-year life and the Future Home.

We have:

• Extended the disciplinary research base of the team
• Nurtured the next generation of early career researchers and research leaders working in the space of design for health
• Re-imagined what a design research space is and developed an accessible creative hub where we can work with the community, test and showcase our work
• Developed new models of knowledge translation and pathways to impact to increase the permeability of research across disciplines and sectors 
• Expanded and consolidated our international partnerships through the creation of a global network

Lab4Living is an interdisciplinary research group, based on a collaborative community of researchers in design, healthcare and creative practices. We work together to address real world issues that impact on health and wellbeing, developing products, services and interventions that promote dignity and enhance quality of life.

Set up in 2007, Lab4Living is one of the longest-established living labs in Europe and is based at Sheffield Hallam University. Our work has spanned more than 150 research projects and has included collaborations in over 80 academic, hospital and community organisations in over 15 countries.

Lab4Living creates opportunities to share work and bring the wider design and health community together through a regular series of events and publications. We established the international Design4Health conferences in 2011. More recently, we have worked with leading published Taylor & Francis to launch a new international refereed journal, Design For Health.

Read more about us, view our specially curated collections of projects, or take an interactive tour of our space in the heart of Sheffield city centre.