Who needs design? Does it still make sense to talk about, reflect on, and invest in interior design projects? What role will architects, designers, and developers play in the near or immediate future? Personally, I do not believe a “threat” will come from AI: I remain a fervent believer and advocate of human error, imperfection, and doubt – namely, the true engines of creativity and human ingenuity. Hey, robot, step aside! I also believe that all evolutionary processes need new tools, new ‘weapons’, and new lenses to focus on the cultural, social, and economic transformations around us. AI has entered the world of design, and it will always be a faithful ally, a device that will enhance our capabilities, a smart tool that (hopefully) will help us take a new leap forward.

At the same time, I do not believe that the radical transformations underway in the world order can distract us from the ‘genetic mutation’ process that society and our cities have embarked on. Of course, we are increasingly confronted with the widespread inability to look beyond our small plots of land, losing sight of great opportunities to imagine and build a better world to live in. We have underestimated the dangers of economic and industrial progress, and now the Western world is clumsily trying to remedy this by imposing new post-industrial rules on all other continents. And it does so even though in many corners of the Earth, industry has not arrived – or, if it has, it is creating armies of slaves who work for $50 a month (almost always for the benefit of aforementioned Western world).

Yet, an epochal change is already underway beneath the skin of the novel generations, and the direction seems very clear: the rejection of the logic that has governed the world so far manifests itself in the small things rather than in big demonstrations or mass gatherings around the leaders of the moment. Youngest creatives have decreed certain values as non-negotiable, which translate into concrete actions: a plastic-free world, a reuse and recycling economy, respect for social rights, and increasingly planet- and animal-friendly food choices. And then, a set of daily actions that excludes private mobility, ownership of a car, a bicycle, or a scooter, in favour of the mantra of sharing; lastly, the disappearance of cash. Have you tried talking to an eleven-year-old, a fifteen-year-old, a university student, or a twenty-year-old girl working two jobs to pay for studies? Sure, they may be minorities or exceptions, but I believe their world has already changed, and we all have a duty, this once, to see it in time.

Therefore, I return to the initial question: what will design be for? In my opinion, architects, designers, and developers have and will continue to have a crucial role in contributing (not hypocritically, not pessimistically, not overly optimistically, not brazenly) to guiding the change. Starting from interior spaces, passing through public architecture and landscape projects, they represent the vital container within which the younger generations (together with others) can and must bring about change. And designers will have to accompany this.

Yes, but how?

By starting again from what is already taken for granted today: a radically sustainable approach to design and architecture, a new sensitivity towards what exists, which will need to be ‘cared for’ and repaired – Renzo Piano’s slogan of urban mending, I hope, will become a new mantra. And again, flexibility and adaptability as essential guiding principles, and, why not, ornamentation, decoration. Let me say it: Beauty.

Not necessarily the expensive, not the speculative, not the blatant opulence, not hedonism, not selfishness. Ornament is no longer a crime! Let us reclaim Adolf Loos’ message, which is far from obvious: designers and thus design can and will be able to help the new society point to ugliness, destruction, the concrete skeletons along coasts and in the countryside, the asphalted parking lots surrounding desolate and desolating shopping malls, as the true crime. Destruction erases civitas, wipes out respect and education between people. What is needed is not tolerance but knowledge. Design has a prosperous future ahead if it can seize this great opportunity and understand the task still in its hands: let’s create schools, dormitories, senior housing, homes, parks, and squares. But also, stations, shopping centres, and airports. For people, for future generations, for the community. With decorum and ornament, for beauty and for a new cheerful, vibrant, and human postmodernism.