Running a workshop is one of the toughest formats to do. My inspiration for Design Lab came from a brand workshop by OMSE at POV Budapest. I wanted a space for designers to just create, with no set topic, few boundaries, and very little time, plus one twist: contrast.

Every format I run shares the same foundation: openness, sharing, creativity. What sets each one apart is a single idea at its center. Design Circles is about controversy, Behind the Design is built on imperfection, and Design Lab is about contrast. Two groups, each defending their point of view, like the first session that put minimalists against maximalists. But that's too easy. Give a minimalist a minimal brief and they feel at home. So there's a twist: the roles switch. Minimalists work on maximalist design, and vice versa.

I love putting people on the spot, in a good way. I believe it's the best way to make people produce something new, something they'd never create otherwise. So my recipe for Design Lab is an unknown style paired with a tight constraint: 60 minutes to make a website, branding, a poster, an illustration, or 3D.

I also love when people share and learn from each other. So Design Lab isn't only about designing, it's about sharing too, going around the circle where everyone briefly tells the group what they made.

I set the rules knowing they might be too tough. That was a deliberate bet, and it paid off. Twenty designers showed up and pushed themselves, and the work that came out of that pressure was better than I expected. One person liked their piece enough to put it in their portfolio. Three others posted about the session on LinkedIn without being asked. It scored 4.9 out of 5 from those who rated it.

The strength of the format isn't only the contrast and urgency, but the simplicity. No specific tasks. No long specs. No cameras or streaming. And relatively no pressure. I see it as a sanctuary for designers to escape the everyday hustle. Most of us work 9 to 5, delivering one design after another, with little space or energy to experiment, to try something we'd never get to use on a client project. So in the end, Design Lab is just a space to let go of the box we usually work in and break it open.

This was the first run, and I'm treating it as a pilot, refining the brief, the timing, and the contrast pairings from here.