Anab is a designer, futurist, filmmaker and educator. As Co-founder and Director of Superflux, she catalyses our Studio’s mission to leave a meaningful legacy for our planet and its future custodians.

Anab grew up in Ahmedabad, Gujarat, India within the entangled postcolonial landscapes of a fast-growing nation. After studying filmmaking at the National Institute of Design she moved to London to gain her Masters at the Royal College of Art, and went on to work on machine intelligence at Microsoft Research, Cambridge. 

In 2009, Anab, with Jon Ardern, co-founded Superflux, a design, research and futures practice. Superflux work with businesses, cultural institutions, academic partners and government bodies to adapt and innovate through periods of uncertainty and change, and build more just futures. In our 15th year, Superflux has received the Design Studio of the Year Award in recognition of our “contribution to the fields of speculative and futures design with a committed social mission.” 

Anab is a globally recognised thought leader renowned for her pioneering work on design-led foresight, emerging technologies, more-than human and ecological thinking. She has been awarded an Honorary Doctorate from the University of the Arts, London, with the citation “A philosopher for our age, her concepts of ‘design for the new normal’ and ‘more-than-human centered design’ are expanding the public’s imagination, and making possible futures tangible.”

Over the years, Anab has is responsible for presenting key ideas to the world, such as Design for the New Normal (2012), More-than-Human-Centred Design (2018) and Ancillary Design (2022)

In 2022, Anab was awarded the prestigious ‘Royal Designers for Industry’ (RDI) Award, by UK’s Royal Society of Arts, in speculative design.  The title ‘Royal Designer for Industry’ (RDI) is the highest accolade for designers in the UK. Only 200 designers, who have achieved “sustained design excellence, work of aesthetic value and significant benefit to society” can hold the title.

Anab is also the recipient of the Award of Excellence ICSID, UNESCO Digital Arts Award, and Grand Prix Geneva Human Rights Festival, as well as awards from Apple and the UK Government’s Innovation Department. Her work has been exhibited at MoMA New York, V&A Museum, Science Gallery Dublin, National Museum of China, Vitra Design Museum, and Tate Modern.

Anab has delivered talks and keynotes at several conferences including TED, Skoll World Forum, Human Rights Watch, MIT Media Lab, NEXT, LIFT, Global Design Forum, and FuturEverything. Recent talks include Why We Need to Imagine Different Futures, More Than-Human Centered Design, Design for the New Normal, Valley of the Meatpuppets and How Will We Live. 

In addition, Anab serves as Professor of Design Investigations at the dieAngewandte, University of Applied Arts in Vienna since 2016. Her hope is to instil a culture of radical enquiry in her students, so they can become active designers-translators-catalysts for a complex and uncertain world.

Recent Interviews:  

BBC Radio 4 | Is ‘feeling’ the future the solution to climate change inaction?

NPR | TED Radio Hour | Can a glimpse of tomorrow change our decisions today

Financial Times | Superflux: the duo inspiring change through hypothetical worlds

Spearheading a new position for design | Damn Magazine

8 Women in STEM who are changing the game

Start the Week, BBC Radio 4

Evening Standard

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