In 2026, after nearly 90 years, the Institute of Design was folded into Illinois Tech's School of Design & Society.
This website is an archive of the impactful and inspirational work produced by the ID community before that transition.

László Moholy-Nagy opened the New Bauhaus in Chicago in 1937, treating design as a discipline that was teachable, testable, and consequential. Nine decades on, its scope had widened from the things people use to the systems they depend on: hospitals, government agencies, classrooms, supply chains, digital platforms. Along the way, ID community members developed the published research, methods, and frameworks that designers rely on every day.

Chief among them is human-centered design: close attention to how people actually live, and advocacy for what that research reveals. It shaped designers who are comfortable with complexity and ambiguity: curious, rigorous, inclusive, and stubbornly optimistic about design's ability to change the systems that shape our lives.

To every one of them, who taught, studied, built, critiqued, and stayed late in the studio: thank you, and keep designing.

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Ben Jacobson

Partner, Conifer Research

Ben Jacobson

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Ben Jacobson teaches Behavioral Observation and other courses as an Adjunct Faculty member at the Institute of Design (ID). He has more than 20 years of consulting experience helping clients develop innovative products, services, and business models from a user-centered perspective. Ben’s strengths lie in developing new approaches to gathering critical insights about everyday user behaviors and working with interdisciplinary teams to invent better user experiences and successful corporate strategies.

He has a bachelor’s degree in behavioral sciences and a master’s in social sciences from the University of Chicago, as well as a master’s degree in cultural anthropology from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Industry Experience

Ben founded Conifer Research in 2001 with a mission to produce evergreen research systems and knowledge bases that leverage the enormous potential of ethnographic research. Conifer specializes in delivering new insights in response to tough challenges, framing research questions and customizing data collection efforts to provide the breadth and depth needed to generate meaningful insights.

The company’s team of independent thinkers come from a variety of disciplines including anthropology, sociology, psychology, design, strategy, journalism and the fine arts. Their work includes research planning, fieldwork, data analysis, writing, information modeling, video production, facilitation, and prototyping. Ultimately, Conifer Research delivers user insights that shape the development of new strategies, products, services, and messages.

Publishing

Ben’s articles include “Why Design Research?” (2019).

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Introduction to Observing Users