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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Brianna Sylver-Galvao

Founder and President, Sylver Consulting, LLC

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Brianna Sylver is the founder and President of Sylver Consulting, an international innovation research and strategy firm working at the intersection of market research, user experience, and business strategy. Since founding the firm, Sylver has partnered with Fortune 500 organizations including DHL, PepsiCo, Adobe, Southwest Airlines, and Marriott International to define clarity and purpose around their innovation and growth agendas.

Sylver is the author of Leading Through Free Fall: How Innovators Turn Turbulence into Trust, recognized by Forbes as a top read for senior leaders. Her work has been featured in Forbes, Inc., Fast Company, BusinessWeek, and HSM Management, and she has been recognized for her contributions to innovation and consumer insights by PDMA, QRCA, and HSM Management.

Brianna Sylver holds a Master of Design from the Institute of Design at Illinois Tech.

Featured work

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ID Researchers Demonstrate How Design Can Offer the Most Value to Organizations