Editorial: Designing Proximities

Proximity, we feel, is not a concept that has been explored in-depth, in design research. Now in the post-pandemic era, with the further acceleration of information and communication tech-nology (ICT) transforming our tools for connecting over distance, notions of proximity are in-creasingly challenged. Coupled with the complexity of societal problems, the so-called ‘systemic turn’ in design, as well as an awakening to the importance of multi-stakeholder collaborations to address these challenges, and the drive for transitioning to preferred scenarios of living, being and making, means that proximity is emerging as an important consideration in social design and design for sustainability research. This raises the question: what do we need close proximity to, as researchers, as designers and as citizens?