• Product - Design - Impact

Prof. Dr. Helge Oder is a trained goldsmith who studied product design at HTW Dresden and earned his doctorate in this field from the Bauhaus University Weimar. Through his design and academic activities, he investigates the significance and uniqueness of design (Entwerfen) in cooperative innovation and development processes. In collaboration with research institutions, such as the Fraunhofer Society, and small to medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), he conducts experimental research and development projects.

At HGK Basel/Masterstudio Design, Helge Oder researched and taught integrative design processes, particularly in the context of sustainable regional development and transformation through design. From 2014 to 2016, he served as a visiting professor for cultural and civilization theory/history of design at HTW Dresden.

His focus on experimental design and aesthetic forms of knowledge serves as a relevant foundation for cooperation and innovation, as well as a fundamental process for interdisciplinary insights. This research into the role of design as a cultural and innovation factor underpins practice-based theoretical development and teaching. His designs have received multiple accolades, including the Lucky Strike Design Award and the Saxon State Prize for Design. Since the winter semester of 2022/23, he has been a professor in the field of "Gestaltung – Produkt – Wirkung" ("Design – Product – Impact") at the Faculty of Design at Augsburg University of Applied Sciences.

Publikationen (ORCID)

Research and Teaching Focus Areas

Within the overarching context of transformation and the development of sustainable and circular economies, textiles constitute a central focus of both research and teaching. This thematic field brings together a diverse range of technological, economic, and ecological dimensions, alongside social, cultural, and societal questions that span both historical and contemporary perspectives. Condensed into a key and representative discourse, the textile context renders complex systemic interrelations both tangible and negotiable.

Building on this foundation, the textile field serves as an expanded laboratory for design-based research—an arena in which not only creative and technical solutions but also cultural and systemic innovations emerge. These approaches are examined with regard to their potential for scaling and transfer within broader structural and systemic transformation processes—extending well beyond the textile domain itself.

Guided by the overarching premise of “local specificity – global sustainability,” the work identifies relevant micro-factors at local and regional scales, explores novel forms of networking among resources and stakeholders through prototypical projects, and systematically analyzes their transferable potential.

In this context, experimental design processes—and the artefacts and prototypes that result from them—function as disruptive elements. They expose unquestioned and increasingly untenable characteristics of established practices and processes, while simultaneously opening up spaces for developing and evaluating alternative perspectives, independent solutions, and new material foundations.

Examples include practices of circular production, frameworks and requirements for the responsible use of artificial intelligence, and the experimental application of local and renewable materials. Moreover, the roles and competencies of both established and emerging actors—as well as the transformative education required to support them—form an integral part of ongoing research and development efforts.

Against the backdrop of current processes of transformation, both fundamental and application-oriented design practices are systematically integrated into teaching and continuously refined through iterative development. The project-based approach serves not only as a didactic principle but also as an epistemic framework for linking research and teaching within the field Design – Product – Impact. It enables a research-driven and reflective engagement with design processes and their cultural, material, and societal implications.