Dezeen School Shows: a woven exhibition that seeks to spotlight uncredited labour by women is among the projects from EMMA Creative Centre Pforzheim.

Also featured are knitted garments informed by the milling history of Kouvola, Finland, and artworks exploring a sustainable future.

EMMA Creative Centre Pforzheim

Course: Designers in Residence 2026
Tutors: Melitta Baumeister, Almut Benkert, Anja Kaiser, Luzia Vogt and Charlett Wenig

School statement:

"Every year from April to June, the city of Pforzheim, in cooperation with Pforzheim University of Applied Sciences and the Design Center Baden-Württemberg, invites international young designers to Pforzheim as part of the Designers in Residence scholarship programme.

"Designers in Residence is aimed at young designers from the fields of jewellery, fashion, accessories, industrial and communication design, as well as other design disciplines.

"A total of three scholarship holders are invited to EMMA – Kreativzentrum Pforzheim for a three-month work phase. The results of the scholarship are then presented in an exhibition at EMMA – Kreativzentrum Pforzheim."

Currents by Hanna-Katri Eskelinen

"This installation explores our hidden wishes for an alternative and sustainable future. By balancing the concepts of secret and revelation, the artworks show how our dreams and hopes for an alternative world take physical form upon sharing.

"Building on a collaborative workshop held at the Inselsteg in Pforzheim, the community's ideas and dreams for a better world were turned into ceramic bottles and scrolled drawings.

"The messages hidden inside the bottles can be physically revealed through an interactive illustration, demonstrating how a community can heal through shared imagination.

"Complementing this, the Harmonia-triptych turns inward, toward a world of sleep and dream landscapes. The installation invites us into a space to reach out, connect and preserve meaningfulness toward a future shaped by collective dreams."

Student: Hanna-Katri Eskelinen
Course: Designers in Residence 2026

Goldstadt by Minerva Skyttä

"Knitting offers endless artistic possibilities. The final form of a work is shaped by its structure, materials, tension and finishing techniques.

"Even a small change creates something new. In this exhibition, Minerva Skyttä worked with paper yarn, cotton, wool, pearls and silver chains.

"Wool brings new flexibility to the knitted forms, while pearls and silver chains become part of the knit itself.

"Paper yarn reflects the designer's hometown Kouvola, Finland, where paper mills and industry have shaped the city.

"In Pforzheim, Skyttä wanted to work with pearls and silver chains because the city has a thousand-year history and a long tradition of jewellery-making. She knit jewellery directly into the garments, so it is not only decoration but part of the structure.

"The forms emerge intuitively and are also informed by everyday observations in Pforzheim, including a vintage sports jacket found at a local flea market, whose silhouette became a starting point for several pieces."

Student: Minerva Skyttä
Course: Designers in Residence 2026

World Woven: The Things You Wouldn't Want to Forget by Floor Berkhout

"Everything digital is made out of sequences of two numbers, One and Zero. Today all this data is largely stored invisibly in clouds and datacenters.

"In 1969, the computer that first led humans to land on the Moon, during Apollo 11, stored its navigation software differently; in woven thread.

"This computational weaving technique is called core rope memory. A wire through a magnetic ring stored a one; a wire around it, a zero.

"The software, developed by a team at MIT led by rope mother Margaret Hamilton, was hand-woven by women in factories whose labour went uncredited: their work labelled 'LOL', for Little Old Ladies.

"In core rope memory, the data takes physical space. It can be touched and changed. Unlike our smartphones, it needs no updates or new hardware, and it does not degrade. Neither should the names of the women who developed it.

"This work is a tribute to them and the technique. During the exhibition opening, 26 June 2026, visitors can weave the name of a woman who must not be forgotten, joining a collective memory of memorable women.

"This installation is the third work in a collection called a woven world."

Student: Floor Berkhout
Course: Designers in Residence 2026

Partnership content

This school show is a partnership between Dezeen and EMMA Creative Centre Pforzheim. Find out more about Dezeen partnership content here.