Elena Formia is Full Professor at the Department of Architecture of the Alma Mater Studiorum Università di Bologna, where she is
Director of First Cycle Degree in Industrial Design and the
Second Cycle Degree in Advanced Design.
She is member of the Advanced Design Unit, a research group that investigates the relationships between design cultures, innovation and anticipation through a cross-disciplinary approach. Within this context, she has investigated, in a historical perspective, how ideas of futures were embedded in artefacts and/or in design projects.
As Director of the Design Programmes of the University of Bologna, she has developed new research interests in the field of Future Design in Knowledge Re-activation, investigating Innovation in Design Education as well as Innovation in Education by Design (co-curator of the Symposium FutureDesignEd "Innovation in Design Education - Innovation in Education by Design", 1st ed., Bologna 2017; the Simposium FutureDesignEd "Updating Values", 2nd edition, San Marino, 2020; the Winter School "Design for Responsible Innovation", 2020-2021).
She is among the funding members of the Latin Network for the Development of Design as a Process and she coordinated research and communication activities partially described in the book Innovation in Design Education. Theory, research and processes to and from a Latin perspective (Allemandi 2012). In 2022, she co-curated the 8th edition of the International Forum of Design as a Process "Disrupting Geographies in the Design World", held in Bologna in collaboration with Universidad Catolica de Chile and il Tecnologico de Monterrey (TEC), Mexico.
Since 2021, she is Deputy Editor-in-Chief of "diid Disegno Industriale - Industrial Design" (an open access, peer-reviewed scientific design journal edited by Bononia University Press founded in 2002).
She taught Design Cultures at the Design Degree Courses of the University of Bologna. She held workshops and seminars in national and international universities such as TEC Monterrey, Campus Guadalajara, Mexico and Politecnico di Milano.
She is author of the books Storie e cronache del design (Allemandi 2012 – with Pier Paolo Peruccio), Storie di Futuri e Design (Maggioli 2017), Design e mutazioni. Processi per la trasformazione continua della città (BUP 2021 - with Valentina Gianfrate and Elena Vai) and editor of the books Innovation in Design Education. Theory, research and processes to and from a Latin perspective (Allemandi 2012), Humanities Design Lab. Le culture del progetto e le scienze umane e sociali (Maggioli 2016 – with Manuela Celi), Design per l’innovazione responsabile (Franco Angeli – with Valentina Gianfrate e Laura Succini)
She wrote articles for international scientific journals such as "I+Diseño", "The Art Newspaper", "Strategic Design Research Journal", "Design and Culture", "The International Journal of Critical Cultural Studies", "Journal of Design History", "DIID".
