With a fast population increase and a high housing demand projected to continue in the coming decades, Geneva encounters a profound challenge. Since decades, the city has been spilling over across the national border. Urban growth and land consumption in the Canton and in the French part of the Genevian agglomeration continue to put pressure on settlement areas and to erode agricultural and natural landscapes. The social fabric across the region is increasingly uneven. How can thus designers offer design and planning strategies, not only for the city of Geneva, but for the entire region?

Can design help mediate among different cross-border interests and governance arrangements, to create transboundary solutions? Can it help promote a common vision for the region, beyond the city-centric conceptions, and beyond the national border? And can design and planning respond to the urgency of social and environmental «transitions», facing up to the climate crisis and biodiversity loss?