Tobias Luthe
How can we, as systemic designers, cultivate the discernment to know when and how to intervene—or not intervene—in complex systems, and what does it take to befriend uncertainty as part of that navigation?
Systemic design is less a fixed methodology than a navigational practice: a way of orienting within living complexity, discerning when and how to intervene—or when non-intervention is the wisest move. This plenary introduces the Navigational Wheel of Inquiry, a framework developed at ETH Zurich’s Systemic Design Labs in collaboration with the MonViso Institute. The Wheel highlights six interdependent modes of inquiry, from quantitative analysis and visualisation to cultural immersion, participatory practices, and inner development. It supports practitioners in building literacy across methods while cultivating the deeper capacity for organic emergence—the ability to befriend uncertainty and let patterns surface relationally, rather than forcing linear control. The talk will explore how navigating complexity creates arcs of impact that are simultaneously personal and collective, technical and cultural.
This video of this talk shares:
A practical navigation tool (the SD Wheel of Inquiry) for systemic designers, enabling them to orient across multiple modes of inquiry (quantitative, participatory, cultural, embodied, etc.).
A reframing of systemic design from being a problem-solving methodology to a relational practice of discernment and sensemaking, where interventions are contextual, timely, and sometimes best left undone.
An invitation to inner and collective practice, building the capacity for organic emergence—the ability to befriend uncertainty and allow patterns to surface through relational engagement rather than forced control.
Sidenote: This framework forms the basis of the upcoming ETH Zurich Designing Resilient Regenerative Systems (DRRS) MOOC and Certificate of Advanced Studies in Systemic Design, providing open access and executive-level learning pathways for a global community of practitioners.
Sketchnote by Patricia Kambitch | Playthink
PROFILE
Tobias Luthe
Co-Founder, Mon Viso Institute | Professor, AHO & ETH Zurich
Tobias Luthe is an academic transdisciplinary hybrid. He is specifically interested in the boundaries between systems. As in nature, biodiversity is highest where systems meet and overlap; complex challenges require timely, evolving neuronal approaches, and boundaries can be porous integration zones.
He was originally trained as a forest scientist, with majors in environmental economics, wood technology, and passive house design, and in education on sustainability, and a PhD in the socio-ecological resilience of mountain systems to climate change. He is a Professor of sustainability science and regenerative design at The Oslo School of Architecture and Design, Norway, and at ETH Zurich, where he is Program Director of a new professional Master’s degree, Designing Resilient Regenerative Systems.
He is an entrepreneur who co-founded the MonViso Institute and Grown, a design-as-nature lab and experience collective, and has won industry awards for bio-composites.
He is a practising designer with 20 years of experience, including inventing the first hemp bio-composite skis and designing and building the passive net-positive regenerative house, Il Doppio.
Tobias is a mountaineering guide and photographer.
