A regenerative design and futures practice
Shaping
Africa’s futures.
We work with people, communities, businesses, and institutions to uncover potential, imagine desirable futures for Africa, and design the systems, enterprises, and capabilities that can bring them into being.
01 / Our belief
The future
is not fixed.
Africa’s futures can be actively imagined, designed and built. People and communities should have the freedom, imagination and capability to shape futures of their own.
Our ambition is to expand Africa’s capacity to imagine and build regenerative futures on its own terms. Regeneration strengthens the ability of people, communities and living systems to thrive and renew over time.
What guides the studioExplore how we work with people, place and enterprise
From problems to potential
What could
this place become?
Every place holds knowledge, relationships, creativity and living systems from which different futures can emerge.
We investigate present needs and constraints alongside aspirations, underlying systems, local knowledge and existing capabilities. With the people who know and inhabit the place, we explore what they want to make possible and which changes could help that possibility take shape.
Through strategy, design, transition support and capability programmes, we help governments, development partners, funders and businesses support these designed futures.
Designing what is possible
Build regenerative
alternatives.
We work with people, communities, businesses and institutions to turn desirable futures into practical alternatives, from enterprises and services to programmes and institutional models.
For new and existing enterprises, we connect purpose and potential with practical choices about commercial viability, operations, ownership, governance and financing.
We also address the relationships, skills, institutions and resources that help these alternatives take root and evolve. The aim is to strengthen the capacity of people, places and living systems to thrive over time.
For businesses and funders, this can mean testing demand, designing a route to market or deciding what evidence a pilot must produce before further commitment.
Enterprise and funder briefs
Research and participation
Understand life today.
Shape what comes next.
We begin with people and place: how everyday life works, what people value and what they want to make possible.
Design research and human-centred design help people frame the questions, develop alternatives and test them in practice.
Research within the Refuture Method02 / What you can commission
Four ways to
move the work forward.
Foresight and futures strategy
Imagine and choose a desirable direction.
Horizon scans, scenarios, shared visions and strategy stress tests; desirable directions and choices for action.Systems and regenerative design
Design around the potential of a system.
Design research, co-design, system maps, models and prototypes; enterprise scopes can include demand, pricing, costs and routes to market.Transition strategy and implementation support
Turn a future ambition into action.
Backcasting, transition roadmaps, pilots and implementation support; operating responsibilities, resources, adoption and review points.Futures and systems capability
Build the capability to imagine, make and renew.
Applied programmes and coaching for people, communities, businesses and teams; tools to investigate, imagine, co-design, test and steward alternatives.03 / How we work
Imagine what is possible.
Design how to realise it.
Our method connects research and imagination with practical experiments, shared decisions and the capability to carry the work forward.
- 01
Ground
Research needs and context.
- 02
Imagine
Explore future options.
- 03
Experiment
Test a prototype with people.
- 04
Build
Agree how it will work.
- 05
Steward
Learn from use and adapt.
Research and feedback continue across every move. Return as learning requires.
Equip and Mobilise throughout. We develop capability and organise the people, commitment and resources needed to act. Evidence can reopen any move.
Explore the approachOur current priorities
The futures we want
to help shape.
We work towards desirable African futures, guided by what people, communities, businesses and institutions want to make possible. These six priority areas help focus our attention and make our work tangible. We follow the connections between them and work across topics and sectors, shaping each engagement around its context and desired outcomes.
Explore the wider research agendaHealth Futures
Better health, care and wellbeing that people can access and trust.
Education & Digital Futures
Learning and digital systems that expand people’s capabilities and opportunities.
Livelihoods Futures
Systems that enable people to earn a decent income, do meaningful work and live well.
Energy & Mobility Futures
Reliable, accessible energy and mobility that support everyday life and productive activity.
Food Futures
Food systems that nourish people, strengthen producer livelihoods and regenerate landscapes.
Cities & Societies Futures
Places and institutions that support belonging, participation and a good quality of life.
Across our priorities
Business Futures
Across these priorities, we explore how enterprises can remain viable, create and share value, and strengthen the people and places they depend on.
Explore business futures and enterprise designEach engagement draws on relevant sector expertise, local knowledge and confirmed delivery capacity.
04 / A brief made concrete
What could a regenerative
food system enable?
An illustrative brief shows how future possibilities can become a system inquiry, an enterprise or service concept, and a transition pathway.
Explore Food System FuturesFood System
Futures
Learning through practice
Africa Futures
Fellowship.
Develop a practice in futures-led innovation through six months of design research, foresight and regenerative design. Apply Refuture Africa’s approach to a real question in Food Futures or Health & Wellbeing Futures, and produce rigorous work that informs Africa’s futures and supports decisions and action.
Register interest. Applications open 9 November 2026 at 00:00 Mauritius time (UTC+4). Begins February 2027.
Explore the fellowshipRefuture Africa tools
Make a question
practical.
Eight free tools to understand a place, trace value, design an enterprise, test choices, agree commitments and sustain the work. Each includes guidance, a fillable worksheet and an illustrative worked example.
Explore the tools and resourcesOur shared agenda
Explore the questions that connect our work.
Thirteen connected areas bring focus to research, programmes and partnerships, from food and climate to livelihoods, learning and culture. Begin with a specific question and context.
Visit the Futures Exploration LabBegin with a brief
What would you like to make possible?
Bring a future you want to shape, a system you want to redesign or an enterprise decision you want to test.