MakeShift 2026: Registration Now Open

A banner for promoting MakeShift 2026 happening in NYC on 20-21 May with the event logo and organizers listed as Superbloom, Helpful Places and SVA MFA Interaction Design

MakeShift 2026 is just around the corner. Across two days, we’ll bring together designers, technologists, policymakers, academics, and researchers to explore how digital systems shaping public life can become more legible, accountable, and open to intervention.

Hosted by Helpful Places, Superbloom Design, and the MFA Interaction Design program at the School of Visual Arts, MakeShift 2026 will take place May 20–21, 2026, in New York City during NYC Design Week, with support from the U.S. National Science Foundation POSE program.

We’re now sharing a first look at the agenda.

Designing accountability into public systems

As AI and digital infrastructure become more embedded in everyday environments, the question is no longer just what these systems do but how they are understood, governed, and challenged.

MakeShift 2026 is focused on that shift. The program brings together conversations on:

AI and accountability in public contexts
Designing infrastructure, not just interfaces
Frameworks for making systems visible and understandable
How these ideas translate into practice

What to expect

MakeShift 2026 combines plenary sessions, community-led workshops, and a project showcase, creating space to move between discussion and application. The program is still taking shape, with more sessions and contributors to be announced soon. Below is an early snapshot of the agenda.

Plenary sessions

The agenda includes sessions exploring what it means to design accountability into emerging systems:

Building the Accountability Layer for Public AI - A discussion on methods, standards, and the communities these systems serve.
DTPR for AI - How the Digital Trust for Places and Routines framework can be applied to AI systems in public environments.

Workshops

Throughout the event, community-led workshops will explore these questions by sharing approaches, tools, and challenges across civic tech, governance, and design. Among them are:

Co-designing the Algorithm: Participatory Approaches to AI - Reshaping AI systems to foster inclusion, accountability, and meaningful human connection.
SMOL GARDENS: Accountable AI for Civic Tech - Exploring how to build accountable, community-centered AI using small language models and practical impact frameworks.

Project showcase

The program also includes a project showcase and public reception, featuring prototypes, installations, and early-stage ideas. This is a chance to see these concepts being tested in practice and to connect directly with the people building them.

NYC Transit Pulse is a voice-first AI agent that gives New Yorkers real-time subway intelligence — delays, service alerts, elevator outages, and more — through natural conversation.

311 Live is a live, multimodal civic reporting product that reimagines how residents communicate city issues. Instead of filling out static forms, residents can speak naturally while showing a problem through their phone camera.

Unseen Stories is a series of physical and digital interactive installations in Strawberry Fields, Central Park. Visitors lift a vintage telephone to hear archival voices, look through a viewfinder to glimpse the site’s layered past, and take home a wooden coaster that brings the stories back to life when scanned.

Who should attend

MakeShift is for people working across:

Design & UX
Research & academia
Civic tech & public infrastructure
Policy & governance
Digital rights & public-interest technology

If you’re working on how digital systems shape public life or trying to intervene in that process, this is a space to connect and share. Curious to learn more? Register to attend now! https://luma.com/602z282n