Biography
Xiaocun Zhu was trained as an architect. Her inclination to see things in context and to search for holistic solutions allowed her to gradually enter the fields of design, sustainability and systems. She earned an BArch & MArch at Southeast University in Nanjing, China, as well as a Master of Design Studies (MDeS) at the Harvard GSD, Boston, USA. She acquired her early teaching and practice experience in China, France and the USA.
In 2003 she joined Tongji University, teaching at the College of Architecture and Urban Planning. She was subsequently active in establishing the College of Design & Innovation, where she acted as team leader of the Environment Design program.
Educating herself and shifting increasingly toward sustainability, her primary teaching and research focus soon lie in aspects such as sustainable rural development, climate friendly design, healthy products, food & processes, regenerative design & value chains, systems design & integrative thinking, open learning & bottom-up enablement, etc.
Xiaocun has been invited as speaker, moderator & visiting professor by various educational institutions, such as Politecnico di Milano, Italy, Central Academy of Fine Arts, China, Lund University, Sweden, Tsinghua University, China, Konstfack University, Sweden, Southeast University, China, etc., as well as by numerous private, corporate and public conferences & enterprises. She has published papers, articles & book chapters both in English and Chinese.
In 2016 Xiaocun moved to Bern, Switzerland, with her son and husband. Since 2022, she also invests her expertise in the Design Management International program at HSLU.
Currently, her focus for research, teaching and student supervision lies on uncovering genuine sustainability in the face of swift environmental changes. She is seeking for processes, transformation and innovation that finally begin to generate ‘more good’ instead of just ‘less bad’. She aims to promote sustainability literacy/ intelligence, environmental stewardship and social innovation, as well as to redefine/reposition designers’ role in the Anthropocene.