Global Impact Challenge

Living with Heat

As rising temperatures become a defining part of our environment, their impact has extended beyond climate alone and reshaped the rhythms of everyday life. This change challenges long-held assumptions about how people interact with their surroundings, and calls for a new approach to design.

The Global Impact Challenge invites 30 multidisciplinary participants-- including designers, engineers, architects, and researchers-- to explore innovative methods for adaptation under extreme heat. Given support from experts and challenge partners, participants will develop early-stage concept solutions, in one of 3B areas, described below: 
●    Buildings – How the built environment responds to extreme heat. 
●    Bodies – How the human body experiences and adapts to heat. 
●    Behaviors – How individuals, communities, and systems respond to heat.

Over the six-day challenge, we will explore how adaptation is a necessary response to climate change. Through cross-disciplinary collaboration, participants will create heat-conscious products, systems, and architectural solutions designed to evolve and adapt—with the goal to enable communities to thrive in an increasingly warming world. Winning teams will continue their journey through an exclusive post-program bootcamp with an external partner, advancing their projects and entrepreneurial skills toward real-world impact.