Stephanie Sherman

I develop systems, stories, and strategies at the intersection of design, technology, and society. My work operates at the level of environments and genealogies rather than artifacts and interventions, drawing on systems theory, philosophy of technology, and design practice to re-think platforms, automation, and the conditions of contemporary life.

I am Strategy Director at Antikythera, a think tank reorienting planetary computation as a technological, philosophical, and geopolitical force founded at the Berggruen Institute, currently focused on its journal and book series with MIT Press. I am also Course Director of MA Narrative Environments at Central Saint Martins, where I lead a postgraduate program in spatial design and future architectures. My forthcoming book Auto: Fordian Prehistories of Platform Automation is a systems theory of platform automation using Ford and the automobile as its genealogical case. A second book, Earthsuits: A Speculative Genealogy of Wearables, is in development with co-authors Lukáš Likavčan and Rachel Pearl, with Earthsuits R&D projects at CSM supported by LVMH.

Earlier in my career I held research positions at the Center for Design and Geopolitics and the UC San Diego Design Lab Automation Team, taught City Design at the Royal College of Art, and co-founded Common Field, a national infrastructure organization for artist-centered institutions in the United States with founding support from the Warhol Foundation. I founded and ran Elsewhere, a living museum and international residency in North Carolina, for nearly a decade. My PhD in Design is from UC San Diego.

I work with institutions, platforms, foundations, and funders thinking seriously at the intersection of design, technology, and planetary scale. Open to board, advisory, editorial, and speaking engagements.