Capsule Urbane
2026
Design for Care Award
Winner
Collettivo Dora Nova
Designers / Creators / Authors / Leaders
Luca Bianchi, Martina Riva, Giulia Ferrero, Matteo Conti, Johannes Weber
The "Capsule Urbane" project from northern Italy came about as a study that aims to increase the mobility of the increasing number of elderly citizens. While contemporary solutions for electric micro-vehicles are technically well established, this project deliberately moves beyond a conventional “form follows function” approach.
Instead, Capsule Urbane begins with a different question: how can mobility design care for the identity, memories, and cultural spirit of aging users?
The project focuses on the generation commonly referred to as the “Boomers”. They were a generation that shaped post-war European culture through freedom, rebellion, and experimentation. This was the generation that rocked the world. In Italy, this generation grew up with scooters as symbols of independence, alongside the transformative influence of music, cinema, and new social freedoms. Now they are in their late seventies and eighties.
Rather than framing older users through limitations, the design team approaches them as carriers of cultural energy. Capsule Urbane translates this perspective into a mobility concept that speaks to continuity rather than decline.
The design process was led by a group of young designers who immersed themselves in the cultural landscape of the 1960s and 70s—studying music, film, and visual language of the era—to understand the emotional world of the users they are designing for.
The result is a mobility concept that positions ageing not as withdrawal from urban life, but as a continued presence within it—active, expressive, and visible. Capsule Urbane becomes a vehicle not only for movement, but for dignity, recognition, and cultural belonging.
The jury particularly recognizes the project’s contribution to Design for Care by shifting the focus from assistance to affirmation: it does not simply help older citizens move through the city but reaffirms who they are as people who once reshaped it.
