IDK

'An ongoing exploration of turfu (“the future”).'

With young people from the Paris banlieues, and as part of the Dome Collectif, IDK are exploring what the turfu (or “future” in French slang) holds for La Courneuve, a banlieue which is facing wide-scale demolition.

Using design as a medium and method we are helping these young explorers find new narratives for their spaces. So far, through workshops and creative sessions, the group has produced a self-published fanzine containing speculative projections of objects and buildings from futures of their own making. This first phase of the project culminated in an exhibition to launch the publication at the gallery Libre Service in Pigalle and in an apartment in Le Mail de Fontenay in La Courneuve. A copy of the fanzine was buried in a time capsule in the Parc Georges Valbon to be dug up in 2039.

The emancipatory capacity of design to change conceptions of place is especially powerful in the much-maligned banlieues where these shifts are urgently required and our ongoing collaboration with these young people is opening up tools and experiences that would otherwise remain out of their reach. La Courneuve is just one of the many banlieues surrounding Paris in which people live, work, love and play. These places deserve a more nuanced appreciation – the kind that often flourishes with the perspective of youth.

APT 101
Since 2021, as part of 'Dome Collectif', IDK has had a residency in Apartment 101, Le Mail De Fontenay.
The apartment is one of 300 due to be demolished in 2026 and Dome Collectif have used its vacancy to run cultural events and workshops from within.