I’m curating a research conference!

Over the last few weeks Clearleft have been teasing out some social media posts about a new 1-day research conference happening in late February 2025. If you’re on their mailing list you’ve likely received an email with the announcement too.

Introducing: Research by the Sea

You might already know about Clearleft’s flagship multi-day conferences UX London and Leading Design. They also host hugely-popular 1-day events; dConstruct, Patterns Day, Responsive Day Out, Ampersand. Not to mention one-off events such as Sofa Conf, retreats, workshops, online and in-person community panels, and the Service Design Breakfast Club hosted at their studio in Brighton.

Research by the Sea is the newest addition to their 1-day events, this time focusing on research.

If you’ve been to UX London before you’ll know that day 1 typically consists of speakers from the research community talking about research. That’s how you can think of Research by the Sea.

There’s a slight difference to the format of this conference though. Firstly, it’ll be hosted it down in Brighton, the home of Clearleft HQ and the newly refurbished Brighton Dome Studio Theatre where the conference will be hosted. Secondly, Research by the Sea is technically 2 days of content; Thursday 27th will be a day of talks and discussion, Friday 28th will be a set of half-day workshops. Separate tickets are available for the the day of talks and each workshop.

At the time of writing Early-bird tickets are still available which gets you ~15% off the final ticket price.

The future of research

The theme for the conference is the future of research, where we’ll be discussing the topics of people, culture and planet.

We’ve invited some of the best thinkers and doers from from in the research space to explore how researchers might respond to today’s most gnarly and pressing problems. They’ll challenge current perspectives, tools, practices and thinking styles, and provide practical steps for getting started today to shape a better tomorrow.

In essence: come to the conference for the ‘you’ of now but also come for the ‘you’ you want to be.

More to come

From now until February I’ll be sharing more about the story behind the conference; my process for curating, the content that has influenced my thinking and why I’ve chosen the speakers.

In the meantime:

• Save the date of 27th and 28th February 2025 for Research by the Sea, Brighton.
• Read more about the first three speakers Priyanca, Tamsin and John on the conference website.
• Grab yourself a ticket.

I really hope to see you there!