Caring. And Design Research is research group within LUCA School of Arts, Belgium that is dedicated to research in the area of empathy, health and wellbeing, valuing participation and the crossover between research and design education.

What started off around 2008 as a research group dedicated to participation within social spaces, Caring. and Design Research has become the dedicated research group within the research at LUCA School of Arts that is focused on the topic of empathy, health and wellbeing.

One of the pillars of Caring. and Design Research is working together with marginalised communities. In 2011, Andrea Wilkinson and Niels Hendriks began designing together with and for persons with dementia, looking specifically at interfaces and integration into care. What started as an 'interesting challenge' quickly became one of the key focus points within their research; how can tools for people with dementia be designed that meet the demands of individuals, care givers and family members? How can researchers be sensitive to the demands of a healthcare work setting? How can the individual's own lived experience foster into personalisation within a particular design? This research within both design as well as design education led to the creation of the Dementia Lab Conference and Dementia Lab Network. The conference, with its 7th edition in 2024 in Portugal, has become an international go-to location for meeting and hearing state of the art research into the topic of design and demential.

Next to the extensive network in the area of dementia, Caring. and Design Research works across the spectrum of care; from mental heath to working with children on the autism spectrum, to supporting caregivers of individuals with special care needs.