Dezeen promotion: 25 designs that offer a range of solutions for improving the lives of refugees living in urban environments have been shortlisted for the first What Design Can Do Refugee Challenge (+ slideshow).
The shortlisted designs were selected from 631 entries and largely focus on offering services and practical products.
25 designs have been shortlisted for the first What Design Can do 2016 refugee challenge, including an app that answers questions frequently asked by refugees
Examples include an app that could help refugees understand their rights in different countries, a ratings system for asylum centres, a photo agency that would help refugees sell their own pictures, and a rapidly deployable temporary home.
What Design Can Do Refugee Challenge leader Dagan Cohen said the entries had offered the jury "few pretty products, plenty of smart services". The online platform and app Refu.rendum by Giacomo Boffo and Oana Clitan gives refugees the possibility to vote on topics related to the camp they're stationed in
"The bulk of entries clearly focus more on ethical and emphatic design and less on aesthetics, demonstrating that service design as a discipline is clearly on the rise," he said.

Related story: "Designers cannot just stand by and watch as the refugee crisis unfolds"

One of the shortlisted designs was voted for by members of the public, via an online platform, on which all the submitted designs can be viewed. The w...