This year’s Integrated Design Research Conference invites designers, researchers, and educators to engage with The Creative Wave, exploring the fluid and transformative nature of creativity within contemporary design contexts. The conference opens a space to reflect on how creative practice evolves across shifting cultural, technological, and ecological landscapes, and how design continues to move, respond, and reshape itself in times of change. It encourages participants to consider design as a dynamic and evolving force, one that reinterprets traditions, navigates uncertainty, and generates new possibilities. Through this shared exploration, the conference brings together diverse perspectives to examine how creativity informs design research, pedagogy, and practice, while addressing complex challenges and imagining resilient, inclusive, and future-oriented pathways.