Contemporary architecture and product design is confronted with a rapidly increasing offer of newmaterials and technologies. At the same time a growing consciousness can be observed that someestablished solutions need a fundamental change in regard to sustainability. This paper discusses selfformationas a method for sustainable innovation on the basis of three projects that have been recentlyrealized: A cloud for fresh Snow – a commissioned research lab to produce artificial snow, theproduction of kayaks and the art project Baetsch in the City.A cloud for fresh snow is a collaborative project at the interface of engineering research, economicinnovation and architectural design. As climate is about to change and average temperatures appearto increase most skiing areas invest a lot of money to artificially produce snow to guarantee wintertourism. Hence, the economy of skiing regions strongly dependents on the technology for snowmaking. As the current technology requires a lot of energy and water, fundamentally new approachesare investigated – as done by Michael Bacher, CEO of www.Neuschnee.co.at. In collaboration withWalter Klasz a cloud for fresh snow was developed - an invention, that not only produces perfectpowder snow, but also presents a groundbreaking sustainable design. A self-formed lightweightconstruction provides space in which snowflakes can emerge, form and grow bigger. Compared toclassical technologies only a reduced amount of energy is needed to provide the boundary conditionsfor the creation of a natural cloud, allowing the formation of real ice crystals (dendrites). Theconstruction of the cloud itself is based on bended wood in a self-found equilibrium with minimalsurface membranes. This self-found equilibrium, the self-formation process, can be used as a generaldesign method, which is shown as well in the two other projects presented in this paper.