Design and the arts are recognized to expand their fields as research approaches enabling new insights, questions and methods in science and education. Design thinking as well as speculative and participatory design provide approaches between composition, craft and (collaborative) knowledge production. Design thinking is a systematic and at the same time flexible process that can enable volunteer researchers and lay designers to work in transdisciplinary teams taking over a strategic role in citizen science (CS) projects. The author claims the potential of design thinking and likes to inspire further experimentation with creativity and idiosyncrasies as resources for CS and open innovation. The article provides an overview on related approaches and highlights potential benefits to CS based on a literature research and inspired by two workshops – including “Kollaboratives Forschen und Spekulieren – Design thinking für Citizen Scientists” at the occasion of ACSC2023.